Why the Old Stories Still Matter

We live in anxious times. In a world of noise, division, and uncertainty, where fear moves quickly, and understanding struggles to keep pace. It is easy to feel as though we are living through something unprecedented, that the tensions we face are new, uniquely modern, and without parallel. But the old stories tell us otherwise.

When we turn to the Second Branch of the Mabinogi and to the story of Branwen, we do not find a distant and irrelevant past; instead, we find something far more unsettling and far more useful. We find ourselves.

The Patterns That Do Not Change

Branwen’s story is not simply a tale of mythic kings and queens from the deep past. This is not the nature of story, for they are essentially a history of the heart, not that which is written by the conqueror. They can be perceived as a study in human behaviour and what happens when communication fails, when pride takes precedence over wisdom, and when people stop listening to one another. A slight, perceived or real, can quickly evolve to become an insult, in turn an insult can become retaliation. Retaliation becomes conflict and conflict once ignited, consumes everything.

This is not ancient history. It is a pattern, one which we can see repeated in our own time, within our politics, in our communities, and even in our personal lives. In the twenty-first century, we speak more than ever, but perhaps we listen less. We react more quickly than we reflect, and in doing so, we risk recreating the very conditions that brought ruin to Branwen’s world.

When We Stop Seeing Each Other

At the heart of Branwen’s story lies another truth, one that is perhaps even more uncomfortable. She is not only a sovereign; she is also a symbol of what happens when a person is no longer seen as fully human. First, she is used as a political bridge, a means to secure an alliance, then, when tensions rise, she becomes something less, diminished, scapegoated, mistreated and silenced. It is a quiet but devastating shift, and it is one we can recognise in modernity.

In our own time, we can see how easily individuals and groups are reduced to labels, to categories, or positions within an argument. Once that happens, empathy can quickly fade. When empathy fades, harm becomes easier to justify. The story of Branwen reminds us that the cost of this is always greater than we imagine.

The Innocent and the Future

There is a moment in the tale that is almost unbearable to behold: the death of Gwern, the innocent child of Branwen. He represents not only innocence, but possibility and the fragile hope of reconciliation between worlds. He is utterly destroyed and consumed in the fires of resentment. Through this, the myth speaks with painful clarity that when conflict is allowed to escalate unchecked, it is the future that suffers most. The innocents rarely shape the conditions of conflict, yet they are the ones who inevitably inherit its consequences. However, this is not a lesson confined to myth; it becomes a cycle that feeds itself.

The Cauldron of Rebirth is one of the most striking images in the story, Y Pair Dadeni, the vessel that restores life, but without voice and without agency. Those who return are not truly whole for something is inexorably missing. It is a powerful metaphor for cycles that sustain themselves, where action leads to reaction, reaction to escalation, and escalation to repetition.

We can see this in many forms today:

• in cycles of retaliation between nations.
• in the relentless churn of outrage in public discourse.
• in the way unresolved pain perpetuates further harm.

The myth does not offer easy solutions, but it does offer recognition, and that is where change begins.

Branwen’s True Teaching

It would be easy to read Branwen’s story as one of tragedy alone. But to do so would be to miss its deepest wisdom. Branwen does not emerge from her story victorious in any conventional sense. She does not restore kingdoms or reverse what has been lost. Instead, she reveals something quieter, and perhaps more enduring.

She shows us that sovereignty is not found in control, nor in the ability to shape the world to our will. It is found in how we meet what we cannot control, how we carry sorrow and how we choose to remain present. It presents itself in how we refuse to lose our humanity even when the world fractures around us. This is not passive but perhaps one of the hardest things a person can do.

Why These Stories Matter Now

The old stories are not simply echoes of a deep and unreachable past. They are living structures of meaning that are shaped by the experiences of those who came before us, they are rooted in their relationship with the land, with each other and with the unseen. They are both ancient and immediate, immanent and imminent. They carry the memory of what has been, but they also arrive, again and again, in the present moment, offering insight into what is unfolding now.

We might easily take them for granted, we may dismiss them as irrelevant, but perhaps we do so at our own peril.

Listening Again

To engage with Branwen is not to escape the modern world, but to see it more clearly. Her story does not tell us what to think, but rather it invites us to notice and to recognise the patterns we are caught within, and to ask ourselves whether we are willing to respond differently. Because ultimately the story is not finished, a myth is something that never happened, but they happen all the time. Its wisdom continues in our choices and in our relationships; it is perpetuated in how we speak, how we listen, and how we carry what has been broken. Perhaps the question Branwen leaves us with is this:

Will we listen… before the pattern repeats?

For more details: https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/moon-books/our-books/pagan-portals-branwen