A 15th-century depiction of the marriage of Kynan Meriadoc and St Ursula
It was the legendary warrior Kynan who, having for Macsen Wledig against those who would seize his throne, conquered Armorica for the Breton peoples. For many years he and his sons and his sons’ sons dispensed with justice and provided guidance for the Breton people. They were a happy people, and their soft lives saw them grow complacent, unalive to the dangers which circled them. There came a time when one of the Kynan’s children, who we know as the Meriadoc clan, died when his own sons were mere babes. Nobody could doubt the wise and just stewardship of the Meriadoc, but it is impossible for a swaddled infant to rule over a people. Erich, whose mother claimed him as a half-brother of the dead king, stepped in to provide guardianship for the babes. When the children were taken by a sudden illness, it only seemed natural that Erich would assume the powers which he had already held by proxy. The Bretons would continue to be ruled by Kynan’s kin, and their blessed existence would continue.
This illusion was shattered by Riotham, who also claimed descent from Kynan, although through a lesser line. He forced Erich’s mother to confess her sins, for she had conspired with her son to seize the throne, lying about his paternity and slaughtering the rightful heirs. Riotham denounced Erich, for only a man of Kynan’s blood could rule in Armorica. Erich was none-too-pleased about the accusations levied against him, nor the execution of his mother, and, continuing to claim descent from Kynan, demanded Riotham’s heart. There was war amongst the Breton people, between the Meriadoc – who looked to Riotham – and Erich and his sons – who were known as the Trencavel.
Neither Riotham nor Erich ever succeeded in slaying the other, despite a myriad of encounters. Instead their struggle persisted for a generation, and many great warriors made their names, but equally many great warriors saw their fall. Eventually, Riotham appealed to his god, Deus, to strike down Erich for his crimes. Although at a great distance, Riotham’s god heard his plea, and the gods of Armorica did not protect Erich, for he had committed a great many sins against them. Thus, Erich was struck down. His greatest son, Budic, became the head of the Trencavel.
Budic was everything his father was not. He was a wise philosopher, and devout in his study of the whims of the gods; his father had been a cynic, so vain as to think himself free of divine influence. He was a valiant fighter, skilled in the way of the sword and the spear; his father had been a coward, only capable of driving a knife into a squalling babe. He was conscientious of his duties; his father had not cared who had to die in order to satiate his gluttony. It was because Budic was everything his father was not that he would succeed in doing what his father could not; he would united Armorica under his leadership, not through conflict but through reconciliation.
Budic said unto Riotham, and unto the Meriadoc, that his father had been an evil man, undoubtedly possessed by demonic spirits. He insisted that he was constituted from the blood of Kynan, but that that blood had been sullied by his father’s sins against that very same blood. He proposed that it if his blood was renewed then this corruption might be diluted, and rightful lordship over Armorica restored. To that end he would tie his blood to Riotham’s blood, by fathering sons with Riotham’s daughter such that their relation to Kynan would be the combination of Riotham and Budics’ own. He implored that Riotham agree to such, for so long as Meriadoc fought Trencavel it would be Kynan’s blood which soaked the ground.
Riotham was no fool. His vendetta had been against Erich, and Erich was now dead. The cost had been great, amongst both his wider and immediate family. Not only had the conflict weakened his people, but there were growing threats in the east. The Romans had been killed, and the godless Franks had come to take their place. A vicious people who stole his cattle and slaughtered his sons, and increasingly they came to settle lands for themselves. In the face of such an existential threat what did it matter if it was a Meriadoc or a Trencavel who ruled, restoring the blood of Kynan was sure to ensure the future of the entire Breton people. Together, Riotham and Budic thwarted the continued expansion of the Franks and restored stability to Armorica.
Budic’s son, Cathno, was a product of the reunion of Trencavel and Meriadoc. Like his father, he was a philosopher-king, well versed in the histories of his peoples. His dominion saw Armorica flourish, recovering from the devastation of the previous generation’s conflict. Many scholars and other well-educated men, fleeing from the Franks and the Saxons came to his court. Unfortunately, for all that Cathno favoured the gods, it did not seem that the gods favoured him. The increasing wealth and bounty of Armorica attracted the attention and envy of other peoples, such was the fame of the plunder available there that even the warrior-king Túathalán, from Britannia’s far north, came to extract a tribute. Cathno’s was a scholarly mind, not given to military manoeuvre, and so Breton villages burned and their harvests were stolen.
The Emperor Macsen Wledig, with whom Kynan once campaigned, was once faced by a similar issue to Cathno. It is the duty of a people to obey, and it is the duty of a ruler to protect. When Macsen Wledig fell short of his duty, he sailed to find Elen, who, union with, would provide him with the capability of just rulership. Kynan was a party to that just rulership: he protected Macsen Wledig’s people, a service rendered in dowry, and he protected the Breton people of Armorica, and for that he was made their King. Cathno did not seek assistance and, as would have happened to Macsen Wledig without Elen’s intervention, his right to rule was usurped. Budic had failed, although the union of Meriadoc and Trencavel had diluted his dirty blood enough remained to depose his son.
