A White Coat

Tolkien seemed clear about his opinion on Celtic literature. He stated his “distaste for things Celtic” in 1937, describing their unreason as their main offenceMichael D.C. Drout. J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia: Scholarship and Critical Assessment. Routledge, 2007, p. 298.. When he submitted a version of The Silmarillion to a publisher in 1937, however, the reply came that the work had “something of that mad, bright-eyed beauty that perplexes all Anglo-Saxons in the face of Celtic art”Shippey, Road p. 350.. Clearly, there is a good possibility that, despite Tolkien’s dislike of things Celtic, his work still has traces of the Celtic literary tradition in it.

The Celts are no strangers to horses in their literature. In the Mabinogion, a particularly remarkable white horse makes its appearance. This collection of Middle Welsh prose texts originating from the oral tradition was translated into English by Lady Charlotte Guest in the nineteenth centurySioned Davies. The Mabinogion. Oxford University Press, 2007, p. ix.. In “The First Branch of the Mabinogi,” Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, encounters Rhiannon, a woman who rides a horse. The horse’s coat is “pale-white,” which Pwyll first notices when he sits upon a mound near his court at ArberthDavies, Mabinogion p. 8.. The setting of a “slow-moving white horse” passing a “magic mound”Jessica Hemming. “Reflections on Rhiannon and the Horse Episodes in ‘Pwyll.’” Western Folklore, vol. 57, no. 1, 1998, p. 19. makes it possible to draw a link to the Uffington White Horse’s folkloric, myth-like setting on its White Horse Hill (Fig 1), but this is not where the magical atmosphere surrounding Rhiannon’s horse stops. After all, the white horse is not only “impossible to overtake,” it also “appears to be moving slowly”Hemming, “Reflections” p. 33.. There is seemingly no correspondence between perception and reality when it comes to the horse’s speed. Even when one of Pwyll’s men uses the fastest horse in the realm, he fails to catch up. Pwyll fittingly notes “there is some magical explanation here”Davies, Mabinogion p. 9.. The source of this magical setting is often attributed to Rhiannon’s association to Epona, a Celtic goddess of the continent with a “mythic affinity” to horsesHemming, “Reflections” p. 20., resulting in a magical touch to Rhiannon’s character.

The white coat of the horse, however, might just as well contribute to the magical quality of the text: in Welsh and Irish tradition, the colour white is associated with the supernaturalDavies, Mabinogion p. 228.. An earlier stage of Pwyll’s story reflects this association, as he encounters dogs that are all “a gleaming shining white” and it is emphasised that he “had never seen dogs of this colour” beforeDavies, Mabinogion p. 3.. The dogs’ white colour is unusual, which implies it might also be Rhiannon’s horse’s white coat which accounts for its ability to stay ahead of whatever follows it. The colour white gives these animals a magical or supernatural attribute, one that distinguishes them from other, differently coloured animals.