Welcome back to White Rose of Avalon, my Darlings. For today’s Mermaid Monday blog post, I will be discussing the story of the Drowned City of Ys! Ys was a city whose folklore was found in the region of Brittany, France.
Ys was a city that was said to be built on the water of the Bay of Douarnenez. The city was famously drowned for several different reasons, depending on the myth. In one of the most famous versions, Ys was drowned due to the promiscuity of the Princess Dahut, daughter of the King Gradlon. Dahut was well known for entertaining many lovers each night, only to kill them and dispose of their bodies in the water surrounding the city each morning. This would lead to the Devil dressed as a Red Knight coming to seduce Dahut and gain the keys to the city from her, eventually leading to death, destruction, and drowning! This happened ultimately after the King made the difficult decision to cast his own daughter into the water, and sealed the fate of his city. However, Gradlon himself did escape. The legend goes on to state that Ys will remain drowned until Paris is destroyed, at which point it will rise again!
Many folklorists have believed that the city of Ys could have its origins in Celtic folklore, which I have to agree with. Brittany is a land famed for its connection to Celtic lore in general. This is shown with Brittany being the home of the French Arthurian legends! Beyond that, it has been pointed out that Dahut, who does not always appear in the earliest versions of the Ys tale, holds a lot of resonance with Celtic Faery Queens associated with Death, Fate, and Magick. It is clear that there is also a lot of Christian symbolism in the story, especially in this version of it. However, this Celtic connection could show some of the Pagan origins of the story, as well.
The story of Dahut does not end with her drowning in the water when her father threw her in. This is because in some versions of the tale, she became a Morgen, or Mari Morgen, a type of Breton Water Faery, or Mermaid! I love this aspect of the tale, as it truly brings in the Celtic lore full force, and even shows that Dahut has even deeper markers of being a Faery Queen. As a Mari Morgen, she could have embodied the energy of the Water itself. This also leads to an interesting exploration as to whether or not she would become an ill-intentioned Water Spirit or one of pure intent. How you read her in the story, as an Evil Enchantress or a misunderstood Faery Woman, would color your interpretation!
In the modern day, many people have come to view this story as one that can be used to warn people of the destruction of Climate Change, spreading the story as a way of evolving environmental understanding! Not to mention that the story has been used in a Romantic context, used in ballads since the medieval period. Ys has gone on to be compared to the Biblical Sodom and Gomorrah (unsurprising given the Christian overtones of the most popular version of the legend), as well as other lost worlds and doomed cities.
I hope you have enjoyed this short look at the legend of the Drowned City of Ys. What is your favorite aspect of the story? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
Note on Image: The image at the top of the post is a lovely artwork of Ys. I found the art on https://vovatia.wordpress.com/2016/07/02/ys-into-it/.
LINK TO AVALONIAN ROSE FAERY MYSTERIES PATREON: patreon.com/AvalonianRoseFaeryMysteries
Further Reading
- https://medium.com/@KDKR/mysterious-legends-of-the-sunken-city-of-ys-in-brittany-9f4a995d97c5
- https://folkrealmstudies.weebly.com/lost-worlds-the-drowning-of-the-city-of-ys.html#google_vignette