Welsh History

The foundation dates of three castles in Maelienydd, traditionally built by the Mortimers.  However the contemporary evidence suggests that Prince Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (d.1240) was far more likely the builder of Cefnllys and Knucklas castles.
The evidence for the foundation of Timboeth by Roger Mortimer in late 1267 and Dolforwyn by Dafydd ap Llywelyn (d.1246) is also put forward.

Welsh and Northwest English Quakers organized their settlement in the Delaware Valley to promote the spiritual development of their children and thereby built a rich agricultural economy that discouraged slavery locally while promoting it in the Atlantic World.

La colonia Chubut, establecida en 1865 a orillas del río Chubut fue la primera colonia agrícola de la Patagonia. Su fundación marcó la continuidad en tierras australes de una política de colonización que se había iniciado casi una década atrás en la órbita de la denominada Confederación Argentina, y que ponía a la inmigración en el centro de la escena. En efecto, entendidos entonces como “agentes civilizatorios” los inmigrantes europeos fueron los destinatarios de campañas de promoción oficiales cuya principal oferta fue la propiedad de la tierra en regiones por entonces remotas. En el caso de la Colonia Chubut, esos inmigrantes eran originarios de Gales, un pequeño país ubicado al oeste de la Gran Bretaña cuyo idioma y religión lo separaba de la vecina Inglaterra. Al grupo inicial de alrededor de centena y media de galeses, siguieron en las décadas siguientes varios cientos de colonos del mismo origen que ocuparon no solamente el valle inferior del Chubut sino también un área cordillerana conocida en galés como Cwm Hyfryd. 

Si bien puede decirse que los galeses refrendaron con su asentamiento una política del estado argentino orientada a hacer valer su soberanía sobre la Patagonia, también es cierto que la empresa colonizadora estuvo animada desde un principio por ideales de refundación de la nación galesa. De allí que el título de este trabajo incluya en primer término la expresión Gwlad yr Addewid que en galés significa “tierra prometida”. El propósito es indagar aquí en las implicancias que tuvieron esas ambiciosas aspiraciones respecto del modo en que fue percibido y recreado el territorio patagónico por aquellos que, siendo partícipes de esa colonizadora, fueron capaces en su momento de escribir sobre esa experiencia y sobre su significación. Para ello se utilizarán como fuente una serie de crónicas escritas originalmente en galés entre las décadas de 1890 y 1920 y que en términos de género y de temáticas tratadas pueden considerarse cercanas a la literatura de viajes. Corresponderá en su momento dar cuenta de esas crónicas con más detalle, pero importa primero establecer las necesarias relaciones que históricamente han vinculado a la literatura de viajes con las representaciones del territorio explorado y colonizado durante el siglo XVIII y XIX. Eso permitirá luego descubrir de qué imaginarios paisajísticos dan cuenta las imágenes acuñadas por los cronistas galeses en el particular contexto de la Patagonia.

This article examines the impact of the Children Act 1908 on longstanding concerns that foster or informally 'adoptive' parents were uniquely likely to murder the children in their care. Making particular reference to the last two high-profile cases of 'baby-farmers' tried for homicide on the Welsh and English Assize circuits (in 1907 and 1919, respectively) it argues that the infant life protection provisions in the 1908 Act had a dramatic and immediate impact on such prosecutions, removing the automatic presumption of malice in cases where fostered or adopted children died in suspicious circumstances.

This investigation of identity construction in twentieth-century Welsh Patagonia breaks new ground by looking at the Welsh community in Chubut not as a quaint anomaly, but in its proper context as an integral part of contemporary Argentina. Addressing the implications of the settler colonialism of the foundational myth of Chubut and its place in the larger question of settler colonialism throughout Argentina, it draws on the literature of the under-studied period immediately preceding the turn-of-the-twentieth-century revitalization of the Welsh community in Patagonia. Ultimately, it presents a newly broad, much richer panorama of what it means to be Welsh in Argentina, free from old stereotypes and fully part of the contemporary nation.

This paper discusses the depiction of ambushes in chronicles of the High Middle Ages. Identifying ambushes in this period is particularly difficult, as the Latin term 'insidia' could also be used more generically to refer to stratagems, snares and cunning ploys. This paper combines evidence from contemporary chronicles, Patristic and medieval theological writing and Anglo-Norman epic verse to examine the variety of situations in which ambushes were used by medieval combatants and the different lessons that historians drew from tales of warriors ambushed (or ambushing) unawares.

