Blodeuwedd: Creation of Owl Geocoin

  This beautiful coin was adopted to us by the cacher Jaybeem!  

Thank you so very much :)

It will be moved to our collection and we will cherish it along with

our other special coins.

It can be discovered along with our other coins when we meet at events or on the trails.  

May 2018 - Blodeuwedd: Creation of Owl Geocoin

This lovely coin was designed by Christian Mackey for the

Geocoin Club May 2018.

It is 50mm tall and 3.5mm thick.

It has a shiny silver finish with soft enamel.

It has its own icon on geocaching.com.

History:

Legend says of the creation of the Blodeuwedd, the Middle Welsh word for "owl".  The word is actually a combination of the word Blodeu (flowers) and Gwedd (face) and this is where the legend begins.

In Welsh mythology, there is an enchanted hero akin to Heracles or Odysseus named Lleu Llaw Gyffes.  He suffers a tynged (magical curse) from his mother Arianrhod to never have a human wife.  To overcome this dweomer, Lleu receives help from the magicians Math and Gwydion.  They gather the blooms of oak, broom flower and meadowsweet and from these beautiful florals they conjure into being the most beautiful maiden on earth... Blodeuwedd ( Flower Face).   Lleu is constantly off on adventures and Blodeuwedd grows lonely and eventually takes a lover.  Together with her lover she conspires to kill the near-immortal Lleu.  They almost succeed in their murderous plot before Lleu escapes the attempt.  The magicians Gwydion and Math are enraged that their conjured flower-face girl should so blatantly rebel against her purpose that they set out to bring her to justice.  They capture her and transform her into an owl.  She is cursed to never dare show her face again in the light of day.  All other feathered creatures will hate her and attack her on sight.  It will be the nature of all birds to hate her, despise her and harass her wherever she should run to over the whole earth.  For all time though, she will retain her name "Blodeuwedd" (Flower-Face).

On the face side of the coin we see Blodeuwedd under the dark eye of dark moon embossed with the tradition Oak Dara knotwork.  Feathers spray around her as she flees pursuers under the blossoms of meadowsweet, broom flower and a leaf of oak.  On the reverse side we Flower Face at her creation surrounded by flowers of the spring season in a riot of color and full bloom.  Pale of skin, fair of face and lushly sporting the colors of fresh flower stems.