Tudalen:Holl Waith Barddonol Goronwy Owen.djvu/138

Prawfddarllenwyd y dudalen hon

Gesyd ei gorn, mingorn mawr;
Corn anfeidrol ei ddolef,
Corn[1] ffraeth o saerniaeth nef.
Dychleim, o nerth ei gerth gân,
Byd refedd,[2] a'i bedryfan;
Pob cnawd, o'i heng, a drenga,
Y byd yn ddybryd ydd â;
Gloes oerddu'n neutu natur,
Daear a hyllt, gorwyllt gur!
Pob creiglethr, crog, a ogwymp,[3]
Pob gallt[4] a gorallt a gwymp

  1. So Homer calls his Hero's Armour, and Virgil that of Eneas, and as there are manifest traces of the Hebrew idiom in the Works of the Greek Poets, it is not likely (notwithstanding the rest of the fable) that this way of speaking was borrowed of the Hebrews, who when they would represent a thing as superlatively great or excellent, usually join to it one of the names of God, El, Elohim, or Iah. The mountains of God (El.) in our English Bibles, Great Mountains, in the Welsh, mynyddoedd cedyrn, SALM xxxvi. 6, GEN. xxx. 8. The wrestlings of God (Elohim) or great wrestlings in the Welsh, ymdrechiadau gorchestol, and in SOLOMON'S SONG, viii. 6. The flame of God (Iah) or a most vehement flame in Welsh, fflam angherddol. See SALM lxxx, 10.
  2. Dr. Davies says, that rhefedd is the same as rheufedd, riches; but erroneously, for rhefedd is formed of rhef, as teredd is of tew, and both signifying the same thing, viz. thickness.
  3. Ogwymp, from gognympo; the Welsh tongue is remarkable for these compounds, of which there are two in this couplet that make a pretty opposition, one upon the verb, and the other upon the noun, and which are great helps in poetry.
  4. Gallt, in North Wales, signifies a steep hill, and in South Wales, a coppice of wood; but in South Wales they throw off the G, and pronounce it allt, in the plural eltydd
    Af yn wyllt o fewn elltydd;
    I eiste' rhwng clustiau'r hydd,
    says Lewis Glyn Cothi, an officer under Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, when he was forced to wander from place to place.