This paper analyses the relationship between popular culture and popular protest. In doing so it acknowledges and reaffirms the incorporation into the study of popular movements of techniques previously associated with social anthropology. This approach involves studying the historical use of symbol and ritual as a means of unlocking the significance of popular protest and of demonstrating complexities and continuity within it. I shall apply this approach to two popular movements in nineteenth century Wales, whose symbolic and ritual aspects have not been fully appreciated in previous scholarship, and consider their integration of symbolic and ritual elements of popular culture into social and economic protest.

Until recently, studies of how Wales entered the First World War have generally been overlooked. Often, the British narrative has been assumed for the Welsh experience, with the once popular topos of war enthusiasm being recently displaced by a more nuanced approach. This paper revisits the July Crisis of 1914 as presented in the Welsh press and argues that on the whole, a complicated picture existed in Welsh newspapers where narratives of race and civilization formed the roots of war culture, yet justification for war was often submerged beneath feelings of opposition and indifference. Eventually, despite some strong feelings of opposition, the Welsh press succumbed to the inevitability of a general European war.

T. P. Ellis’ 50 pages of legal analysis of the Mabinogion (1928) is exceptionally methodical and detailed, with supporting  quotes on all important points, and  page referencing to the mediaeval MSS. As a high court judge in a tribal society Ellis' professional expertise is particularly apt. His paper is therefore highly recommended as a priority source analysis. Unfortunately his paper is not openly accessible, so I am sharing my own study paraphrase, which reduces 50 pages to 17 pages. It includes all Ellis' points relating to the Four Branches, and names comparisons with other tales. The key issue of sarhad, honour, is thoroughly analysed with legal provisions, and Mabinogion examples. Ellis comments this is central to an understanding of the texts.

Ellis, Thomas Peter., ‘Legal References, Terms, and Conceptions in the  Mabinogion’, Cymm., xxxix (1928), pp. 86–147.

Many points Ellis makes are found in later literature on mediaeval Welsh prose, without crediting him. Here, as with his 1929 translation, he suffers from undeserved obscurity.
The paper can be specially requested from NLW, then the PDF still has to be transcribed as it does not copy/ paste easily. I am making my own paraphrased version of my transcription available, to save others’ from duplicating my efforts, and to provide a shorter version than the original. 

As my own research focus is the Four Branches of the Mabinogi. I include all Ellis' points in this area, often quoting him, together with the source quotes he gives and MS. page references. Comparisons with other tales from the Mabinogion are noted but usually without quotes or MS. page references. There are a few of my own points: these are indicated by square brackets. I have slightly reorganised the topics to make just five categories: political organisation, the family, criminal law/ civil law, marriage law, courts and procedure. (Ellis’ own subsections are listed at the top, which they are not in the origianl.)
The resulting document makes Ellis' excellent and painstaking work much more easily available in RTF text format (at least for the Mabinogi material, and other tales can be traced from the notes given).. Ellis' analysis has stood the test of time very well indeed and stands as a classic which needs to be openly available to scholars.

Popular interpretations of national identity often focus on the unifying qualities of nationhood. However, societies frequently draw hierarchical distinctions between the people and places who are ‘most national’, and those who are ‘least national’. Little attention is paid to these marginal places within the nation and the experiences of their inhabitants. This article helps to address this by analysing the ‘less Welsh’ British Wales region of Wales, a country which has traditionally possessed a hierarchical, regionally constituted nationhood. The article studies the British Wales region both ‘from above’- considering how some areas develop as ‘less national’- and ‘from below’, introducing empirical ethnographic work into ‘everyday Welshness’ in this area. Whilst previous work on hierarchical nationhood focuses on how hierarchies are institutionalized by the state, this article demonstrates how people at the margins of the nation actively negotiate their place in the nation. Whilst people in this area expressed a strong nationhood, they also struggled to place themselves in the nation because they had internalized their lowly place within the national hierarchy. The article demonstrates the importance of place and social class for national identity construction, and draws attention to the role of power in the discursive construction of hierarchical nationhood.

An examination of the available data used to build a tree of the early Baskerville family from 1066 to 1200.
Please feel free to add comments, corrections and any further original sources.
Hopefully this article will be published next year as an appendix to a forthcoming book.

