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The Brut Chronicle, also known as the Prose Brut, is the collective name of a number of medieval chronicles of the history of England. The original Prose Brut was written in Anglo-Norman; it was subsequently translated into Latin and English. The chronicle begins England’s history with the mythological founding of Britain by Brutus of Troy, named “Brut” in French and English; Brutus is the legendary great-grandson of Aeneas and his founding of Britain thus links that country to the grand history of Troy. […]

Originally a legendary chronicle written in Anglo-Norman in the thirteenth century (identified by the fact that some existing copies finish in 1272), the Brut described the settling of England by Brutus of Troy, son of Aeneas, and the reign of the Welsh Cadwalader.[7] In this, it was itself based on Geoffrey of Monmouth’s text from the previous century.[8] It also covered the reigns of many kings later the subject of legend, including King Cole, King Leir (the subject of Shakespeare’s play, King Lear), and King Arthur, and exists in both abridged and long versions.[7] Early versions describe the country as being divided, both culturally and politically, by the River Humber, with the southern half described as “this side of the Humber” and “the better part”.[9] Having been written at a time of division between crown and nobility, it was “baronial in its sympathies”.[10]

Source: Brut Chronicle – Wikipedia

Scota, in Scottish mythology, and pseudohistory, is the name given to the mythological daughter of an Egyptian Pharaoh to whom the Gaels and Scots traced their ancestry. Scota first appeared in literature from the 11th or 12th century and most modern scholars interpret the legends surrounding her to have emerged to rival Geoffrey of Monmouth’s claims that the descendants of Brutus (through Albanactus) founded Scotland.[5][6] However some early Irish sources also refer to the Scota legends and not all scholars regard the legends as fabrications or as political constructions.[7] In the Scottish origin myths, Albanactus had little place and Scottish chroniclers (e.g., John of Fordun and Walter Bower) claimed that Scota was the eponymous founder of Scotland and the Scots long before Albanactus, during the time of Moses.

Source: List of legendary kings of Britain – Wikipedia

A petrosomatoglyph is a supposed image of parts of a human or animal body in rock. They occur all over the world, often functioning as an important form of symbolism, used in religious and secular ceremonies, such as the crowning of kings. Some are regarded as artefacts linked to saints or culture heroes.

Source: Petrosomatoglyph – Wikipedia

Prydain is the medieval Welsh term for the island of Britain (the name Albion was not used by the Welsh). More specifically, Prydain may refer to the Brittonic parts of the island; that is, the parts south of Caledonia. This distinction appears to derive from Roman times, when the island was divided into Roman Britain to the south and the land of the Caledonians to the North. The peoples north of the Roman borders eventually came to be known as the Picts (Welsh: Brithwyr); the Welsh term for Pictland was Prydyn, which caused some confusion in the texts with Prydain.

Source: Prydain – Wikipedia

Sometimes described as taking the form of a crocodile, giant beaver or dwarf, it is also said to be a demonic creature. The afanc was said to attack and devour anyone who entered its waters.

Various versions of the tale are known to have existed. Iolo Morganwg, who revived Welsh bardic traditions during the 18th and 19th centuries, popularised a version of the myth that had Hu Gadarn’s two long-horned oxen drag the afanc from the lake, enabling it to be killed. An earlier variation on this had the oxen cast the afanc into Llyn Ffynnon Las (lake of the blue fountain), where it was unable to breach its rocky banks to escape.

In one telling the wild thrashings of the afanc caused flooding which drowned all the people of Britain, save two, Dwyfan and Dwyfach. Another has a maiden who tamed the afanc by letting it sleep in her lap, which allowed her fellow villagers to capture it. When the afanc awoke its struggles crushed the maiden.

Later legends had King Arthur or Peredur slaying the monster. Near Llyn Barfog is a rock with a hoof print carved into it, along with the words Carn March Arthur (stone of Arthur’s horse), supposedly made when his steed, Llamrai, dragged the afanc from the deep.

The afanc has been variously known as the addanc, adanc, addane, avanc, abhac and abac. Several sites lay claim to its domain, among them Llyn Llion, Llyn Barfog ad Llyn-yr-Afanc (the Afanc Pool), a lake in Betws-y-Coed.

