Saint Cenydd of Gower
The fifth of July in the Orthodox Church is the feast of Saint Cenydd of Gower, another holy hermit of Wales’s Age of Saints. A patron in particular of the disabled and of unwanted children, the prayers of holy hermit Cenydd are direly in need in our own day and age.
Cenydd [also Kenneth, Kinède or Guidec] was – according to the traditional hagiography of John of Tynemouth – an illegitimate child, fathered in an incestuous union by one high-born ‘Dihoc’ (most likely Deroch II of Domnonea) and a close kinswoman of his. The woman gave birth to Cenydd over the Christmas feast in Llwchwr, and as it was discovered that he was deformed – with one of his legs near fully bent back over itself at the knee such that the calf adhered to the thigh – his father ordered him to be exposed according to the old pagan custom. The infant Cenydd was placed, like Moses, in a cradle made of willow branches, and thrown into the Afon Llwchwr to be borne away on the flow to the sea. A storm blew up and carried the cradle on the crests of the waves to Ynys Weryn or Worm’s Head Isle. Both cradle and babe arrived there sound.
Once he made land Cenydd was borne aloft on the pinions, not of seraphim but of seagulls, up to the top of a rock. Once there the seagulls plucked down from their own breasts and lined the cradle with them. They brought food to him and fed him. And when the weather raged the gulls would spread their wings over young Cenydd and keep him safe and dry. On the ninth day on Ynys Weryn, an angel appeared from heaven and gave to Cenydd a brass bell in the shape of a human breast for a toy. As Sabine Baring-Gould remarks on this tale: ‘Certain practical difficulties, such as would suggest themselves to a mother, are got over by the author by way of an ingenious explanation.’
On one occasion the young child was discovered by a ploughman living nearby, who took the child and gave it to his wife, who at once put young Cenydd to bed. The gulls were not amused. Dividing themselves into two bands, one flock of gulls went to peck and scratch and squawk at the ploughman’s oxen, driving them toward water; the other flock flew into the window of the farmer’s house went to Cenydd’s cradle and made to pull away the covers. The ploughman, alarmed for his stock, took Cenydd and placed him back out on Ynys Weryn. Once he had done so, the gulls ceased their attack. It was said afterward that a hind came out from the nearby woods to suckle Cenydd.
From his infancy until the age of eighteen, Cenydd took instruction in letters and in Holy Scripture from the angels. Of these, one of them told him to move himself to a remote spot about a mile distant. Cenydd, being lame and wearying easily of moving, started out. He sat down twenty-four times along the way, and at each spot a miraculous holy well sprang up to relieve his thirst. Once he arrived, he set up a house for himself made of willow branches and thatched with reeds. Here a certain man joined the holy hermit and offered himself as a servant.
Saint Cenydd was visited in his new home by a band of local robbers who sought to plunder him. They could not bring their spears inside but had to leave them outside the house when they went in. Cenydd received them hospitably, but his servant snuck outside and stole the spear of the bandits’ ringleader. The robber asked for his spear back, but the servant swore he had not seen it. The servant was made to swear so on Saint Cenydd’s brass bell, but caught in this lie he went mad. He fled to Dewi Sant’s see, and lived there as a wild man for seven years, with the hair growing out all over his body as his only clothing. At the end of seven years Saint Cenydd remembered his servant in prayer, and the servant was restored to his right wits. He returned to Cenydd’s cell in penitence, and was allowed to remain.
It so happened that another band of plunderers, this time under orders from a certain Morgan King of Glywysing, trespassed upon Cenydd’s peace. Saint Cenydd sent his servant with the brass bell to demand a share. The plunderers, upon seeing Cenydd’s servant, answered him with blows. And then they fell to blows themselves, arguing over their own shares of the spoil. Many of them killed each other. Morgan King, witnessing this disaster among his men, knew that the cause was his failing to respect the holy man. Morgan thereafter went humbly with Cenydd’s servant to make restitution; he took the holy man up a great height and bade him ask for any of the land that he could see. Cenydd chose for himself a stretch along the Afon Llwchwr near Gŵyr, where he stayed for the rest of his days.
One other tale of Saint Cenydd is worthy of mention. He was met by Dewi Sant, along with the saints Teilo and Padarn, as they made their way to the Synod of Llanddewi Brefi in 545. Dewi Sant begged Cenydd to attend the synod with them, but Cenydd merely remarked: ‘You see my leg, how it is bent back upon itself. How can I go?’ With that Dewi pronounced a prayer in the name of the Holy Trinity, and Cenydd’s leg unfolded itself, straightened and strengthened, so that he could walk as nimbly as any other man. But this was not to Cenydd’s liking. He prayed to the Trinity that his infirmity could be restored, and again his leg bent back upon itself so that the calf adhered to the thigh. Thus Cenydd did not join the other saints at Brefi.
This fanciful hagiography of Saint Cenydd, authored by John of Tynemouth in the thirteenth century, ends here. However, contemporary Welsh sources (toward which Baring-Gould makes no secret of her implicit trust with regard to their historical accuracy) make Saint Cenydd instead the son of Gildas the Historian, who in turn fathered two other holy men prior to his eremitical career: Ffili and Ufelwyn. He was known and trusted of both Saint Illtud and Saint Dewi, the former of whom made him a teacher at Cor Tewdws and the latter of whom made him the head of a monastic community at Gŵyr. Holy father Cenydd, pray unto Christ our God that our souls may be saved!
Rejecting thy princely dignity and worldly position,
Thou didst retire to the desert, O righteous Kenneth,
And as we rejoice in thy God-pleasing asceticism,
Beseech Christ our God that He will save our souls.
Church of St Cenydd, Llangennith, Wales
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