At those times the place is like hell, or at any rate like my own mental picture of hell. Most of the things one imagines in hell are if there — heat, noise, confusion, darkness, foul air, and, above all, unbearably cramped space. Everything except the fire, for there is no fire down there except the feeble beams of Davy lamps and electric torches which scarcely penetrate the clouds of coal dust. George Orwell, " Down the Mine " 1937

Hidden behind the finished products of history are long, painstaking processes of evaluating both sources and the narratives produced from them. All historians go through these processes but for contemporary historians they have unique dimensions. Rather than having to cope with a scant historical record, the contemporary historian is more likely to be overwhelmed with sources, forcing him/her into crucial decisions of selection. An author can also be very near to a topic and thus have strong preconceptions to overcome. Moreover, his/her subjects might still be alive which raises ethical questions about ownership of the past. This article addresses such issues, paying particular attention to how writers of surveys of contemporary history have tackled them. The solutions are often literary ones and, for all the problems of writing contemporary history, when done well it can be lively, entertaining, engaging, unsettling and provocative.

There is relatively little about the Four Branches of the Mabinogi itself in the Mabinogion chapter section. The relevant material needs gathering from scattered points elsewhere, as is done here below.
The book does much to classify types of literature, firstly into four periods and the book focuse the second: 1080 – 1350. Stephens critiques mediaeval bardic poetry as elitist, with strict rules and therefore narrow concerns, though reliable as records.  This contrasts with the popular prose stories which offer portraits of living society, with distinctive social values.
‘Mabinogi’ and ‘Mabinogion’ are given a clear and consistent explanation, which is very useful to grasp the literary context of the 18th-19thC regarding these terms. ‘Mabinogi’ means a pre-Arthurian prose narrative of a personage, with ‘Mabinogion’ as its plural. He gives a helpful translation of Lhuyd’s 1707 categorisation of prose stories in three groups (the original is in Latin); the first is Mabinogion. Stephens then prefers a simple two categories of Mabinogion and other Stories, as pre-Arthurian or post-Arthurian according to their content.
A rare profiling of the (Four Branches of the) Mabinogi is his point that the ‘supernatural’ is essential to its plot ‘machinery’. Annwfn is a key aspect of this which is accessible to some people. He proposes the title Pen Annwfn means Pwyll and Pryderi guard that access. Notably there is no promotion of Pryderi as the hero of the Branches as in later theory; he appears only as Pwyll’s son. Rhiannon is not mentioned. Nor is Gwydion other than in quoted poems. Other major characters, Bendigeidfran, Arianrhod, Lleu are also absent.
He notes the frequent use of dialogue in the Mabinogion, which may indicate a performance drama tradition. He admires Mabinogion free flowing style of language, and the storytellers as part of an  intenrational culture.
Stephens writes in an accessible style, and gives all due credit to his scholarly predecessors, with a good if not perfect provision of references.

Se realiza una revisión crítica del estado de la cuestión, a través del análisis de las diversas posiciones sostenidas en las principales crónicas y producciones historiográficas, para luego efectuar un balance y exponer las principales conclusiones a las que hemos arribado, a la luz de nuestro trabajo de tesis doctoral (Gavirati 2012).
Más allá del relato clásico de una convivencia espontánea y absolutamente armoniosa, surgida de la generosa ayuda brindada por los “pacíficos tehuelches” y del trato humanitario de los colonos, presente en la tradición oral y en algunos textos de carácter histórico o periodístico, como asimismo de una producción crítica que pone en duda su singular carácter pacífico, la relación entre galeses, pampas y tehuelches presenta elementos y características que la ubican como un caso atípico con respecto al modo relacional que imperara en la frontera pampeano patagónica: 1) un establecimiento promovido por un grupo colonizador extranjero con objetivos propios que trascendían los del Estado nacional, 2) su ubicación en pleno territorio indígena sin protección militar estatal, 3) la ausencia de enfrentamientos violentos durante las dos décadas de convivencia en relativo aislamiento.
Los ejes centrales que articularon nuestro trabajo de investigación, que ahora procuramos sintetizar, apuntaron a historiar, analizar y explicar las bases constitutivas (políticas, económicas y socioculturales) de esta singular experiencia relacional. En particular: a) identificar los actores sociales subyacentes bajo los indefinidos rótulos de “galeses y tehuelches”, b) determinar la composición cualitativa y cuantitativa de los intercambios comerciales y culturales producidos, c) detectar
las transformaciones operadas en sus respectivos espacios y los posibles cambios en la visión del “otro” como consecuencia de la interacción.
Descartados los extremos relacionales compuestos por una utópica ausencia absoluta de conflicto, como asimismo la inexorabilidad de su ocurrencia propuesta por el modelo de la “fricción interétnica”, la detección de una importante complementariedad económica y de balance o —incluso— predomino de las sociedades indígenas en el poderío bélicoeconómico, nos brindaron las herramientas necesarias para diseñar un modelo explicativo alternativo, denominado “modelo de convivencia interétnica pacífica”. Según éste, galeses, pampas y tehuelches, fueron capaces de articular sus respectivos intereses mediante la negociación y el intercambio pacífico de bienes como modos relacionales predominantes, lo que les permitió superar de forma duradera la potencial conflictividad inherente a toda interrelación social y configurar un espacio social, económico y cultural, con características propias e irrepetibles que lo distinguen de otras experiencias fronterizas.

