Tegau Eurfron

Tegau Eurfron is a Welsh holy woman, the wife of Caradog Freichfras (477 to 540). In the Middle Ages she was best known for three things: her mantle (one of the Thirteen Treasures of Britain), her faithfulness and her virginity. She is described as the wife of Caradog in the French romances Livre de Carados and Le Manteau Mal Taillé, a short piece from the end of the twelfth century.

The first record of the name Tegau is from the fourteenth century, in the work of Goronwy Ddu ap Tudur and in a poem by Dafydd ap Gwilym. Guto'r Glyn compares his patroness to her, and his patron to Caradog; he says her mantle reached the floor, while the mantles of other women were not so long. The poets refer to her as a symbol of the purity of her virginity and of her faithfulness to her husband. The name Eurfron appears for the first time in 1576.

Several tales were told about her, spreading from Wales through Britain to France. One explains how she got the name Eurfron. Another tells of her mantle, with secret properties, which proved whether a woman was a virgin or not; it is in Le Manteau Mal Taillé and later in an English ballad, The Boy and the Mantle, with a link to Guinevere, wife of King Arthur. In the story the mantle did not fit the court ladies and looked torn on them; when Tegau put it on it was the same, but she said she had kissed her beloved, Caradog, before marrying him, and then the mantle fitted her like a glove. A third tale speaks of a drinking horn that spills wine over any man whose wife is unfaithful, and the last test is a carving knife, likewise a test of fidelity.

The source calls her a saint (santes) but shows no canonization.