Esyllt and Sabrina – Geoffrey of Monmouth (1 100? – 1 154?)
Our information about Geoffrey of Monmouth is very limited. He was probably of Welsh origin, and lived in the Welsh Marches, not far from the scenes of the most famous exploits of Arthur and his knights. His Chronicle has been aptly called a “romance-history.” The twelve books or chapters of which it is composed are stories of the early (actual or imaginary) rulers of Britain. Among the finest of these are stories of King Lear, King Arthur, and the one here reprinted. Esyllt and Sabrina is one of the loveliest of all the early English tales.
The present version, translated from the original Latin by Louisa J. Menzies, is reprinted from Legendary Tales of the Ancient Britons, London, 1864.
Esyllt and Sabrina (From the Chronicle of Geoffrey of Monmouth)
It was about three thousand years ago that there lived a fierce warrior, named Hymyr, the Hun, whose chief delight it was to voyage about over the mighty sea, and to make descents upon fruitful lands and take to himself by rapine and violence the produce of the long toil of the husbandman and the artisan; nor was he always content with stores of corn, treasure of gold, of silver, and apparel; many fair children did he carry off from burning homesteads, young maidens, and even wives, who sorrowed in vain for slaughtered husbands and brothers, and bore in pale resignation the stern rule of the tyrant and his haughty queen.
Once Hymyr fitted out a great armament, and voyaging up the river Albis, carried off from its banks the fair daughter of a German King, whom he found playing with her maidens in a flowery meadow; then he coasted along the shore of Frisia, a terror to the husbandmen, and, forasmuch as he had heard that there was much and singular wealth in the island of Albion, newly named Britain, from its King Brutus, he turned the heads of his ships northward, and came to the part of the island that lies towards the Great Bear, and which was then called Albany. Landing here with his fierce sea-robbers, he easily defeated Albanactus, the king, who came hastily to meet him with raw levies, for he was but newly come to his throne, and was thinking of nothing less than invasion.
Then Hymyr had a joyous time of it, he reveled and feasted in the halls of Albanactus, and so pleasant did the country, seem in his eyes, with its great rows of purple mountains, its gleaming lakes abounding in fish, and its forests teeming with game, that he was in no hurry to take to the sea again: so he hunted and feasted till the summer was past its prime, eating the good fruits of the earth, and making the land desolate of men. Then news came to him that Albanactus, the king, was marching up from the south with an army of tried warriors, the warriors of Locrinus, his brother, King of Loegria, for so the southern part of Briatin was named, and that Locrinus himself was with them.
