I. That we have throughout Europe, at an early period, a great body of
literature, known as Mediæval Romance, which, amidst much that is wholly
of Teutonic origin and character, includes certain well-marked traces of
an older Celtic nucleus.
II. Proceeding backwards in time, we find these romances, their
ornaments falling away at each step, existing towards the twelfth
century, of simpler structure, and with less encumbered Celtic features,
in the works of Wace, and other Bards of the Langue d’Oil.
III. We find that Geoffrey of Monmouth, Layamon, and other early British
and Anglo-Saxon historians, and minstrels, on the one hand, transmitted
to Europe the rudiments of its after romance, much of which, on the other
hand, they drew from Wales.
IV. Crossing into Wales we find, in the Mabinogion, the evident
counterpart of the Celtic portion of the continental romance, mixed up,
indeed, with various reflex additions from beyond the border, but still
containing ample internal evidence of a Welsh original.
V. Looking at the connexion between divers of the more ancient
Mabinogion, and the topographical nomenclature of part of the country, we
find evidence of the great, though indefinite, antiquity of these tales,
and of an origin, which, if not indigenous, is certainly derived from no
European nation.
It was with a general belief in some of these conclusions, that I
commenced my labours, and I end them with my impressions strongly
confirmed. The subject is one not unworthy of the talents of a Llwyd or
a Prichard. It might, I think, be shown, by pursuing the inquiry, that
the Cymric nation is not only, as Dr. Prichard has proved it to be, an
early offshoot of the Indo-European family, and a people of unmixed
descent, but that when driven out of their conquests by the later
nations, the names and exploits of their heroes, and the compositions of
their bards, spread far and wide among the invaders, and affected
intimately their tastes and literature for many centuries, and that it
has strong claims to be considered the cradle of European Romance.