Hi
Dydd Santes Dwynwen Hapus/Happy St Dwynwen Day.
Well, the young lovers within the western world will shortly be celebrating St Valentine’s Day (February 14th), which originated as a Pagan celebration, before Christianity purloined it from the Pagans. However, here in Cymru/Wales we have already celebrated our lover’s day, St Dwynwen’s Day, which falls on January 25th, and its origin is not Pagan, it is a Welsh Christian celebration for lovers from the 5th-century CE. Princess Dwynwen (means “Pure White Wave or White Wave” from Dôn/Wave, and (g)wyn or wen/White/Pure) is the Welsh patron saint of lovers. Dwynwen’s day was popular in Britain a millennium before Valentin’s Day became popular in Chaucer’s Engelond in the 14th-15th-century.
Dwynwen lived during the 5th-century and legend has it that she was one of the prettiest of the 24 daughters of Brychan, king of Brycheiniog (today Bannau Brycheiniog). Dwynwen fell in love with a prince/nobleman from the north called Maelon Dyfodrull, but unfortunately, her father had already arranged that she should marry someone else.
Dwynwen was so upset that she could not marry Maelon that she begged God to make her forget him. After falling asleep, Dwynwen was visited by an angel, who appeared carrying a sweet potion designed to erase all memory of Maelon and turn him into a block of ice.
God then gave three wishes to Dwynwen. Her first wish was that Maelon be thawed; her second that God meet the hopes and dreams of true lovers; and third, that she should never marry. All three were fulfilled, and as a mark of her thanks, Dwynwen devoted herself to God’s service for the rest of her life.
She founded a convent on Ynys Llanddwyn (Island), off the west coast of Anglesey, where a well named after her became a place of pilgrimage after her death in AD 465.
For those who would like more information, see links.
My grandfather on Dydd Santes Dwynwen/St Dwynwen Day, gave my Grandmother a Welsh love spoon he hand-carved from a log, which is tradition on this day, and the spoon is still in my family’s possession today.
What do you say?
Cofion
R&I ~ MJM
https://breakingnewsandreligion.online/discuss/
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