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diff --git a/24947-h/24947-h.htm b/24947-h/24947-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1fe3f92 --- /dev/null +++ b/24947-h/24947-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4710 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Mediæval Wales; Six Popular Lectures, by A. G. Little. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + table tr td {padding-top: .5em; padding-bottom: .5em;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + a {text-decoration: none;} + + img {border: none;} + + em {font-style: italic;} + + sup {vertical-align: .2em; font-size: .8em;} + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-style: normal; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + + .bbox {border: solid 2px; padding: 1em;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .lowercase {text-transform: lowercase;} + + .dropcap {float: left; padding-right: 3px; font-size: 350%; line-height: 83%;} /* Plain dropcaps */ + + .caption {font-weight: bold; text-align: center; padding-bottom: 3em; padding-top: 1em;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 3em;} + + .link {font-weight: bold; font-size: small;} /* for links to larger images */ + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: .2em; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + + .tdl {text-align: left; vertical-align: bottom;} /* left align cell */ + .tdrt {text-align: right; vertical-align: top;} /* right top align cell */ + .tdrb {text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;} /* right bottom align cell */ + .tdc {text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom; border: 2px solid black;} /* center align cell */ + .tdcb {text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom; font-weight: bold; border-top: 2px solid black; border-left: 2px solid black; border-right: 2px solid black;} /* center align cell bold */ + .tdlin {text-align: left; text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 2em; padding-right: 1em; + border-left: 2px solid black; border-right: 2px solid black;} + .tdlint {text-align: left; text-indent: -1em; padding-left: 2em; padding-right: 1em; + border-top: 2px solid black; border-left: 2px solid black; border-right: 2px solid black;} + + .sig {text-align: right; margin-right: 4em;} /* address of letter aligned right */ + + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mediæval Wales, by A. G. Little + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Mediæval Wales + Chiefly in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: Six Popular Lectures + +Author: A. G. Little + +Release Date: March 29, 2008 [EBook #24947] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEDIÆVAL WALES *** + + + + +Produced by Sam W. and the Online Distributed Proofreading +Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from +images generously made available by The Internet +Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + +<h1 style="padding-top: 3em;"><span class="smcap">Mediæval Wales</span></h1> + +<p class="center">CHIEFLY IN THE TWELFTH<br /> +AND THIRTEENTH CENTURIES</p> + +<h2 style="padding-top: 3em;">Six Popular Lectures</h2> + +<p class="center"><b>BY</b></p> + +<h2>A. G. LITTLE, M.A., <span class="smcap">F.R.Hist.S.</span></h2> + +<p class="center" style="font-size: small;">PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY<br /> +COLLEGE OF SOUTH WALES AND MONMOUTHSHIRE<br /> +AUTHOR OF “THE GREY FRIARS IN OXFORD,” ETC.</p> + +<p class="center" style="padding-top: 3em;">WITH MAPS AND PLANS</p> + + +<p class="center" style="padding-top: 5em;">LONDON<br /> +T. FISHER UNWIN<br /> +<span class="smcap">Paternoster Square</span><br /> +1902</p> + + + +<p class="center" style="padding-top: 5em;">[<i>All rights reserved.</i>]</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p> + +<h2>PREFACE</h2> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">T</span>HIS volume contains the substance +of a course of popular Lectures delivered +at Cardiff in 1901. The work +does not claim in any way to be an +original contribution to knowledge, and is +published on the recommendation of some +friends in whose literary judgment I have +confidence. In a popular book of this +kind I have not thought it necessary to +give detailed references to authorities, but +a list of a few of the books which I used +in the preparation of the Lectures, and +which are likely to be interesting to +readers of Welsh history, may be useful. +Among mediæval works I may mention +the two Welsh chronicles—the Annales +Cambriæ and the Brut y Tywysogion, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span> +both published in the Rolls Series; +Geoffrey of Monmouth’s “History of the +Kings of Britain” (translated in Bohn’s +“Six Old English Chronicles”); Giraldus +Cambrensis, “The Itinerary and Description +of Wales” (translated in Bohn’s +library); the prefaces, especially those by +Brewer, in the Rolls Series edition of +Giraldus, will be found interesting. Of +the English chroniclers, Ordericus Vitalis, +Roger of Wendover, and Matthew Paris +are perhaps the most valuable for the history +of Wales and the Marches during the +twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Among +modern books, the reader may be referred +to Rhys and Jones, “The Welsh People”; +Freeman, “William Rufus”; Thomas +Stephens, “Literature of the Kymry”; +Henry Owen, “Gerald the Welshman”; +Clark, “Mediæval Military Architecture,” +and “The Land of Morgan”; Newell, +“History of the Welsh Church”; Tout, +“Edward I.”; and the “Dictionary of +National Biography.” Since these Lectures +were delivered at least three books +on Welsh history have appeared which +deserve mention: Mr. Bradley’s “Owen +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span> +Glyndwr,” with a summary of earlier +Welsh history; Mr. Owen Edwards’s +charmingly written volume in the Story +of the Nations Series; and Mr. Morris’s +valuable work on “The Welsh Wars of +Edward I.”