some bad @$$ mead from 650 A.D.

I figured I'd share some excerpts from a very old poem about a mead drinking excursion. In about 600 AD, some Welsh warriors from what is now Scotland (Gododdin) went to a place called Catraeth to kill some English pagans. Mead was an important part of their payment for service. Linguists have dated the poem to as early as 650 A.D., about 1,360 years ago. To be fair, some date it later, 9th century or so.

"XI. Men went to Catraeth at dawn:
Their high spirits lessened their life-spans.
They drank mead, gold and sweet, ensnaring;
For a year the minstrels were merry.
Red their swords, let the blades remain
Uncleansed, white shields and four-sided spearheads,
Before Mynyddawg Mwynfawr's men....

xxx...
After holding bright mead in hand,
Never a one saw his father.

XXXI
Men launched the assault, moving as one.
Short were their lives, made drunk by pure mead,
Mynyddawg's band, renowned in battle.
For a feast of mead they gave their lives,
Caradawg and Madawg, Pyll and Ieuan,
Gwgan and Gwiawn, Gwyn and Cynfan, "


This is Joseph Clancy's translation. Here's the rest of it:
http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/a01b.html


OBVIOUSLY, This was some GOOD stuff. anybody been moved to righteous slaughter by drinking too much mead?

Gosh darn it. I lurk in this forum almost solely because I think the history of mead is really cool. So it's posts like this that will finally drive me over the edge to finally making some mead. I'm fighting the urge, but the temptation grows stronger.

Bravo to you sir.

I'd rather a poem that made them mead infused indestructible warriors of awesomeness instead of drunk idiots getting slaughtered. Still pretty cool though.