It was Guoedanau, son of Riotham’s son, who removed Cathno from the throne. Whilst Cathno had sat amongst his scrolls, it was Guoedanau who had fought off various raiding peoples, his sword lit by the light of Deus. He had come to Cathno’s court, and all the warriors there having fought alongside him in various campaigns, they did not move to stop him when he dragged Cathno from the throne and placed Cathno’s eldest son, Tiernuallon, there instead. Tiernuallon, it was hoped, was sufficiently removed from the evils of Erich that he would find favour with Kynan where Cathno had not. None could doubt that he was a more capable warrior, having bloodied his spear alongside Guoedanau, a feat his father never achieved.
It can not be denied that as a king, Cathno had duties to his people, and he was derelict in those duties; there was thus justice in Gouedanau’s removal of Cathno, for in failing his duties he had abdicated his rights. Equally, it can not be denied that as a son, Tiernuallon had duties to his father. It has long been an issue for all people to determine what the demands of their relationships are, which the gods would favour superseding the other, and where justice can be found. Before our own great imperium it is only Rome that succeeded in codifying the requirements of justice; in Armorica Tiernuallon was bereft of guidance, and it was for the individual to determine what was just to the greatest extent of their capabilities. To Tiernuallon, Guoedanau’s incarceration of his father following his father’s abdication was an injustice.
The realities of the situation in Armorica in the immediate aftermath of Cathno’s abdication left Tiernuallon, who had only just entered manhood, with few choices, and the inability to dispense his own perception of justice. Cathno remained Guoedanau’s prisoner whilst Tiernuallon set about restoring order. Where raiding parties had previously been able to ravage the land with impunity, they were now met with resistance and, in some cases, campaigns against their own homelands. This saw Tiernuallon’s legend grow to rival Guoedanau’s own, and he gathered a loyal core of veteran soldiers around him.
It was his father’s death which finally spurred Tiernuallon to move against Guoedanau. He, alongside his brothers Cathno mac Cathno and Iarnhitin, challenged Gouedanau and his in-laws to a trial-by-combat. Riwal, Gouedanau’s father-in-law looked to get the better of Iarnhitin, and disfigured him with a vicious blow to the youth’s face, but in doing so he had exposed himself, and Tiernuallon struck him down. This enraged Gouedanau: Riwal was not only his relation but had also been his mentor and now Tiernuallon, who he had once looked upon as a mentee, had killed him. Gouedanau advanced upon Tiernuallon, launching a series of heavy strikes against him. For all his experience and skill, Gouedanau’s prime was behind him, and in his wrath he had fallen into the patterns of a younger, fitter, man. Once he had exhausted himself, he was slain by Tiernuallon with a single blow; his eyes were taken so that he could not watch over his descendants and his tongue so that he could commune with them.
Fresh blood begets fresh blood, and the stain of betrayal meant that the Trencavel were forever weak to the whispers of greed. Some say that the same demon which had enthralled Elrich had returned to possess his grandson, others claim that the sight of Gouedanau’s butchered body awakened the darkness already present in his blood; whatever the cause, Cathno mac Cathno, who we now call Cathno II, thrust a blade into his elder brother’s back and proclaimed himself as King of the Bretons. The shock of a crime even greater than nepoticide, that being fratricide, caused such a disturbance amongst the Breton people that no cohesive resistance to Cathno II could be formed; if a man could not trust his own brother, then how could he be expected to trust anybody else.
The men who had fought alongside Gouedanau against Tiernuallon had been from the Morles clan and were related to Gouedanau by his marriage to Ronana, Riwal’s only daughter. Many prominent members of the Morles had been killed by the Trencavel, and thus Ronana set about seeking assistance in placing her and Gouedanau’s son, Ferox, on the throne. The boy was a mere child when Cathno II ascended, and so it would take time for support to coalesce, but as the boy grew into a man and the same issues which had plagued the Bretons during Cathno I’s reign re-emerged under Cathno II, more began to the secretly pledge themselves to Ferox of the Meriadoc.
The claims of both Ferox and Cathno II were founded in their blood-relation to Kynan. This meant that Iarnhitin, Cathno II’s twin that had been wounded in the fight against Gouedanau, had the potential to emerge as a third claimant. Following the betrayal of Tiernuallon, Iarnhitin had fled Armorica, as he had had no hand in Cathno II’s skulduggery. The stories which reached Armorica told of the warrior Iarnhitin who, with his face marred by old wounds, led a band of mercenaries in defence of the various Brythonic kingdoms as they struggled against Saxon incursions.
Fortunately for Ronana, Iarnhitin had no interest in ruling over the Bretons; instead he asked that she provide him with access to Cathno II, so that he might gain vengeance for his other brother. Once Ferox had reached manhood, and Ronana felt comfortable with that she was owed sufficient allegiance to secure his succession, she smuggled Iarnhitin into the heart of Armorica. There he struck down his twin, and as Tiernuallon had once done to Gouedanau, he took the dead man’s eyes and the dead man’s tongue. The deed done, he departed from Armorica; presumably returning to his warrior life in Britannia. Thus, with the Trencavel humbled by infighting, the Meriadoc were restored to the throne, and Ferox became King of the Bretons.