Source: Dwyfan and Dwyfach – Wikipedia

Dwyfan and Dwyfach, sometimes also called Dwyvan and Dwyvach, in Welsh mythology, were the equivalents of Noah or Deucalion who take their names from small rivers, as told in a flood legend from the Welsh Triads.[1] A great flood was caused by the monster Afanc, who dwelt in Llyn Llion (possibly Bala Lake).[1] All humans were drowned except Dwyfan and Dwyfach, who escaped in a mastless boat. They built an imposing ship (or ark) called Nefyd Naf Neifion, on which they carried two of every living kind.[1] From Dwyfan and Dwyfach all of the island of Prydain (Britain) was repeopled.[1] Dwyfach appears to take her name from the small Dwyfach (Welsh: little Dwy) River of Gwynedd (until 2018, Caernarvonshire) that flows into Cardigan Bay; Dwyfan would then derive from the river it enters, the Dwyfawr or Dwyfor (Welsh: great Dwy).[1]

Source: Dwyfan and Dwyfach – Wikipedia

As the convoy cruised along, rowers rowing, Benda and Greppo the First King looked ahead off to the sea in the direction of Buorth. The Lost Direction was found again, thanks to an unlikely hero, Tob Gobble, and his reed flute.

A subtle silvery stream of water seemed to flow just beneath the surface of the vast ocean, and the prow of their ship clove to it. Neither man spoke, each filled with his own thoughts. Benda’s were of the tragic loss to Quatria which he knew in his heart was destined to come, and that he in his returning to Kremel had propelled that ruin into existence. Greppo’s was solely focused on the gains in wealth and majesty to himself, his kingdom and all of Kremel which were to surely come. He felt great pride too, for re-opening the way, the way of his ancestors – for he too traced his line of descent from Embatet, the magical son of Omouna, who had been expelled from the Far Blessed Lands. For each, then, it was a kind of sacred home-coming, though the meaning inverted one to the other.

As Benda stood in contemplation of his predicament, and what he ought to do, he thought he heard a small voice speak from nowhere. He turned around, but the decks were clear on his ship. He looked back to the next, and though he saw activity there, discerned no probable source of voice, none who had spoken to him, as if just near at hand – or within?

“Papa!” he heard the voice now clearly ringing, as of a bell in his heart. And he knew it at once, as though his own. “Sol?” he said aloud, and turned around again in wonder. No one was there still, but as the chained-together ships swayed and lumbered under oar, he saw a ways off on the deck of the third ship the sable golek Machef, along with his wife Lualla, and his young son Sol.

“We are with you,” the voice of Machef spoke now in his heart. “You need suffer no more in loneliness.”

On the channels of light which connected them, the golek mindspeaker acted as a lightwell, a kind of transceiver. It happened with some regularity that non-mindspeaker listeners who often received from mindspeakers would have these internal ports temporarily or permanently opened on account of the purity and intensity of this manner of communication. And they would learn to feed back into the lightways, replying in like manner. This had not yet happened between Benda and Machef naturally, but it was on the verge of becoming. Machef simply pushed the door open the rest of the way, stepped back, and acted as bridge and repeater to connect to Lualla and Sol.

Sol, a child, took to it naturally, not knowing that among his people, mindspeaking had retreated to being only the province of beasts, and magicians, and madmen. Lualla, however, this being her first such experience, was much more fearful and tentative. She could listen, but she could not speak thus. Benda, whose heart was near to overflowing, however spoke for all of them, and he did in not words, but brilliant pictures.

He sent them along the lightways the fullness of his experience since he had left them that day outside Cananxus village for what should have been a three hour fishing tour. It had been a day like any other, but which lead him by the hand of fate instead to a storm-at-sea, and then to those far shores. He showed them the fear he felt and then all the joy and happiness he’d found in the welcome of the peoples of Quatria. He showed them how he had given it all up to return to the two of them, his family – the one true source of all joy, without which he knew, no matter how rich the country, or beautiful the people, he would surely languish and die.

Lualla wept, and Sol listened and watched in the shared chambers of their hearts in rapturous wonder.

Benda showed them the island of Ovarion, which had been promised to him before his departure by the High Augur, a bright shining green and white jewel in the sea to the west of Quatria, on the cusp of the Houses of Song and Silence. And he showed them the strong but humble house he vowed to build them there, once things had been put to rights. It was a dream of his, an inward vision which he had always dwelt on but had not yet named. But the name welled up spontaneously in his heart, calling itself in the Quatrian tongue, Tantathawe. He shared it with them as his vow, a testament, a promise. Despite their fear, and the losses they had and would still have to endure, all would be made whole again at a higher level in Tantathawe.

Just then, the sky darkened, and out of it stooped the eagle Murta, landing heavily on deck of the first ship, to report to Greppo. Machef let the canals of light connecting himself and the others to Benda go dark and silent once more.

“The winds are upon us, my lord. We have reached Tetharys.”

It was then the storms began in earnest.

