Caer Troiau

{67}

CAER TROIAU.

To James Evans, Esq. Secretary of the Cymmrodorion.

Dear Sir,—It being among the leading objects of the Institution to record the memorials of the ancient customs of Wales, or whatever may tend to their illustration, permit me to trouble you to present to its consideration the following facts and remarks

on the

CAER TROIAU and TROY WALLS.

The forming of the maze called Caer Troiau is a very common amusement in Wales. On the fine mountain-turf a level spot is selected, whereon the boys cut this figure with their knives, and sometimes it is made sufficiently spacious to admit their walking along its intricate windings. The manner of planning it is traditionally preserved among them; and which is, first, by marking out a central square, with a semicircle in each angle, and a point in the middle of every semicircle, and, lastly, by drawing lines round, beginning at any point of the cross, and proceeding to the nearest point of the adjoining semicircle, and then connecting all the other points by similar lines in succession.

The same figure is, also, familiarly known to school-boys over England generally, under the appellation of Troy Walls; and we find it among the various labyrinths which adorn old books of gardening, but with its revolutions changed from circles into squares.

What renders the operation here described, as practised in Wales, deserving of more particular attention is the name given to it, which is—Tori llun Caer Troiau. The meaning of every word in this phrase is perfectly understood by all persons speaking the Welsh tongue; nevertheless, the impression upon my mind, as upon the minds of those with whom I used to co-operate, when a boy, was that the Walls of Troy were thus represented; and the literal import of the words “Tori llun Caer Troiau,”—Cutting the form of the Citadel of Turnings,—was not at all thought of.

At what period this amusement originated in Wales, and whether it was from thence introduced among the English, or the contrary, would be, perhaps, difficult to determine. It might have {68} been an ancient mythological emblem preserved by the Cymry, unconnected with the introduction of the various stories concerning Troy into Wales; and, in such a case, those who practised it, could have given it no other signification than was conveyed, abstractedly, by the words Caer Troiau, or The Citadel of Turnings. Should it have been so preserved by the Cymry, from high antiquity, we might then pronounce it to have been an hieroglyphical representation of the orbits of the planets in the solar system, and invented among those nations that paid adoration to the host of heaven.

By whomsoever invented, the figure of the Caer Troiau, or labyrinth, is of the highest antiquity; for we find it introduced as an emblematical ornament on the temple of Theseus, at Athens, erected about five hundred years prior to the Christian era; and it is also to be seen on several Greek coins; but, more particularly, on those of Crete, wherein was raised the principal structure representing this emblem, and which bore the appellation of the Cnosian Labyrinth, or the Labyrinth of Minos, and whence, doubtless, the whole island came also to be called Cnosus and Gnosus.

And as the Caer Troiau of the Cymry was exactly delineated on the coins of Greece, a copy of one of them will serve to illustrate its form, as it is at the present time cut on the mountains of Wales. A print of the coin selected for the purpose is given by Chishull, in his “Antiquates Asiaticæ,” under the section of Monumenta Teia, page 127, and he refers to the original, as being in the collection of the Duke of Devonshire. This author describes the coin as having, on one side, the prison of the celebrated Minos, with the word ΚΝΩΣΙΩΝ, or labyrinth; and, singularly, on the other side is delineated, not Apollo, as is usually seen, but, agreeably to the forms of democratic cities, a female head, as the collective head of the people, with the epithet ΠΟΛΧΟΣ impressed,—a word probably of the same origin as the Italian Volgo, and the Teutonic Volck, or Folk.

Having thus laid before the Institution an exact model of the Caer Troiau, as cut on the mountains of Wales, delineated on a Greek coin upwards of two thousand years old, I take the liberty, in the next place, of offering some hints which may be conducive towards corroborating the idea, before suggested, of this maze being originally designed for an emblem of the solar system.

{69} But here it may be proper to bring to our recollection that the Welsh tongue preserves a great body of primitive words, in common with the Hebrew, Arabic, Greek, and other ancient languages, and identified as agreeing in sound and signification; and, that being demonstrated, it might not be presumptuous to assert that the Welsh may also have retained the meaning of many other words which might be sought for in vain elsewhere.

Proofs have been adduced by Bryant, in his Mythology, of there having been anciently several towns bearing the name of Troy; and both he and De Gebelin, with others, say, that such places were so denominated as being, like Heliopolis, distinguished resorts for the adoration of the host of heaven.

Very conclusive reasons are given by De Gebelin, as well as by others, that the fable of the Seven Kings of Troy designated the seven as regents of the days of the week; and that Priam’s reign of fifty-two years, with his fifty daughters, represented the year and its subdivisions; as, also, did Ourchol, or Hercules, with his twelve labours, designate the year divided into months.

The fable of the seven noble Athenians, annually delivered as victims to the Minotaur, in the labyrinth of Minos, has also the appearance of bearing an allusion to the mysteries connected with the solar worship therein: probably, those seven were so devoted to be sacrificed, under the sanction of some ancient compact between the two states, for the celebration of the horrid rites belonging to their depraved worship.

To the foregoing hints may be added another, and which is a very interesting fact, with which the authors above-named were unacquainted. Of the celebrated names of Troy and Ilion we in vain look for any plain and evident significations in the Greek language; but both are familiar words, and of well-known import, in the Welsh, and are both equally appropriate terms for the revolutions of the planetary system. Our word tro is equally common as its equivalent in English, which is turn; as, also, its several derivatives, like the verb troi, to turn, and its plurals, troiau and troion, turns or turnings. The word il signifies a whirl ; and it is the common term for the working or fermentation of liquors, as rhoi breci yn yr il, to put wort in the ferment; and the appropriate plural form of il is ilion.

Thus, admitting the suggestions, that have been here brought forward, to be well grounded, of Troy being so named on account of its being a place of distinguished resort for solar worship, also, its being denominated Ilion by the Grecians is accounted for, because Troiau and Ilion are synonymous terms preserved in the Welsh, of the same import as turns and whirls in English, and appropriate terms for the planetary revolutions. And the common Welsh phrase for the turn of the summer or winter solstice is Troad y Rhod, the turning of the wheel or ecliptic.

Idrison.

August 1, 1821.