Sports history has much to offer local history.6 It sheds light on daily life in communities, the joys and tribulations of their inhabitants, and the local impact of wider events and agencies. This article demonstrates that relevance, through an exploration of the history of a small semi-professional soccer club which played its part in giving some vitality and colour to the cultural landscape of the Rhondda. Mid Rhondda FC only existed from 1912 to 1928, and has been largely forgotten by historians and people in the Rhondda itself. Its minutes, like those of so many small organisations, have been lost but through the rich vein of material in local newspapers, supplemented by company records and other sources, it is possible to capture something of the club’s story. Its short and turbulent history sheds light not only on underexplored areas of the historiography of sport, but also, perhaps, on the very nature of what local history should be about

The prehistoric monuments of southern Anglesey have been interpreted in various ways over the past three centuries, as an examination of the work of antiquarians, artists, landscape designers, and other contemporary commentators reveals. During the post-medieval period, the meanings of these monuments shifted, as perceptions of the pre-Roman era changed. As embodiments of the past, megalithic monuments were embraced by Welsh historians, antiquarians and artists, in the movement to formulate a Welsh national identity. Moreover, their incorporation into landscape gardens was indicative of the extent to which they captured the contemporary imagination. Local communities, meanwhile, reacted in differing ways to the megaliths, influenced concurrently by superstition and agrarian pragmatism.

This document provides a stripped down and minimally annotated translation of the ninth century Cambro-Latin 'History of the Britons'. In contrast to most offer version available all the later additions has, so far as they can be identified, been removed.

This chart, keyed to Rachel Bromwich's seminal work "Troiedd Ynys Prydein," lists every known triad from the Welsh canon and the manuscripts in which they appear.  It uses Bromwich's triad names and numeration for ease of use. 

This is useful both as an index for Bromwich's book and as a shorthand list of available manuscripts for codicological study. 

Adapted from:  Bromwich, Rachel.  Troiedd Ynys Prydein = The Welsh Triads.  Cardiff:  U of Wales P, 1991.

From the sixth century forward, the early written sources for post-Roman Britain agree on the same dated events. In particular, the dates in chapter sixty-six of the Historia Brittonum coincide with those in Bede and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and are consistent with Gildas’ sequence of post-Roman events. Any variation is due to the Historia author’s incorrect belief that consuls (and not emperors) ruled Rome after 388. This in turn fully explains twenty-four supposedly missing years in chapter sixty-six. Recognition that relative, or ‘stepping stone,’ dating underpins early post-Roman historiography accounts for current chronological inconsistencies.

Genealogy was a central element of life in medieval Wales. It was the force that held society together and the framework for all political action. For these reasons, genealogical writing in medieval Wales, as elsewhere in Europe, became a fundamental tool for representing and manipulating perceptions of the socio-political order across historical and literary time. From its beginnings within an early medieval Insular genre of genealogical writing, Welsh genealogy developed across the Middle Ages as a unique and pervasive phenomenon.
This book provides the first integrated study of and comprehensive introduction to genealogy in medieval Wales, setting it in the context of genealogical writing from Ireland, England and beyond and tracing its evolution from the eighth to the sixteenth century. The three most important collections of secular genealogies are carefully analysed and their composition is considered in relation to medieval Welsh politics. Particular attention is devoted to the pedigrees of the kings and princes of Gwynedd, which were subject to many intricate alterations over time. The book also includes fresh critical editions of the most significant extant collections of secular genealogy.

If you go into St. Michael's church in Llanyblodwel (which you should, if only to see its beautifully painted interior), you will find a small brass plaque beneath a stained glass window that reads: "To the glory of God and in memory of Elias Owen MA, FSA, vicar of this parish 1892-98, Diocesan Inspector of Schools 1876-1892, author of The Old Stone Crosses of the Vale of Clwyd and Welsh Folk Lore &c. This window and tablet are dedicated by his many friends in this diocese." Elias Owen was born in Llandysilio in 1833. He was one of nine children. His mother and father, Susannah and James Owen, were farmers, and James would later become one of the first constables in the Montgomeryshire Constabulary, which was established in 1840.