</p> + +<p>The maps are taken from large wall +maps which I used when lecturing. In +drawing up the map of Wales and the +Marches at the beginning of the thirteenth +century, I had the assistance of my friend +and former pupil, Mr. Morgan Jones, +M.A., of Ferndale, who generously placed +at my disposal the results of his researches +into the history of the Welsh Marches.</p> + +<p class="sig">A. G. LITTLE.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span></p> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="60%" summary="Table of contents"> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt"> </td> + <td class="tdl"> </td> + <td class="tdrt"><small>PAGE</small></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">I.</td> + <td class="tdl">INTRODUCTORY</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">II.</td> + <td class="tdl">GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">III.</td> + <td class="tdl">GIRALDUS CAMBRENSIS</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">IV.</td> + <td class="tdl">CASTLES</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_77">77</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">V.</td> + <td class="tdl">RELIGIOUS HOUSES</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_99">99</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdrt">VI.</td> + <td class="tdl">LLYWELYN AP GRUFFYDD AND THE BARONS’ WAR</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td> + </tr> +</table> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p> + +<h2>MAPS AND PLANS</h2> + + +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="60%" summary="Maps and plans"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"> </td> + <td class="tdrt"><small>PAGE</small></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">WALES AND THE MARCHES, c. A.D. 1200-1210</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_2">2</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">CASTLES AND RELIGIOUS HOUSES</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">CARDIFF AND CAERPHILLY CASTLES</td> + <td class="tdrb"><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td> + </tr> +</table> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 394px;"> +<img src="images/mwspl01th.png" width="394" height="500" alt="" /> +<span class="link"><a href="images/mwspl01.png">See larger image</a></span> +</div> + +<p class="caption">WALES & THE MARCHES, c. A.D. 1200-1210.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p> + +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>INTRODUCTORY</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>N the following lectures no attempt +will be made to give a systematic +account of a political development, +which is the ordinary theme of history. +History is “past politics” in the wide +sense of the word. It has to do with +the growth and decay of states and +institutions, and their relations to each +other. The history of Wales in the +Middle Ages, viewed from the political +standpoint, is a failure; its interest is +negative; and in this introductory lecture +I intend to discuss “the failure of the +nation” (to use the words of Professor +Rhys and Mr. Brynmor Jones) “to effect +any stable and lasting political combination.” +Wales failed to produce or +develope political institutions of an enduring +character—failed to become a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> +state. Its history does not possess the +unity nor the kind of interest which the +history of England possesses, and which +makes the study of English history so +peculiarly instructive to the student of +politics. In English history we study +primarily the growth of the principle of +Representative Government, which we +can trace for centuries through a long +series of authoritative records. That is +the great gift of England to the world. +Not only has Wales entered on this +inheritance; it helped to create it. It +was Llywelyn ap Iorwerth who began +the revolt against John which led to the +Great Charter, and the clauses of the +Great Charter itself show that it was the +joint work of English and Welsh. Wales +again exerted a decisive influence on the +Barons’ War—the troubles in which the +House of Commons first emerged. And +Wales—half of it for more than six +hundred years—half of it for nearly four +hundred—has lived under the public law +and administrative system which the +Norman and Angevin kings of England +built up on Anglo-Saxon foundations. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> +This public law and this administrative +system have become part and parcel of +the life and history of Wales. The +constitutional history of England is one +of the elements which go to make up +the complex history of Wales.</p> + +<p>The history of Wales, taken by itself, +is constitutionally weak; and its interest is +social or personal, archæological, artistic, +literary—anything but political. And the +fact—which is indisputable—that Wales +failed to establish any permanent or united +political system needs explanation.</p> + +<p>The ultimate explanation will perhaps +be found in the geography of the country. +The mountains have done much to preserve +the independence and the language +of Wales, but they have kept her people +disunited; and the Welsh needed a long +drilling under institutions, which could only +grow up in a land less divided by nature, +before they could develope their political +genius.