Mabinogion - Name

Name

The name first appears in 1795 in William Owen Pughe's Cambrian Register: "The Mabinogion, or Juvenile Amusements, being Ancient Welsh Romances." It was then adopted as the title by the first English translator of the complete tales, Lady Charlotte Guest. The form mabynnogyon does indeed occur at the end of the first of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi, but it is now generally agreed that this is a scribal error that was assumed to be the plural of the Welsh word mabinogi, which occurs correctly at the end of the remaining three branches. The word mabinogi itself is something of a puzzle, although it is ultimately related to the Welsh mab, which means "son, boy". Professor Eric P. Hamp, however, suggests that mabinogi derives from the name of the Celtic deity Maponos ("the Divine Son"), and originally referred to materials pertaining to that god. Strictly speaking, "Mabinogi" applies only to the Four Branches (see below), which are speculated to have derived from older tradition. Each of these four tales ends with a colophon meaning "thus ends this branch of the Mabinogi" (in various spellings), hence the name.