#plus in taliesin's poetry the welsh underworld is a seen as a bad place so like make of that what u will

[gingersnaptaff]

Oooh, okay, so the authorship question of the Mabinogi is tricky. I've heard various things like, for example, Gwenllian ferch Gruffudd ap Cynan wrote it as a tract to stir up rebellion in the 1100's. This has to do with the fact that much of the action within the branches takes place in Dyfed and Gwynedd. Dyfed at that time was part of Deheubarth, the kingdom into which Gwenllian married, and Gwynedd, the kingdom of which her family ruled. Andrew Breeze, if I remember correctly, is the person who postulated this.

As for the God/gods thing, like yeah, u gotta remember this text was set down by somebody who had a religious upbringing but they're building on earlier - and to them much more Pagan - stories. There is a brilliant book that talks about this - although it is fiction - but it's called 'The Assembly of the Severed Head' by Hugh Lupton. In it, a bard - who knows the stories in their Paganist entirety- tells the monks about them. The monks then copy them down, dispensing with anything that's too pagan. For example, in Branch 3 Manawydan's run-in with the clerk, the priest, and the bishop when he's trying to hang the mouse the author re-imagines the bard saying it was a storyteller, a bard, and a finely dressed lord, and the monks then immediately whacked down the aforementioned clerk, priest, and Bishop instead.

Also, you gotta remember that these stories were around for millennia. I don't think we can say for certain that it is a nuanced take, honestly. To me, it seems that Rhiannon is othered because she's a goddess or at least the remnants of one. She's punished for her supposed crime of cannibalising her son. Later, she, Manawydan, Pryderi, and Cigfa are othered when they go to England to try and make a life there cuz they're stupidly good at shoes. It's not a stretch to think it could be because in a way the authors are like 'These are still pagan gods, guys.' The connection to their original nature is are always there, you just sort of don't see it. I'm not saying you can't think there's 'no need for conflict' betwen the two but I think the text is still very much depowering these gods.

But these are just my thoughts. Hope this helped or made everybody at least 90% more confused.

It's a shame that grounded and gritty adaptations of Arthur like The Mists of Avalon and The Warlord Chronicles always portray Christians and Pagans in conflict when the theology of the actual early texts like the Mabinogion is much more nuanced and interesting. Like you have these ancient Celtic deities living in otherworldly realms and wading across oceans deferring to an almighty singular God. There's no need for conflict between the old gods and Christianity because the old gods themselves are Christians. They baptise their infants and everything. Small g gods worshipping a capital G God.