</p> + +<p>Wales, owing largely to its geography, +had the misfortune never to be conquered +at one fell swoop by an alien race of +conquerors. Such a conquest may not at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> +first sight strike one as a blessing, but it +is, if it takes place when a people is in +an early, fluid, and impressionable stage, +as may be seen from a comparison of +countries which have undergone it with +countries which have not—a comparison, +for instance, of England with Ireland or +Germany. Perhaps the nearest parallel +in the history of Wales to the Norman +Conquest of England is the conquest of +Wales by Cunedda, the founder of the +Cymric kingdom, in the dark and troublous +times which followed the withdrawal of +the Roman troops from Britain. But +though an invader and a conqueror, +Cunedda was not an alien; he spoke +the same language as the people he +conquered and belonged to the same +race to which the most important part +of them belonged. And this militated +against his chances of becoming a founder +of Welsh unity. A race of conquerors +distinct from the conquered in blood and +language and civilisation, must hold together +for a time; they form an official +governing class, enforcing the same principles +of government, and establishing a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> +uniform administration throughout the +country. And the uniform pressure reacts +on the conquered, turning them from a +loose group of tribes into a nation. This +is what the Norman Conquest did for +England. But if the conquerors are of +the same race and language as the conquered, +they readily mix with them; +instead of holding together they identify +themselves with local jealousies and tribal +aspirations. This happened again and +again in Germany. A Saxon emperor +sends a Saxon to govern Bavaria as its +duke and hold it loyal to the central +government; the Saxon duke almost +instantaneously becomes a Bavarian—the +champion of tribal independence against +the central government; and so the +Germans remained a loose group of +tribes and states—a divided people. +This illustration suggests one of the +reasons why Cunedda’s conquest failed +to unite Wales.</p> + +<p>Again the custom of sharing landed +property among all the sons tended to +prevent the growth of Welsh unity. +Socially it appears far more just and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> +reasonable than the custom of primogeniture. +It is with the growth of +feudalism (already apparent in the Welsh +laws of the tenth century) that its political +dangers become evident. The essence of +feudalism is the confusion of political +power and landed property; the ruler is +lord of the land, the landlord is the ruler. +If landed property is divided, political +power is divided. When the Lord Rhys +died in 1197 leaving four sons, Deheubarth +had four rulers and formed four +states instead of one; and civil war +ensued.</p> + +<p>The unity of Welsh history is not to +be found in the growth of a state or a +political system. But may we regard the +history of Wales as a long and heroic +struggle inspired by the idea of nationality? +A caution is necessary here. It +is one of the besetting sins of historians +to read the ideas of the present into the +past; and to the general public historical +study is dull unless they can do so. It is +very difficult to avoid doing so; it needs a +severe training, a long immersion in the +past, and a steady passion for truth above +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +all things. In no case perhaps is this +warning so necessary as in matters involving +the idea of nationality. This is +characteristic of the present age, but it has +not been characteristic of any other to +anything like the same extent. We live +in an atmosphere of nationality; we have +seen it create the German Empire and +the kingdom of Italy, and the Welsh +University; we see it now labouring to +break up the Austrian Empire, and +perhaps changing the unchanging East. +But the whole history of Europe shows +that it is an idea of slow and comparatively +late growth. The first appearance +of nationality as a conscious principle of +political action is found in England—and +possibly in France—at the beginning of +the thirteenth century, and in Wales +about the same time; in the other +countries of Europe much later. And it +was very rarely till the very end of the +eighteenth century that it became a +dominant factor in politics. Of course our +ancestors always hated a foreigner—but +they did not love their fellow-countrymen. +The one thing a man hated more than +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> +being driven out of house and home by +a foreign invader, was being driven out +by his next-door neighbour; and, as his +neighbour was more likely to do it, and +when he did it, to stay, he hated his +neighbour most. A certain degree of +order and settled government was necessary +before the national idea could become +effective.</p> + +<p>In mediæval Wales it never succeeded +in uniting the people; the petty patriotism +of the family stood in the way of the larger +patriotism of the nation; local rivalries +and jealousies were always stronger than +the sense of national unity. The attempt +of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth to create a +National Council, like the Great Council +of England, died with him. In the final +struggle with Edward I., when for a few +months the idea of Welsh unity was nearest +realisation in action, the men of Glamorgan +fought on the winning side. Read the +“Brut y Tywysogion” and consider how +far the actions there related can have been +inspired by the feeling of nationality. +Here is the account in the “Brut” of +what was happening in Wales in 1200 +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +and the following years, the period +represented by our map.