:
Price anwyl, pur ei wasanaeth diwyd
Eang ei wybodaeth;
Gwr o aspri, ffri a ffraeth,
A thrwyadl mewn athrawiaeth.
Dear Price, pure in his diligent service
Wide in his knowledge;
A man acerbic, fearless and fluent,
And thorough in doctrine.
]]
Englyn (; plural englynion) is a traditional
Welsh language short
poetry form. It uses quantitative metres, involving the counting of
, and rigid patterns of
rhyme and
half rhyme. Each line contains a repeating pattern of consonants and accent known as
cynghanedd.
Early history
The englyn is found in the work of the earliest attested Welsh poets (the
cynfeirdd), where the main types are the three-line englyn milwr and englyn penfyr.
[Rowland, Jenny, Early Welsh Saga Poetry: A Study and Edition of the Englynion (Cambridge: Brewer, 1990), p. 305.] It is the only set stanzaic metre found in the early Welsh poetic corpus, and explanations for its origins have tended to focus on stanzaic Latin poetry and hymns; however, it is as likely to be a development within the Brittonic poetic tradition.
[Rowland, Jenny, Early Welsh Saga Poetry: A Study and Edition of the Englynion (Cambridge: Brewer, 1990), pp. 305-8.] Whereas the metrical rules of later englynion are clear (and are based on counting syllables), the precise metre of the early englynion is debated and could have involved stress-counting.
[Rowland, Jenny, Early Welsh Saga Poetry: A Study and Edition of the Englynion (Cambridge: Brewer, 1990), pp. 308-32.] The earliest englynion are found as
marginalia written in a tenth-century hand in the Juvencus Manuscript.
[ A Selection of Early Welsh Saga Poems, ed. by Jenny Rowland (London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 2014), p. xxvi.] Many early englynion form poems which seem to represent moments of characters' emotional reflection in stories now lost: Canu Llywarch Hen,
Canu Urien,
Canu Heledd. Others survey heroic tradition, for example the Englynion y Beddau or
Geraint son of Erbin, and others again are lyric, religious meditations and laments such as the famous
Claf Abercuawg and
Kyntaw geir.
Types of englynion
There are a number of types of englynion. Details of their structures are as follows; not all of these, however, are included in the Traditional Welsh poetic metres.
Englyn penfyr
Also known as "the short-ended englyn". It consists of a stanza of three lines. The first line has ten syllables (in two groups of five), the second has five to six; and the third has seven. The seventh, eighth or ninth syllable of the first line introduces the rhyme and this is repeated on the last syllable of the other two lines. The fourth syllable of the second line may echo the final syllable of the first through either rhyme or consonance.
Englyn unodl union
The "straight one-rhymed englyn", identical to englyn penfyr except that it adds a fourth, rhyming, seven-syllable line at the end. Thus it consists of four lines of ten, six, seven and seven syllables. The seventh, eighth or ninth syllable of the first line introduces the rhyme and this is repeated on the last syllable of the other three lines. The part of the first line after the rhyme alliterates with the first part of the second line.
This is an englyn unodl union by Alan Llwyd:
Englyn milwr
The "soldier's englyn". This consists of three seven-syllable lines. All three lines rhyme.
Englyn gwastad
The "even englyn", more common in the Middle Ages than later. This consists of four seven-syllable lines. All four lines rhyme. One example (showing the half-rhyme of -edd with -er) is:
Englyn byr crwca
The "short crooked englyn". This is like englyn penfyr, but orders the lines differently: seven syllables in the first, ten syllables (in two groups of five) in the second, and five to six syllables in the third. In the following example, the second line does not participate in the rhyme:
Englyn unodl crwca
The "crooked one-rhyme englyn". This englyn is like englyn byr crwca, except that it adds an extra seven-syllable line at the beginning. This is made up of four lines of seven, seven, ten and six syllables. The last syllables of the first, second and last lines and the seventh, eighth or ninth syllable of the third line all rhyme.
Englyn cyrch
The "seeking englyn". This form has four lines of seven syllables each. The final syllables of the first, second, and last line rhyme. The final syllable of the third line rhymes with the second, third or fourth syllable of the last line:
Englyn proest dalgron
In this englyn, there are four seven-syllable lines that half-rhyme with each other (half-rhyme means that the final consonants agree).
Englyn lleddfbroest
This is identical to the englyn proest dalgron except that the half rhymes must use the ae, oe, wy, and ei
diphthongs.
Englyn proest cadwynog
The "
chain rhyme englyn". In this version there are four lines of seven syllables. The first and third lines rhyme and the second and fourth half rhyme on the same vowel sound as the full rhyme syllables.
Englyn proest cyfnewidiog
The "reciprocal half-rhyme englyn". This has four lines of seven syllables. All four lines half-rhyme, and there is additional cynghanedd.
Englyn toddaid
This is a hybrid between an englyn and a toddaid. The first two lines are as for an englyn, and there follow two more lines of ten syllables each.
Englyn cil-dwrn
After the first two lines there is just one more line of three syllables or fewer, which follows the rhyme of the first two lines.
Examples
Here are two englynion by the 12th-century Welsh poet italic=no:
The poet Robert Graves wrote an englyn in English, included in the Juvinalia (1910–1914) of his Complete Poems
Here is an English-language englyn by novelist Robertson Davies.
Grace in the form of an englyn (with cynghanedd shown) in a poem by W. D. Williams:
Breton
Bretons poet Padrig an Habask also writes
Breton language englynion; in 2020, he has published a collection of them called Lampreiz. (http://brezhoneg.org/en/node/11057)
See also
