Another group, unknown to the _Mabinogion_, save that Taliesin is one of the bearers of Bran's head, is found in the _Book of Taliesin_ and in the late story of Taliesin. These, like the _Arthur_ cycle, often refer to personages of the _Mabinogion_; hence we gather that local groups of gods, originally distinct, were later mingled in story, the references in the poems reflecting this mingling. Late as is the _Hanes Taliesin_ or story of Taliesin, and expressed as much of it is in a _Märchen_ formula, it is based on old myths about Cerridwen and Taliesin of which its compiler made use, following an old tradition already stereotyped in one of the poems in the _Märchen_ formula of the Transformation Combat.[419] But the mythical fragments are also mingled with traditions regarding the sixth century poet Taliesin. The older saga was perhaps developed in a district south of the Dyfi estuary.[420] In Lake Tegid dwell Tegid Voel, Cerridwen, and their children--the fair maiden Creirwy, Morvran, and the ugly Avagddu. To give Avagddu knowledge, his mother prepares a cauldron of inspiration from which three drops of inspiration will be produced. These fall on the finger of Gwion, whom she set to stir it. He put the finger in his mouth, and thus acquired the inspiration. He fled, and Cerridwen pursued, the rest of the story being accommodated to the Transformation Combat formula. Finally, Cerridwen as a hen swallows Gwion as a grain of wheat, and bears him as a child, whom she throws into the sea. Elphin, who rescues him, calls him Taliesin, and brings him up as a bard.[421] The water-world of Tegid is a submarine Elysium with the customary cauldron of inspiration, regeneration, and fertility, like the cauldron associated with a water-world in the _Mabinogion_. "Shall not my chair be defended from the cauldron of Cerridwen," runs a line in a Taliesin poem, while another speaks of her chair, which was probably in Elysium like that of Taliesin himself in Caer Sidi.[422] Further references to her connection with poetry show that she may have been worshipped by bards, her cauldron being the source of their inspiration.[423] Her anger at Gwion may point to some form of the Celtic myth of the theft of the elements of culture from the gods' land. But the cauldron was first of all associated with a fertility cult,[424] and Cerridwen must therefore once have been a goddess of fertility, who, like Brigit, was later worshipped by bards. She may also have been a corn-goddess, since she is called a goddess of grain, and tradition associates the pig--a common embodiment of the corn-spirit--with her.[425] If the tradition is correct, this would be an instance, like that of Demeter and the pig, of an animal embodiment of the corn-spirit being connected with a later anthropomorphic corn-goddess.