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>“1200. One thousand and two hundred +was the year of Christ when Gruffudd, son +of Cynan, son of Owain, died, after taking +upon him the religious habit, at Aberconway,—the +man who was known by all in +the isle of Britain for the extent of his gifts, +and his kindness and goodness; and no +wonder, for as long as the men who are +now shall live, they will remember his +renown, and his praise and his deeds. In +that year, Maelgwn, son of Rhys, sold +Aberteivi, the key of all Wales, for a +trifling value, to the English, for fear of +and out of hatred to his brother Gruffudd. +The same year, Madog, son of Gruffudd +Maelor, founded the monastery of Llanegwestl, +near the old cross, in Yale.</p> + +<p>“1201. The ensuing year, Llywelyn, +son of Iorwerth, subdued the cantrev of +Lleyn, having expelled Maredudd, son of +Cynan, on account of his treachery. That +year on the eve of Whitsunday, the monks +of Strata Florida came to the new church; +which had been erected of splendid +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> +workmanship. A little while afterwards, about +the feast of St. Peter and St. Paul, Maredudd, +son of Rhys, an extremely courteous young +man, the terror of his enemies, the love of +his friends, being like a lightning of fire +between armed hosts, the hope of the +South Wales men, the dread of England, +the honour of the cities, and the ornament +of the world, was slain at Carnwyllon; and +Gruffudd, his brother, took possession of his +castle at Llanymddyvri. And the cantrev, +in which it was situated, was taken possession +of by Gruffudd, his brother. And +immediately afterwards, on the feast of +St. James the Apostle, Gruffudd, son of +Rhys, died at Strata Florida, having taken +upon him the religious habit; and there +he was buried. That year there was an +earthquake at Jerusalem.</p> + +<p>“1202. The ensuing year, Maredudd, son +of Cynan, was expelled from Meirionydd, +by Howel, son of Gruffudd, his nephew, +son of his brother, and was despoiled of +everything but his horse. That year the +eighth day after the feast of St. Peter and +St. Paul, the Welsh fought against the +castle of Gwerthrynion, which was the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +property of Roger Mortimer, and compelled +the garrison to deliver up the castle, +before the end of a fortnight, and they +burned it to the ground. That year about +the first feast of St. Mary in the autumn, +Llywelyn, son of Iorwerth, raised an army +from Powys, to bring Gwenwynwyn under +his subjection, and to possess the country. +For though Gwenwynwyn was near to him +as to kindred, he was a foe to him as to +deeds. And on his march he called to +him all the other princes, who were related +to him, to combine in making war together +against Gwenwynwyn. And when Elise, +son of Madog, son of Maredudd, became +acquainted therewith, he refused to combine +in the presence of all; and with all +his energy he endeavoured to bring about +a peace with Gwenwynwyn. And therefore, +after the clergy and the religious had +concluded a peace between Gwenwynwyn +and Llywelyn, the territory of Elise, son +of Madog, his uncle, was taken from him. +And ultimately there was given him for +maintenance, in charity, the castle of +Crogen, with seven small townships. +And thus, after conquering the castle of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> +Bala, Llywelyn returned back happily. +That year about the feast of St. Michael, +the family of young Rhys, son of Gruffudd, +son of the lord Rhys, obtained possession +of the castle of Llanymddyvri.”</p> +</div> + +<p>One may almost say that Wales is +Wales to-day in spite of her political history. +Wales owes far more to her poets +and men of letters than to her princes and +their politics.</p> + +<p>Giraldus Cambrensis laid his finger on +the spot, when he said: “Happy would +Wales be if it had one prince, and that a +good one.” A necessary preliminary to +the union of Welshmen was the wiping +out of all independent Welsh princes +except one. Till that happened local +feeling would always remain stronger +than national feeling; the disintegrating +forces of family feuds and personal ambitions +and clannish loyalty would always +outweigh the sense of national unity.</p> + +<p>The Lords of the Marches were slowly +doing this for Wales; they were wiping +out all the independent Welsh princes +except one. We may see the process +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> +going on in the accompanying map, which +gives the chief political divisions of Wales +at the beginning of the thirteenth century, +and we will turn for a few minutes to consider +the fortunes of some of these petty +states and the manner of the men who +ruled them.</p> + +<p>The great Palatine Earldom of Chester, +a kingdom within the kingdom, was ruled +before 1100 by Hugh the Wolf, of +Avranches, who conquered for a time +the north coast of Wales. In Anglesey +he built a castle, and kennelled the hounds +he loved so well in a church, to find them +all mad the next morning. The stories of +his savage mutilation of his Welsh prisoners +show that he merited the name of “the +Wolf.” Yet he was the friend of the holy +Anselm, and died a monk. The struggle +between Chester and Gwynedd for the +possession of the Four Cantreds, the lands +between the Conway and the Dee, was +almost perpetual during the twelfth and +thirteenth centuries, and the fortune of war +continually changing. With the extinction +of the old line of the Earls of Chester +(1237) and the grant of the earldom to +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> +Prince Edward (1254), a new era opened +for Wales.