Fercuson—On the Kenfig Inscription. dol 
cross, accompanied by ornamentation of a very primitive type, recalling 
the zig-zag and volutes of Dowth, together with the remains of a much- 
corroded inscription: Hane crucem fecimus VII.anmak .. . . (orate) 
(orate). Who were the Septem anmacs, if I have rightly read the legend, 
or whether the name of the parent was masculine or feminine, time has 
made it impossible to guess; but the monument gives an entirely 
Christian and even mystical character to the place. Merlin, indeed, 
is the very impersonation of esoteric ideas, for parallels to which we 
might look to the Bogomiles of the fifth century and kindred sects in other 
countries. It is true, Welsh tradition treats him as a real person, and 
the author of the Hnglynion y beddeu, corresponding to the Irish Laoi na 
leacht, or Poem of the Graves, calls him Merlin Ambrosius, the Lion of 
Luaghor, the Son of the Nun (anap llevan), and records that his grave 
isin Newais Vynyd, which may, perhaps, indicate this very Nunydd:— 
Bed an ap lleian ym Newais 
Vynyd lluagor lleu Emreis 
Priff ddawin Merdyn Emreis. 
(Myv. Arch. I. 77.) 
And, if Eglys Nunidd were indeed the place meant—though I would 
rather imagine it to be called after the name of a person—these verses, 
at least as old as the time of William of Salisbury, in the fifteenth 
century, would be very apposite to this inquiry; but I am not 
qualified to determine a question of Welsh topography, and conclude 
that whether Merlin was a real or imaginary being, and whether this 
be or be not the once-reputed place of his burial, there are pro- 
bable grounds for believing that his name and designation did, at 
one time, exist on this western arris of the Kenfig monument. 
Let us now give our attention to that part of the Ogham text 
existing on the left-hand or eastern arris. The character resembling 
the civil ‘‘ broad arrow’’ certainly corresponds to a well-known 
symbol in use among the Welsh Bardic writers. This symbol is 
alleged, by those who believe in the authenticity of Welsh Bardic 
tradition, to have stood for the name of God from primeval times, and 
to have been the original from which all alphabetical writing among 
them, especially the Coelbren y beirdd, or Bardic alphabet, proceeded. 
The critical school of Welsh writers denies to the Coelbren a proved 
existence earlier than the end of the sixteenth or beginning of the 
seventeenth century, and condemns the symbol from which it professed 
to originate to a similarly questionable origin. Mr. Pryse, editor of 
the 38rd edition of Dr. Owen Pughe’s Welsh Dictionary (Denbigh, 
1866), has accurately summed up the conclusions of this school in what 
he says in his preface to that work, when speaking with some dis- 
paragement of Dr. Pughe’s belief in the authenticity of the Bardic 
writings :—‘‘ He was also a believer in the authority and adaptability 
of the Bardic alphabet.to the Welsh language, although its existence 
has not been proved before the time of Llewelyn Sion, about 1600” 
