Cerridwen Cards

Cerridwen ("White Sow", or "White Crafty One") is the Welsh grain and sow Goddess, keeper of the cauldron of inspiration and Goddess of transformation. Her son Afagddu was so horribly ugly She set to making a brew of wisdom for him, to give him a quality that could perhaps overcome his ugliness. Every day for a year and a day She added herbs at the precise astrological times, but on the day it was ready the three magical drops fell instead on the servant boy, Gwion Bach, who was set to watch the fire. Instantly becoming a great magician, the boy fled from Her wrath, and as She pursued him they each changed shape--a hound following a rabbit, an otter chasing a salmon, a hawk flying after a sparrow--until finally the boy changed to a kernel of wheat, settling into a pile of grain on a threshing-floor. Cerridwen, becoming a black hen, found him out and swallowed him down. Nine months later She gave birth to Taliesin, who would be the greatest of all bards.