</p> + +<p>Further south, in the Middle March, along +the upper valleys of the Severn and the +Wye, the great power of the Mortimers was +growing. They had already stretched out a +long arm to grasp Gwerthrynion. But the +greatest expansion of their power came +later, under Roger Mortimer, grandson of +Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, friend of Edward I. +in the wild days of his youth, persistent +foe of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd; and soon +the Mortimer lands embraced all Mid-Wales +and reached the sea, and a Mortimer +was strong enough to depose and +murder a king and rule England as +paramour of the queen. Savage as the +Mortimers were, they were mild compared +with one of their predecessors. +Robert Count of Bellesme and Ponthieu, +the great castle builder of his time, became +Earl of Shrewsbury and Arundel in 1098. +Men had heard tales of his ferocity on the +Continent—how he starved his prisoners +to death rather than hold them to ransom; +how, when besieging a castle, he threw in +the horses to fill up the moat, and when +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> +these were not enough he gave orders to +seize the villeins and throw them in, that +his battering rams might go forward on a +writhing mass of living human bodies. +These tales seemed incredible in England, +but the men of the Middle March believed +them when they were “flayed alive by the +iron claws” of the devil of Bellesme. In +his rebellion against Henry I. the princes +of Gwynedd supported him, till their army +was bought over by the lying promises of +the king; but the day when the Earl of +Shrewsbury surrendered to King Henry +and the whole force of England was a +day of deliverance alike to England and +to Wales.</p> + +<p>We next come to the group of lordships +held about this time by William de +Braose, lord of Bramber in Sussex. They +stretched from Radnor to Gower, from +the Monnow to the Llwchwr, and included +the castles of Builth, Brecon, +Abergavenny. But he held these lands +by different titles, and they were never +welded together. William de Braose +began his public career by calling the +princes of Gwent to a conference at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> +Abergavenny, and massacring them. He +was on intimate terms with King John, +who gave Prince Arthur into his keeping; +but this was a piece of work which +even De Braose recoiled from, and he +refused to burden his soul with Arthur’s +murder. A few years later John suddenly +turned against him, and demanded +his sons as hostages. His wife, Maud de +St. Valérie, who lived long in the popular +memory as a witch, sent back the answer: +she would not entrust her children to a +man who had murdered his nephew. The +king chased Braose from his lands, caught +his wife and eldest son, and starved them +to death in Windsor Castle. The Braose +family continued to hold Gower, but the +rest of their possessions passed to other +houses—Brecon to the Bohuns of Hereford, +Elvael to Mortimer, Abergavenny to +Hastings, Builth first to Mortimer and +then to the Crown.</p> + +<p>Glamorgan, during our period, was +attached to the earldom of Gloucester. +From Fitzhamon the Conqueror it +passed, through his daughter, to Robert +of Gloucester, and early in the thirteenth +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> +century to the great house of Clare, Earls +of Gloucester and Hertford, who held the +balance between parties in the Barons’ +War. With the organisation of Glamorgan +and with its great rulers we shall +deal later. At the time represented by +our map, it was in the hands of King +John, who obtained it by marriage. John +divorced his wife in 1200, but managed to +keep her inheritance till nearly the end of +his reign; and Fawkes de Bréauté, the +most infamous of his mercenary captains, +lorded it in Cardiff Castle.</p> + +<p>Further west, between the Llwchwr and +the Towy, lay the lordship of Kidweli, +held by the De Londres family, who had +accompanied Fitzhamon in the conquest +of Glamorgan, and were lords of Ogmore +and founders of Ewenny. One episode in +the history of this family may be mentioned—the +battle in the Vale of Towy in 1136, +when Gwenllian, the heroic wife of Rhys +ap Gruffydd, led her husband’s forces +against Maurice and De Londres, and +was defeated and slain by the Lord of +Kidweli. Her death was soon avenged +by the slaughter of the Normans at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> +Cardigan. The present castle of Kidweli +dates from the later thirteenth century, +before the war of 1277, after the +lordship had passed to the Chaworths.</p> + +<p>In the extreme west, in Dyfed, the land +of fiords, Arnulf of Montgomery had +early founded the Norman power, but he +was involved in the fall of his brother, +Robert of Bellesme, and Henry I. tried +to form the land into an English shire, +and planted a colony of Flemings in +“Little England beyond Wales.” But it +was too far off for the royal power to +be effectively exercised there, and the +Earldom of Pembroke was granted to +a branch of the De Clares, who had +already conquered Ceredigion, and built +castles at Cardigan and Aberystwyth. +The De Clares also held Chepstow and +lands in Lower Gwent. The Earldom +itself was smaller than the present shire +of Pembroke, and William Marshall, who +succeeded the De Clares through his +marriage with the daughter of Richard +Strongbow (1189), owed his commanding +position in English history of the thirteenth +century far more to his personal +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> +qualities, his courage and wisdom and +patriotism, than to his territorial possessions.