The River Severn is Britain's longest natural waterway. It rises in mid-Wales, where it is known as the Hafren. Both these names stem from that of a river goddess, known since prehistoric times as Sabrina.
To stop anywhere along Sabrina's course, or on either side of her beautiful estuary, is to risk becoming absorbed and transfixed by her ever-moving, yet timelessly repetitive progress. Throw a net across Sabrina, from side to side, and you might catch a fish, but the body of her stream will pass straight through the mesh.
Can words possibly convey the elusive majesty of her current, or adequately describe its multi-stranded sacred story? In Spirits of Severn, artist and mythographer Michael Dames - whose acclaimed work includes The Silbury Treasure, The Avebury Cycle and Mythic Ireland - brings the river's illusive legacy to the surface, while tracing her progress from her pair of sources to the furthest tips of her Mor Hafren estuary.
Born in 1938, Michael Dames was educated at Aylesbury Grammar School and Birmingham University.
He worked in education for much of his career, teaching both Art and History of Art. Between 1976 and 1981 he was Rochdale's Town Artist. He has had one-man exhibitions of his art works in Rochdale, Hull, Manchester, Oxford, Droitwich, Northwich, and London.
In 1976, he began a long-term investigation of the mythography of the West of England, Wales and Ireland with The Silbury Treasure (Thames and Hudson, 1976; reprinted 2004) and The Avebury Cycle the following year (Thames and Hudson, 1977; 2nd edition 1992). Both books are now regarded as classics of the genre.
Since 1990, he has dedicated himself to writing full-time. His books include: Mythic Ireland (Thames and Hudson, 1992); Ireland, a Sacred Journey (Element Books, 2000); Merlin and Wales (Thames and Hudson, 2002); Taliesin's Travels (Heart of Albion Press, 2006); Silbury, Resolving the Enigma (The History Press, 2010); Pagans Progress (Strange Attractor Press, 2017).
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