The Book of Taliesin () is one of the most famous of Middle Welsh manuscripts, dating from the first half of the 14th century though many of the fifty-six poems it preserves are taken to originate in the 10th century or before. The volume contains some of the oldest poems in Welsh, possibly but not certainly dating back to the sixth century and to a real poet called Taliesin (though these, if genuine, would have been composed in the Cumbric dialect of Brittonic-speaking early medieval north Britain, being adapted to the Welsh dialect of Brittonic in the course of their transmission in Wales). Date and provenance of the manuscript The manuscript, known as Peniarth MS 2 and kept at the National Library of Wales, is incomplete, having lost a number of its original leaves including the first. It was named Llyfr Taliessin in the seventeenth century by Edward Lhuyd and hence is known in English as "The Book of Taliesin". The palaeographer John Gwenogvryn Evans dated the Book of Taliesin to around 1275, but Daniel Huws dated it to the first quarter of the fourteenth century, and the fourteenth-century dating is generally accepted. The Book of Taliesin was one of the collection of manuscripts amassed at the mansion of Hengwrt, near Dolgellau, Gwynedd, by the Welsh antiquary Robert Vaughan (c. 1592–1667); the collection later passed to the newly established National Library of Wales as the Peniarth or Hengwrt-Peniarth Manuscripts. It appears that some "marks" presumably awarded for poems – measuring their "value" – are extant in the margin of the Book of Taliesin. Contents by topic Titles adapted from Skene. Praise poems to Urien Rheged XXXI "Gwaeith Gwen ystrad" ("The Battle of Gwen ystrad") XXXII Urien Yrechwydd (A Song for Urien Rheged) XXXIII Eg gorffowys (A Song for Urien Rheged) XXXIV Bei Lleas Vryan (A Song for Urien Rheged) XXXV "Gweith Argoet Llwyfein"("The Battle of Argoed Llwyfain") XXXVI Arddwyre Reged (A Song for Urien Rheged) XXXVII "Yspeil Taliesin" ("The Spoils of Taliesin") XXXIX "Dadolwch Vryen" ("The Satisfaction of Urien") Other praise-songs XII "Glaswawt Taliesin" ("The Praise of Taliesin") XIV "Kerd Veib am Llyr" ("Song Before the Sons of Llyr") XV "Kadeir Teyrnon" ("The Chair of the Sovereign") XVIII Kychwedyl am dodyw ("A rumour has come to me") XIX "Kanu y Med" ("Song of Mead") XX "Kanu y Cwrwf" ("Song of Ale") XXI "Etmic Dinbych" ("Praise of Tenby") XXIII "Trawsganu Kynon"