Footprints, handprints and game boards, incised on flat slate gravestones, are to be found in a large number of churchyards in north Wales. These graffiti seem to be the remnants of a folk tradition of the late 18th and 19th centuries, of which little record survives. The largest and most interesting collection is in the churchyard at Dolgellau, where 27 slabs have some 57 graffiti, including an unusually large number of handprints. Traditions relating to footprints are discussed and the 12th century stone at Llanetyd Church, with a deeply incised footprint, is described.

The series Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae traces the English cathedral clergy from the Norman Conquest of 1066 to the later nineteenth century. Cathedral positions were often used either to reward individuals of outstanding merit or to support important servants of church and/or state. Accordingly, many of the individuals catalogued here were significant in the leadership and administration of church and state, were active members of the universities, were prominent in authorship and scholarly endeavour, and so forth.

The Fasti enables users to trace networks of patronage, competition and collegiality among these most prominent members of the English church. It is also useful in interpreting historical documents. For example: In an archive, one might find an undated letter from the archdeacon of this place to the dean of that cathedral, obliquely referring to comments made by a certain bishop in the House of Lords. By looking up the individuals concerned, the range of dates when the individuals held these offices enables approximate dating of the letter and gives the document, perhaps otherwise uninterpretable, enough historical context that it can contribute to our knowledge.

This volume follows the clergy of Hereford Cathedral from the Reformation to the later nineteenth century, and is based on over 50,000 pages of unpublished manuscript material.

This essay provides an analysis of how and when St Winefride’s cult became popular; how personal and political motives lead to the promotion of the cult (particularly at Holywell, Shrewsbury and Basingwerk) and also how her popularity extended beyond Wales. It includes interesting discussions of cures at the well, royal visitors and the post-reformation cult, and traces the origins of the cult and its development in a chronological fashion.

Evan Roberts is a key historic figure, deeply involved with the remarkable Welsh revival of 1904.  This paper analyzes how 10% of the Welsh population became involved in the revival within two years.  It also looks at the social impact on Welsh culture, particularly in terms of crime, alcohol abuse, and the court system.

Slide show to accompany discussion of Welsh immigration and settlement in the American Midwest. Topics include: Overview of Welsh immigration to North America, 1600s-1900; reasons for emigration in the 19th century; agricultural and industrial immigrants; migration to the Midwest; Welsh churches and religious organizations; the Welsh language and eisteddfodau; prominent Welsh-Americans from the region.

This is the story of the killing of Prince Llywelyn gathered from translations of the original documents - many of which have not been translated before.  The book takes a long look at those recorded as involved in the events of that day as well as many myths that have grown up over the centuries.

The study aims to analyse the culture of the visual arts in Wales between 1940 and 1994 – a period when the British state took formal responsibility for arts patronage through the Arts Council of Great Britain.  Special attention focuses on how exhibitions organised by Welsh representatives of the Arts Council helped define and assert a Welsh sense of national identity, whose interests this served, and what were its wider implications.  Following Peter Lord’s idea of an “Aesthetics of Relevance,” the study therefore examines Welsh art in relation to the broader social, political and economic development of the Welsh nation.  Using discourse analysis of exhibition files held in the Welsh Arts Council Archive, together with other primary and secondary sources, the study finds that the Welsh Arts Council promoted a British sense of Welshness – conceived first in communal, later in more progressive terms – that served to legitimise and reproduce the British social democratic consensus negotiated between government, capital and labour during the Second World War.  At the same time, it marginalised nationalist ideas of Wales.  This was achieved not only through the kinds of images shown by the Welsh Arts Council, but also how they were presented to Welsh audiences.  In conceptual terms, the Welsh Arts Council can therefore be thought of as a “disciplinary mechanism” which made use of curatorial practices of display to regulate images into discursive formations that permitted, and so naturalised, certain ways of thinking about national identity, while silencing others.  In turn, this codification of national culture helped define the social-space of the Welsh nation.  On the other hand, audiences often challenged the authorised version of Welsh art through the different knowledges and experiences they brought to a display site.  Art is therefore a key discursive space in which consensus on national identity is negotiated and contested.

| Praise for Exhibiting Welshness:

"For the evolution of Arts Council policy in Wales, see Huw David Jones, 'Exhibiting Welshness: Art, Politics and National Identity in Wales, 1940-1994', unpublished PhD thesis, Swansea University, 2007. I have drawn extensively on the work of Dr Jones for this chapter, and I am greatly indebted to him for his enrichment of my understanding of the period".

Peter Lord (2016). The Tradition: A New History of Welsh Art, 1400-1990. Cardigan: Parthian, p.322 [n.28]. (Peter Lord is Wales's leading art historian)