</p> + +<p>It was by driving the De Clares out of +Ceredigion in Stephen’s reign that Rhys +ap Gruffydd laid the foundation of his +power, and raised Deheubarth to be the +foremost of the native principalities. +The Lord Rhys was clever and farseeing +enough to win the confidence of Henry II., +and received from him the title of Justiciar—or +King’s Deputy—in South Wales. As +long as Owain Gwynedd lived the unusual +spectacle was seen of a prince of South +Wales and a prince of North Wales +working harmoniously together. But after +Owain’s death (1170) Rhys fought with +his successors over the possession of +Merioneth, while Owain Cyfeiliog, the +poet-prince of Powys, did all he could +to thwart him. In 1197 the death of +Rhys, “the head and the shield and the +strength of the South and of all Wales,” +and the civil wars among his sons, opened +his principality again to the encroachment +of foes on all sides, and removed one danger +from Powys. Powys, however, was being +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +steadily squeezed by the pressure of +Gwynedd on one side, and the growing +power of Mortimer on the other, and its +princes resorted to a shifty diplomacy and +a general adherence—open or secret as +circumstances dictated—to the English +Crown, till they sank at length into the +position of petty feudatories of the English +king.</p> + +<p>The Prince of Gwynedd alone upheld +the standard of Welsh nationality, the +dragon of Welsh independence; only in +Gwynedd and its dependencies did the +Welsh public law prevail over feudal +custom. And what was the result? +Exactly what Giraldus Cambrensis had +foreseen and longed for. The eyes of +Welshmen everywhere began to turn to +the Lord of Eryri, the one hope of Wales. +It was an alluring—an inspiring prospect, +which opened before the princes of +Gwynedd—to head a national movement, +drive out the foreigners, and unite all +Wales under their sway. Llywelyn ap +Iorwerth, at the end of his long reign, +deliberately rejected the dream. That is +the meaning of his emphatic declaration +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +of fidelity and submission to Henry III. +in 1237. “Llywelyn, Prince of Wales, by +special messengers sent word to the king +that, as his time of life required that he +should thenceforth abandon all strife and +tumult of war, and should for the future +enjoy peace, he had determined to place +himself and his possessions under the +authority and protection of him, the English +king, and would hold his lands from +him in all fealty and friendship, and enter +into an indissoluble treaty; and if the king +should go on any expedition he would, to +the best of his power, as his liege subject, +promote it, by assisting him with troops, +arms, horses, and money.” Llywelyn the +Great refused to dispute the suzerainty of +England. This may appear pusillanimous +to the enthusiastic patriot, but subsequent +events proved the old statesman’s wisdom +and clearsightedness. His successors were +less cautious, were carried away by the +patriotism round them and the syren +voices of the bards. And to Llywelyn ap +Gruffydd the prospect was even more +tempting than to Llywelyn ap Iorwerth. +The Barons’ War weakened the power of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> +England, and the necessities of Simon de +Montfort led him to enter into an alliance +with Llywelyn. The expansion of Gwynedd +was great and rapid. Llywelyn’s +rule extended as far south as Merthyr, +and made itself felt on the shores of +Carmarthen Bay. The Earl of Gloucester +found it necessary to build Caerphilly +Castle to uphold his influence in +Glamorgan. But it was just the expansion +of Llywelyn’s power which forced +Edward I. to overthrow him once for all. +“We hold it better”—so ran Edward’s +proclamation in 1282—“that, for the +common weal, we and the inhabitants of +our land should be wearied by labours +and expenses this once, although the +burden seem heavy, in order to destroy +their wickedness altogether, than that we +should in future times, as so often in the +past, be tormented by rebellions of this +kind at their good pleasure.”</p> + +<p>The “Principality” now became shire +land—under English laws and English +administration. The rest of Wales remained +divided up into Marcher Lordships +for another two hundred and fifty +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> +years, under feudal laws—a continual +source of disturbance and scene of disorder. +These were the lands in which +the King’s Writ did not run, where (to +summarise the description in the Statute +of 1536) “murders and house-burnings, +robberies and riots are committed with +impunity, and felons are received, and +escape from justice by going from one +lordship to another.”