Welsh UFO sightings from 1805. For sightings from other years please click HERE.
Theophilus Jones published his first volume of The History of Brecknockshire in 1805. The Cambrian printed this passage on the superstitions of the Welsh on December 14th 1805:
We have been frequently told that the Welsh are remarkably superstitious, and that most, if not all of them, believe in the reality of apparitions, this is idle assertion and mere conjecture; they have no more superstition of credulity than falls to the lot ot the humble inhabitants of an equal tract of land in any other part of the kingdom; they have, it is certain, their stock stories, their provincial demons and goblins, and their characteristic phenomena, with whom many are acquainted, most wish to hear of, and some few believe: among the visionary beings, of whom tradition tells, and whom imagination creates, we frequently, hear of the fairies, whom they call, bendith eu mam-mau aud y tylwyth tëg, i.e. the blessings of their mothers, the fairies or fair household, meaning that they were fair of form, though most foul in mind. The stories related of these fairies as well as of witches, who were supposed to play tricks with the milk-maid and spoil the butter, are similar to those heard in England. Fairies are undoubtedly of Gothic origin, as appears from Icelandic Sagas and the Edda or Runic Mythology, they were divided into good and bad, and regarded by the Northern tribes as having the absolute disposal of the fortunes of the human race; from the Goths the superstition spread, with their arms, amongst the nations whom they subdued and enslaved. The same idea prevailed on the continent of Asia, and particularly in the East. Mr. Mallet observes, that "the notion is not every where exploded, that there are in the bowels of the earth fairies or a of dwarfish and tiny beings of human shape, remarkable for their riches, their activity, and their malevolence." In many countries in the North, the people are still firmly persuaded of their existence. In Iceland at this day the good folks shew the very rocks and hills in which they maintain that there are swarms of these small subterraneous men of the most tiny size, but of the most delicate figures.
Our Welsh fairies are certainly of the same family - hatched in the same hot-bed of imagination. Let us compare the legends of Edmund Jones with the above description of Mr. Mallet. The latter tells us, they are little, active, and malevolent, and that they reside in rocks and mountains; the "sad historian" of Aberystruth says, £they appeared often in the form of dancing companies, and when they danced, they chiefly, if not always, appeared like children and not as grown men, leaping and frisking in the air," that they were desirous of enticing people into their company, and used them ill; that they were quarrelsome to a proverb, insomuch that it was said of people at valiance "ni chydunant hwy mwy na Bendith eu Mam-mau," (i.e.) "they'll no more agree than the fairies;" that they seemed not to delight in open plain ground of any kind, far from stones and wood, nor in watery but in dry grounds not far from trees. The parallel is here remarkably correct, and the inference will naturally occur that both had the same origin. There are indeed few of our popular superstitions that may not be traced up to some opinion which was consccrated by the religion of the Goths or Celts nor (to use the language of Mallet) need we always except those which seem in some respects to hold a conformity to doctrines or practices which the christian religion alone could have taught us.
They have an universal and unconquerable aversion to mushrooms and look upon the gentry (as they call them) who are fond of this excellent vegetable, as somewhat worse than swine in this particular.
Fairies or destinies are of different origin .some proceed from the Gods, some from the genii, amf others from the dwarfs. The hornies or fairies sprung from a good origin, are good themselves, and dispense good destinies; but those men to whom misfortunes happen, ought to ascribe them to evil hornies or fairies. The dwarfs from whom the evil fairies are supposed to have sprung are described in the Edda as a species of beings bred in the dust of the earth", just as worms are in a dead carcase. It was indeed from the body of the giant Ymir they issued; at first they were only worms but by order of the Gods they partook of both human shape and reason, nevertheless they always dwell in subterraneous caverns and among the rocks." Edda, Úlbie vii. Mallet's North. Antiq. voi, p. 4?.. History of the parish of Aberystruth.
The book continues:
Besides these diminutive representatives of man, the Welsh have also fiends peculiar to themselves, or at least generally forgotten by the majority of the inhabitants of the island; these they call cwn Anwn or Anwn's dogs. Anwn is translated by Owen, unknown, but it is rather anwfn, bottomless, and the prince of this country who is personified in the Mabynogion may be called the king of immensurable darkness, of that boundless void or space in which the universe floats or is suspended. This Being, say the gossips, is the enemy of mankind, and his dogs are frequently heard hunting in the air, some time previous to the dissolution of a wicked person: they are described in the beautiful romance to which we have referred, to be of a clear shining white colour with red ears. No one, with us, pretends to have seen them, but the general idea is that they are jet-black. To these dogs we conceive Shakespeare alludes in his "Tempest," when he talks of noise of hunters heard in the air, and spirits in the shapes of hounds, and not to Peter de Loier "who (says Malone in a note) Hecate did use to send dogges unto men to fear and terrify them, as the Greeks affirmed."
The corpse candle, which precedes the death of some person in the neighbourhood, and marks the route of the funeral from the house of the deceased to the church is a common topic among our peasantry, who believe it confined to the diocese of St. David's: a tradition is likewise very commonly received extraordinary among them, which preserves the memory of certain extraordinary and wonderful feats of strength, performed by two oxen of prodigious size, called "ychain banog," or the oxen of the summits of the mountains. Davies in his Celtic Researches calls them "elevated oxen," and supposes them to allude to a sacrifice made by Hu gadarn or Hu the mighty; but whatever may have been the origin of the legends told of these oxen, the tradition seems to have been derived from the Mythology of the Druids, and in some measure confirms the antiquity of the Triads, from whence it is evidently derived.
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