Glyn Cuch is the forest hunting ground where Pwyll’s encounter with Arawn sets a year-long exchange of identities and a struggle for the kingship of Annwvyn in motion. First a place of pursuit, it becomes their appointed meeting point and the scene where the two kings restore one another to their proper forms.

Setting and approach

Pwyll, lord of the seven cantrefs of Dyved, sets out from his chief palace at Narberth to hunt in Glyn Cuch. He travels as far as Llwyn Diarwyd that night, stays there, and reaches the hunting ground early the next morning. Once there, he releases his dogs and sounds his horn. As the chase unfolds, he becomes separated from his companions, leaving him alone to hear unfamiliar hounds approaching from the opposite direction.

The forest opens onto a level glade. Pwyll sees the other hounds bring down a stag, but instead of first attending to the kill, he is struck by the dogs’ appearance: their coats shine white and their ears are red. He drives them from the stag and sets his own pack upon it. This breach of hunting courtesy, committed in a remote clearing, prompts the encounter that changes the course of the story.

The meeting with Arawn

Arawn rides into the glade on a large light-grey horse, dressed in grey hunting clothes and carrying a horn. He recognizes Pwyll but refuses to greet him, explaining that the cause is Pwyll’s discourtesy in taking over the stag and driving off the hounds that had brought it down. Arawn declares that he will repay the insult with dishonour greater than the value of a hundred stags.

When Pwyll offers to make amends, Arawn identifies himself as a crowned king from Annwvyn and names his rival, Havgan, as the source of his continuing trouble. He proposes that Pwyll take his likeness and rule in his stead for a year, while Arawn assumes Pwyll’s appearance. Their arrangement makes Glyn Cuch the starting point of an alliance: the hunting encounter’s dispute is redirected into a bargain concerning royal power and service.

The appointed return

Arawn fixes the place and time for their next meeting: one year later, Pwyll is to return to Glyn Cuch. By then, acting in Arawn’s form, he is to meet Havgan at the ford and defeat him with a single blow; Arawn specifically warns him not to strike a second time. The year-long interval gives the forest a role beyond that of the initial encounter: it marks the beginning and the scheduled end of Pwyll’s service in another king’s realm.

After Havgan falls, Pwyll receives the homage of the nobles and gains control of both kingdoms of Annwvyn. He then keeps the tryst and comes back to Glyn Cuch, where Arawn is waiting. The two greet one another with joy, and Arawn restores Pwyll’s own form before returning to his court. Arawn’s household, which had not known of his absence, receives him without noticing the exchange.

Narrative significance

Glyn Cuch frames the episode as a passage from a local breach of courtesy to a consequential agreement between rulers. Its glade brings Pwyll face to face with the unfamiliar hounds and their master; the same named place later receives him back after the year’s service. That return closes the exchange of appearances and confirms the friendship secured through Pwyll’s victory over Havgan.

The setting thus anchors the episode’s reversals in a repeatable, recognizable place. The first meeting begins with Pwyll taking another hunter’s quarry; the second finds the kings reunited after Pwyll has exercised authority in Arawn’s stead. Glyn Cuch is both the site of the offense and the appointed ground of reconciliation.