On the fifth day, three stout ships set sail from the Bay of the Kremel. In the first ship embarked Consciolus Greppo, who claimed this position by right as First King of Kremel. With him were certain of his retainers and Benda, who it was believed was the Keyholder of the Gate of Song and the way back to Quatria. In the following ship were Murta and Martis Ovnis, the Third and Fourth Kings and their retainers. And in the third ship were Mergolech, the Second King, and Eradus, the Fifth, and their retainers. With them traveled Benda’s wife Lualla and Sol – as proteges of Mergolech – along with the sable golek Machef, and none other than Tob Gobble.

Following what Greppo said were instructions encoded in the Scroll of Omouna, they went under sail three days to the east, until they were in deep ocean, and far from any sight of land. Thick chains held fast the ships in a column, so that they would not be separated, and they traveled without incident until they reached the doldrums where no winds blew.

Once there, Greppo ordered the sails furled, and the rowers to their stations. Each ship held forty rowers, hardy men-at-arms, who upon landing on those far shores would form their advance guard as the invaders established a beachhead on one of the outer islands of Quatria below the Bay of Erasure. Mergolech, however, as the King of the Fishers, was then called upon as he was the only one among them who was thought to know which way was Buorthus, the Lost Direction. According to the legends of his people, it was an ancient fifth direction which was neither north nor south, east nor west, nor any combination of them. Greppo signaled from the lead ship, and awaited Mergolech’s reply as to what direction they should row in.

Benda meanwhile searched within his heart, and realized he truly did not know the way. A storm-at-sea had carried him there and back. He was filled with fear and sorrow, however, that the way would be discovered, and that because of him, unarmed and peaceful Quatria would surely fall to this force of only a little over a hundred men-at-arms.

Murta, as eagle, leapt into the air and circled high above them, looking for clues to the Lost Direction.

Tob Gobble, who had been uncharacteristically silent nearly the whole trip, except to run and play below decks with young Sol, said to Mergolech, “Sire, the Great River, upon which I traveled here, is said to connect all the Wide Lands and the Thousand Seas. Would that we could find its current even here, surely it would take us to Tetharys and beyond.”

“Tell me then the way, gentle Tob,” said Mergolech kindly. “For I see it not. To me, it remains but a legend.”

“Better then, perhaps,” said Eradus behind him, “that it remain that way. Turn us back, and this future can still be averted.”

Tob, meanwhile, had produced from his sack, the reed flute upon which he had often played before, but which had been silent since leaving the Citadel. His heart was heavy too, but he put it to his lips, and he played. Unlike his normal feisty and painfully out of tune airs, he blew for them then a sad song, sweet and sorrowful. It was a simple tune of only a few notes repeating in a piteous plaintive pattern. Though not loudly played, the sound of it wafted amongst the three ships, so that all could hear. And Murta as eagle descended upon hearing it from the upper airs, landed on the second ship, and became again a man. “I have seen the way,” he said, shouting across the decks so the others could hear him.

“As have I,” said Mergolech loudly, and he pointed in a direction which was – to all of their surprise – neither north nor south, east, nor west, nor any combination of them, but was something wholly… other. They all saw it then, and understood, that though normally it lay hidden to their eyes, it was always close at hand. They wondered how they had never seen it before.

Tob stopped playing, and put away his flute. Greppo ordered the rowers to turn about in all three ships, and manuevering with dexterity, they did so. As they came to, a thin stream, as of a silver flowing filament, revealed itself just below the water’s surface, and they struck to this course, onward to Tetharys and the Gate of Song.

Cantabria has archaeological sites from the Upper Paleolithic period, although the first signs of human occupation date from the Lower Paleolithic. The most significant site for cave paintings is that in the cave of Altamira, dating from about 37,000 BC[8] and declared, along with nine other Cantabrian caves, as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO. […]

There is a heavy presence of fabulous beings of giant proportions and Cyclopean features (the ojáncanos), fantastic animals (culebres, caballucos del diablu (lit. horses of the devil, damselflies), ramidrejus, etc.), færies (anjanas, ijanas of Aras), duendes (nuberos, ventolines, trentis, trasgus, trastolillos, musgosu, tentiruju), anthropomorphic characters (the sirenuca (little mermaid), the fish-man, the cuegle, the wife-bear of Andara, the guajona), etc.

Source: Cantabria – Wikipedia

Sentimental ballads had their origins in the early Tin Pan Alley music industry of the later 19th century.[5] Initially known as “tear-jerkers” or “drawing-room ballads”, they were generally sentimental, narrative, strophic songs published separately or as part of an opera, descendants perhaps of broadside ballads. As new genres of music began to emerge in the early 20th century, their popularity faded, but the association with sentimentality led to the term ballad being used for a slow love song from the 1950s onwards.[6]

Source: Sentimental ballad – Wikipedia