What Are Welsh Folk Tales?

Welsh folk tales are stories that have been handed down through the generations among the Welsh people. Throughout history people of all cultures have found ways to pass down lessons and stories from their ways of life to younger generations. Through various verbal and visual means, groups of people have worked to guarantee that their life, past and present, is not forgotten in the future. One of the most common ways of transmitting such stories is through the telling of folk tales, which are generally anonymous, timeless, and placeless tales circulated orally among a people. The Welsh folk tales are no exception. Often these tales are eventually written down in efforts to preserve and circulate them among wider audiences.

The first known use of the term folk tale dates back only to 1852, although, many of these stories have been around for hundreds of years.  Such stories can be found from cultures around the world, and the Welsh culture is no exception to this. 

• Wales, along with Scotland and England, is part of Great Britain, which, along with Northern Ireland, comprises the United Kingdom. 
• Bordered by England to the east and water to the north, west, and south, the history of Wales is a story of its people’s struggle for self-preservation. 
• This struggle to preserve their land, language, and culture has made its way into the country’s folk tales, many of which tell of wars and battles, kings and dragons, knights and ladies, of magic and fairies. 
• King Arthur is thought to have been based in Wales and, by the 12th century, tales of his adventures that originated among the Welsh people had made their way into France, England, and Germany. 
• These tales of chivalry and romance continue to be told and studied as historically important pieces of literature even today.

Famous Welsh Folk Tales

One of the most famous collections of Welsh tales is the Mabinogion, a body of work that was translated from Welsh into English by English businesswoman and translator Lady Charlotte Guest. 

• Between 1838 and 1849, these stories were published in several volumes, with the first volumes telling the tales of King Arthur and other volumes telling Welsh romances. 
• The stories in the Mabinogion are thought to have been written down in Welsh in the 11th century, and based on tales that had been passed down verbally from a much earlier time, as the characters are from early Celtic mythology. 
• The title Mabinogion comes from a word that originally meant “boyhood,” then later meant a tale of a hero’s boyhood or a tale in general.
• The texts are found in the "White Book of Rhyderch" and the “Red Book of Hergest.” 
• Though she was not Welsh herself, Lady Charlotte is known for her role in reviving and preserving Welsh culture.

Tales of King Arthur and his defeats of the Saxons as they tried to take over Wales are part of Welsh folklore. Other tales include such titles as “A Boy That Visited a Fairyland,” “The Welshery and the Normans,” “The Maiden of the GreenForest,” and “King Arthur’s Cave.”

So, now you know about Welsh folk tales as more details about the Welsh culture and why folk tales took the form they did in Wales.