</p> + +<p>Yet the Marcher Lords did something +for Welsh civilisation in their earlier +centuries. Guided by enlightened self-interest, +they often founded towns, granting +considerable privileges to them in +order to attract burgesses—such as low +rents, and freedom from arbitrary fines. +Fairs, too, were established and protected +by the Lords Marchers. The early lords +of Glamorgan seem to have been specially +successful in this respect; in the twelfth +century immigrants from other parts of +Wales are said to have come to reside in +Glamorgan, owing to the privileges and +comparative security which were to be +found there. Nor perhaps has it been +sufficiently recognised how soon the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> +Lords of the Marches began drilling +their Welsh subjects in Anglo-Norman +methods of local self-government. Most +of the greater Marcher Lords possessed +estates in England; not a few of them, +such as William de Braose, served as +sheriffs in English shires; some, such +as John de Hastings, were judges in the +royal courts. They introduced into Wales +methods of government which they learnt +in England, and institutions with a great +future before them, like the Franco-Roman +“inquest by sworn recognitors,” +from which trial by jury was developed, +were soon acclimatised in the Marches of +Wales.</p> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">W</span>HEN Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote, +Norman influence in Wales was at +its height. In the old days we used to +begin English history with William the +Conqueror; since Freeman wrote his five +thick volumes and proved—not that the +Norman Conquest was unimportant—but +that it did not involve a breach of continuity, +a new start in national life, the +pendulum has swung too much the other +way, and the tendency of late years has +been to underestimate the importance of +the Norman Conquest.</p> + +<p>The Norman wherever he went brought +little that was new; he was but a Norseman—a +Viking—with a French polish. +He had no law of his own; he had forgotten +his own language, he had no literature. +But he had the old Norse energy; +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +which not only drove him or his ancestors +to settle and conquer in lands so distant +and diverse as Russia and Sicily, Syria +and North America, but enabled him to +infuse new life into the countries he conquered. +Further, he still retained that +adaptability and power of assimilation +which is characteristic of peoples in a +primitive stage of civilisation. With a +wonderful instinct he fastened on to the +most characteristic and strongest features +of the different nations he was brought in +contact with, developed them, gave them +permanent form, and often a world-wide +importance.</p> + +<p>The Norman conquerors were not +always fortunate in their selection. Ireland +has little to thank them for. The most +striking characteristic which they found in +Ireland was anarchy, and they brought it +to a high pitch of perfection. To quote +Sir J. Davies’s luminous discourse on +Ireland, in 1612: “Finding the Irish +exactions to be more profitable than the +English rents and services, and loving the +Irish tyranny which was tied to no rules +of law and honour better than a just and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> +lawful seigniory, they did reject the +English law and government, received the +Irish laws and customs, took Irish surnames, +as MacWilliam, MacFeris, refused +to come to Parliaments, and scorned to +obey those English knights who were sent +to command and govern this kingdom.”</p> + +<p>One extortionate Irish custom, called +“coigny,” they specially affected, of which +it was said “that though it were first +invented in hell, yet if it had been used +and practised there as it hath been in Ireland, +it had long since destroyed the very +kingdom of Beelzebub.”</p> + +<p>England and Wales were more fortunate. +In England—while the old English literature +was crushed out by the heel of the +oppressor, the Norman instinct seized on +the latent possibilities of the old English +political institutions, welded them into a +great system, developed out of them +representative government, and created a +united nation.</p> + +<p>In Wales, the Normans paid little or no +heed to Welsh laws and political institutions; +the law of the Marches was the +feudal law of France, the charters of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> +liberties of the towns were imported from +Normandy; the Welsh Marches and +border shires were the most thoroughly +Normanised part of the whole kingdom. +But with a fine instinct for the really great +things, in Wales the Normans seized on +the literary side—the poetic traditions of +the people—giving them permanent form, +adding to them, making them for ever part +of the intellectual heritage of the whole +world.</p> + +<p>It may very likely be a mere accident +that the earliest Welsh manuscripts date +from the twelfth-century—Norman times; +it may also imply an increased literary productiveness. +It may be due to accidental +causes that the first accounts of Eisteddfodau +extant date from the twelfth century; +it may also be that the institution excited +new interest, received new attention and +honour, under the influence of the open-minded +and keen-sighted invaders. Take, +for instance, the account of the great +Eisteddfod in 1176, from the Brut y +Tywysogion: “The lord Rhys held a +grand festival at the castle of Aberteivi, +wherein he appointed two sorts of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> +competitions—one between the bards and +poets, and the other between harpers, +fiddlers, pipers, and various performers of +instrumental music; and he assigned two +chairs for the victors in the competitions; +and these he enriched with vast gifts. A +young man of his own court, son to Cibon +the fiddler, obtained the victory in instrumental +music, and the men of Gwynedd +obtained the victory in vocal song; and +all the other minstrels obtained from the +lord Rhys as much