When Illtud lived as a hermit at Llanhamlach, he did not go out for his food. A mare brought his provisions to him. According to what Gerald of Wales calls the ancient and authentic records of the district, one day a stag covered this mare, and in time she gave birth to a foal unlike any other: a horse in its front half and a stag in its back half. It could run faster than anything in the country.
Gerald put this story next to a few others from the same neighbourhood in his own day. A wild sow had been suckled by a hunting bitch famous for her nose, and grew up to hunt better than any hound. A soldier called Gilbert Hagernel, after three years of illness and pains like a woman in labour, passed a calf in front of many witnesses. Gerald took all of these as signs of something, though he did not always know what.
The stag-horse makes most sense as a story about the saint. Illtud's legends are full of animals that serve him or are tamed by him, and a hermit's mare giving birth to a wonder-beast is the kind of thing that would be told about him at his own church. It is recorded here as a medieval marvel.
Comments