“The men went to Catraeth, swift was their host, the pale mead was their feast and it was their poison.”

—  Aneirin , book Y Gododdin

Stanza A8, pp. 118.
"This famous quotation does not mean that the Gododdin army was too drunk to fight properly, but that they lost their lives in 'earning their mead'" (Jackson The Gododdin p. 35).
Y Gododdin

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The men went to Catraeth, swift was their host, the pale mead was their feast and it was their poison." by Aneirin?
Aneirin photo
Aneirin 4
Brythonic (Welsh) poet; author of the Gododdin. 525–600

Related quotes

Alison Croggon photo

“It is good to dress in fair clothes to dine with friends. It honors your host, if you are a guest; and your guest if you are a host. And both adorn the feast, and so celebrate the gifts of the world.”

Alison Croggon (1962) contemporary Australian poet, playwright and fantasy novelist
Osbert Sitwell photo

“The Rich Man's Banquet, which was to last for a decade, had now begun: the feast, it was recognised, went to the greediest.”

Osbert Sitwell (1892–1969) British baronet

Left Hand, Right Hand!, Bk. II, ch. 6.
Of the Edwardian age.

Thomas Fuller (writer) photo

“1577. Fools make Feasts, and wise Men eat them.”

Thomas Fuller (writer) (1654–1734) British physician, preacher, and intellectual

Compare Poor Richard's Almanack (1745) : Fools make feasts and wise men eat them.
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)

John Keats photo

“No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolfs-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kiss’d
By nightshade.”

John Keats Ode on Melancholy

"Ode on Melancholy", st. 1
Poems (1820)

Bill Bryson photo

“The taipan is the one to watch out for. It is the most poisonous snake on Earth, with a lunge so swift and a venom so potent that your last mortal utterance is likely to be: "I say, is that a sn--”

Bill Bryson (1951) American author
Arthur Rimbaud photo

“And dawn, exalted like a host of doves - and then I've seen what men believe they've seen!”

Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891) French Decadent and Symbolist poet

“The rabbis paled. I’d managed to terrify holy men. Maybe I could beat up a nun for an encore.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Bleeds

Sydney Smith photo

“Dean Swift's rule is as good for women as for men — never to talk above a half minute without pausing, and giving others an opportunity to strike in.”

Sydney Smith (1771–1845) English writer and clergyman

"Parisian Morals and Manners", published in The Edinburgh Review (1843)
Smith might have been thinking of the final words of Swift's "Hints Towards an Essay on Conversation": "It is not a Fault in Company to talk much; but to continue it long, is certainly one; for, if the Majority of those who are got together be naturally silent or cautious, the Conversation will flag, unless it be often renewed by one among them, who can start new Subjects, provided he doth not dwell upon them, but leaveth Room for Answers and Replies".

John Heywood photo

“Enough is as good as a feast.”

John Heywood (1497–1580) English writer known for plays, poems and a collection of proverbs

Part II, chapter 11.
Proverbs (1546), Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Related topics