Goddess Spectral

Spectral, Hounds of the Wild Hunt

Submitted by: swampy

“For he was speechless, ghastly, wan,
Like him of whom the story ran,
Who spoke the spectre hound in man.”
– Sir Walter Scott, The lay of the last minstrel, Canto VI, v.26.

In the Celtic lands, cold midwinter nights are often filled with the sounds of what is called the Wild Hunt. In these hunts, a pack of ghostly hounds is accompanied by their Underworld master. During the hunt, hounds and master search for souls which they harvest and take back with them to the nether regions. The phantom chase is usually heard as the baying of the spirit hounds or seen as hounds flying through the skies in midwinter, but is always accompanied by a howling wind.

The hounds of the Wild Hunt usually take the form of snow-white, red-eared spectral hounds. They are associated with the sounds of migrating wild geese, and since Christian times, are sometimes said to be leading the souls of the damned to hell. In Brythonic mythology, the hounds that took part in the Wild Hunt are called Cwn Annwn, or the hounds of Annwn. In the UK, they are often called the Gabriel Hounds, Ratchets or the Gabble Retchets, and sometimes the Yell Hounds.

In various myths, the Wild Hunt hounds are owned by various Gods with different names. In Wales, the ghost hounds are usually said to be accompanied by Arawn (also spelled Arawyn, Arrawn or Arawn) whose name means “silver-tongued”. Arawn is the Welsh Underworld god of Annwn who rides upon a pale horse. Annwn is the Welsh nether world, but unlike many other underworlds, Annwn is not a place of eternal torment or punishment, and mortals may visit it. It is said that it is from Annwn that the Wild Hunt rides out. In the Mabinogion, there is a tale involving Pwyll, lord of Dyfed, and his encounter with Arawn and the hounds. Pwyll was out with his own pack of hounds when he encountered a strange pack of hounds, pure white except for their red ears. Beating them off their prey (a stag), he set his own pack upon them, an act for which he was chided by their owner, Arawn. As a punishment for his act, Arawn laid upon Pwyll the following penance: Pwyll was to live in Arawn’s place, disguised, for a year and a day, while Arawn lived in his place in Dyfed. At the end of the time, he would do battle with Hagfan, Arawn’s rival for dominion of the underworld, and defeat him, for only a mortal man could so do. Pwyll not only fulfilled this task and defeated Hafgan for Arawn, but also refrained from sleeping with Arawn’s wife, so as a reward, Arawn became his close friend.

In other Welsh tales, the hounds are said to be accompanied by Gwyn ap Nuad (also spelled Gwynn Ap Nudd). Gwyn ap Nuad is a God of war, death and the hunt and the patron God of fallen warriors. His name means “white son of Darkness” since he is the son of the sun/death God Llud. Gwyn ap Nuad appears in a flowing gray cloak and rides upon a pale wild white horse following the hounds during the midwinter Wild Hunts. In some of the tales, his hounds are pictured as three in number – with one hound red, one black and one white.

In other Celtic regions the hounds are said to be accompanied by the hunters Gwyn, Bran, Arthur, Gabriel or Herne the Hunter. In the Norse and Teutonic traditions the hounds of the Wild Hunt are hunted by Wotan, Grim, or Odin. No matter who the huntsman is of the Wild Hunt, the spectral hounds always represent the wild winter months and the journey to the darker netherworlds.

That Wild Hunts still occur in more modern times is indisputable. In 1127 in the UK, an Abbot called Henry of Poitou was appointed to Peterborough Abbey. The chronicler of the day wrote this in the Abbey’s official journal: ‘tat as soon as he (Henry of Poitou) came there . . . the soon afterwards many people saw and heard many hunters hunting. The hunters were black and big and loathsome, and their hounds all wide-eyed and loathsome, and they rode on black horses and black goats.’ Such a wild hunt was reported at a similar time in the Welsh Marches by Walter Map, writing about 1190. And in 1960, a spectral hound appeared to two people in Somerset – both of whom died soon after.