The Mabinogion · 12 of 192 · tr. Lady Charlotte Guest
Tale THE LADY OF THE FOUNTAINg
And as long as thou concealest it, it will conceal thee.
When they have consulted together, they will come forth to fetch thee, in order to put thee to death; and they will be much grieved that they cannot find thee.
And I will await thee on the horseblock yonder; and thou wilt be able to see me, though I cannot see thee; therefore come and place thy hand upon my shoulder, that I may know that thou art near me.
And by the way that I go hence, do thou accompany me.” Then she went away from Owain, and he did all that the maiden had told him.
And the people of the Castle came to seek Owain, to put him to death, and when they found nothing but the half of his horse, they were sorely grieved.
And Owain vanished from among them, and went to the maiden, and placed his hand upon her shoulder; whereupon she set off, and Owain followed her, until they came to the door of a large and beautiful chamber, and the maiden opened it, and they went in, and closed the door.
And Owain looked around the chamber, and behold there was not even a single nail in it that was not painted with gorgeous colours; and there was not a single panel that had not sundry images in gold portrayed upon it.
The maiden kindled a fire, and took water in a silver bowl, and put a towel of white linen on her shoulder, and gave Owain water to wash.
Then she placed before him a silver table, inlaid with gold; upon which was a cloth of yellow linen; and she brought him food.
And of a truth, Owain had never seen any kind of meat that was not there in abundance, but it was better cooked there than he had ever found it in any other place.
Nor did he ever see so excellent a display of meat and drink, as there.
And there was not one vessel from which he was served, that was not of gold or of silver.
And Owain ate and drank, until late in the afternoon, when lo, they heard a mighty clamour in the Castle; and Owain asked the maiden what that outcry was.
“They are administering extreme unction,” said she, “to the Nobleman who owns the Castle.” And Owain went to sleep.
The couch which the maiden had prepared for him was meet for Arthur himself; it was of scarlet, and fur, and satin, and sendal, and fine linen.
In the middle of the night they heard a woful outcry.
“What outcry again is this?” said Owain.
“The Nobleman who owned the Castle is now dead,” said the maiden.
And a little after daybreak, they heard an exceeding loud clamour and wailing.
And Owain asked the maiden what was the cause of it.
“They are bearing to the church the body of the Nobleman who owned the Castle.” And Owain rose up, and clothed himself, and opened a window of the chamber, and looked towards the Castle; and he could see neither the bounds, nor the extent of the hosts that filled the streets.
And they were fully armed; and a vast number of women were with them, both on horseback and on foot; and all the ecclesiastics in the city, singing.
And it seemed to Owain that the sky resounded with the vehemence of their cries, and with the noise of the trumpets, and with the singing of the ecclesiastics.
In the midst of the throng, he beheld the bier, over which was a veil of white linen; and wax tapers were burning beside and around it, and none that supported the bier was lower in rank than a powerful Baron.
Never did Owain see an assemblage so gorgeous with satin, and silk, and sendal.
Themes
◆Ancestor Venerationpraxis
Ritual maintenance of relationship with the dead as ongoing presences whose favour is cultivated and whose offence is propitiated. Shinto uji-gami and obon, Norse disir and the alfablot, Celtic samhain and the feast for the deceased, Roman lares and parentalia, Chinese ancestor rites, Vedic śrāddha. Practice-coded rather than belief-coded: distinct from soul_migration (cosmological doctrine of soul-transmigration) and theosis_deification (deification trajectory); ancestor_veneration centres the living's ongoing ritual obligation to the dead.
The detailed description of the funeral procession and extreme unction highlights the cultural importance of rites for the dead.
The doctrine and worldview that natural phenomena, places, and objects possess inherent spirit, soul, or personality — and that the cosmos is populated by countless local, plural, embodied divine agents: kami in mountain and tree, sidhe in cairn and well, landwights in field and stone, nymphs in spring and grove, haltija in forest and lake, lares and penates in household and threshold, Iamblichean daemons in element and place. Distinct from monotheism (single transcendent God), pantheism (one underlying substance), and emanation_hierarchy (cascading single source); animism's signature is the plurality, locality, and embodied-in-landscape character of the divine.
The Lady of the Fountain functions as a supernatural spirit tied to a specific landscape feature, consistent with the definition's examples of nymphs in springs or local divine agents.
The doctrine and practice that spoken or sung word carries causal-magical force — that uttering names, formulas, songs, or incantations alters reality directly rather than merely communicating about it. Vainamoinen's runo-songs that move mountains and command iron, Norse galdr, Vedic mantra, Shinto kotodama, the magician's barbarous names in the Greek Magical Papyri, Iamblichean arcane signatures and inexplicable symbols, biblical creation-by-word. Distinct from sacred_names (the ontological power of names themselves) and prayer (address to the divine); word_power_incantation is the magical-causal efficacy of the spoken word as such.
The instruction 'as long as thou concealest it, it will conceal thee' operates as a magical formula that directly governs the efficacy of reality.