as they asked for, so +that there was no one excluded.” An +Eisteddfod where every one obtained +prizes, and every one was satisfied, +suggests the enthusiasm natural to a new +revival. It was now—when Wales was +brought in contact with the great world +through the Normans—that modern Welsh +poetry had its beginning. The new intellectual +impetus is clearly illustrated by the +change which takes place in the Welsh +chronicles about 1100. Before that time +they are generally thin and dreary: they +suddenly become full, lively, and romantic. +Wales was not exceptional in this +renaissance; something of the same sort +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +occurred in most parts of Europe; and the +renaissance is no doubt to be connected +with the Crusade, the reform of the Church, +in a word, with the Hildebrandine movement, +and so ultimately with the Burgundian +monastery of Clugny. But it was the +Normans who brought this new life to +England and Wales; the Normans were +the hands and feet of the great Hildebrandine +movement of which the Clugniac +popes were the head.</p> + +<p>Among the Norman magnates who +encouraged the intellectual movement in +Wales—one stands out pre-eminent—Robert +Earl of Gloucester and Lord of Glamorgan, +a splendid combination of statesman, +soldier, patron of letters. Robert was +a natural son of Henry I.—born before +1100—there is no evidence that his +mother was the beautiful and famous Nest, +daughter of Rhys ap Tudor. He acquired +the Lordship of Glamorgan together with +the Honour of Gloucester and other lands +in England and Normandy, by marriage +with Mabel, daughter and heiress of Fitzhamon, +conqueror of Glamorgan. An +account of the wooing is preserved in old +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> +rhymed chronicle: the king conducts +negotiations; the lady remarks that it +was not herself but her possessions he was +after—and she would prefer to marry a man +who had a surname. The account is not +historical, as surnames had not come in: +in the early twelfth century the lady would +have expressed her meaning differently. +However, there is evidence that she was a +good wife: William of Malmesbury says, +“She was a noble and excellent woman, +devoted to her husband, and blest with a +numerous and beautiful family.” Robert +was a great builder of castles; Bristol and +Cardiff Castles were his work, and many +others in Glamorgan; he organised +Glamorgan, giving it the constitution of +an English shire—with Cardiff Castle as +centre and meeting-place. After Henry +I.’s death, he was the most important man +in England, and was the only prominent +man who played an honourable part in +the civil wars which are known as the +reign of Stephen; he died in 1147. His +relations with the Welsh appear to have +been good; large bodies of Welsh troops +fought under him at the battle of Lincoln, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> +1141—he was probably the first Norman +lord of Glamorgan who could thus rely on +their loyalty. And it is significant that +in the earliest inquisitions extant for +Glamorgan—or inquests by sworn recognitors—Welshmen +were freely employed +in the work of local government.</p> + +<p>Robert of Gloucester was a magnificent +patron of letters; to his age Giraldus +Cambrensis looked back with longing +regret as to the good old times in which +learning was recognised and received its +due reward. To Robert of Gloucester, +William of Malmesbury, the greatest +historian of the time, dedicated his history, +attributing to him the magnanimity of his +grandfather the Conqueror, the generosity +of his uncle, the wisdom of his father, +Henry I. He was the founder of Margam +Abbey, whose chronicle is one of the +authorities for Welsh history; Tewkesbury, +another abbey whose chronicle is preserved, +counted him among its chief +benefactors; Robert de Monte, Abbot of +Mont St. Michel, the Breton and lover +of Breton legends, was a native of his +Norman estates at Torigny, and wrote a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> +valuable history of his times. Among +the brilliant circle of men of letters who +frequented his court at Gloucester and +Bristol and Cardiff were Caradoc of +Llancarven, whose chronicle (if he ever +wrote one) has been lost, and greatest of +all Geoffrey of Monmouth.</p> + +<p>Geoffrey dedicated his History of the +Kings of Britain to Robert: “To you, +therefore, Robert Earl of Gloucester, this +work humbly sues for the favour of being +so corrected by your advice that it may be +considered not the poor offspring of +Geoffrey of Monmouth, but, when polished +by your refined wit and judgment, the +production of him who had Henry, the +glorious King of England, for his father, +and whom we see an accomplished scholar +and philosopher, as well as a brave soldier +and tried commander.”</p> + +<p>Not very much is known about Geoffrey. +The so-called “Gwentian Brut,” attributed +to Caradoc of Llancarven, on which his +biographers have relied for a few details +of his life, is very untrustworthy, and, +according to the late Mr. Thomas Stephens, +was written about the middle of the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> +sixteenth century, though containing earlier +matter. The sixteenth century was a +great age for historical forgeries. We +find a Franciscan interpolating passages +in a Greek manuscript of the New Testament +in order to refute Erasmus; a learned +Oxonian forging a passage in the manuscript +of Asser’s “Life of Alfred” to prove +that Alfred founded the University of +Oxford; and Welsh genealogies invented +by the dozen and the yard—reaching back +to “son of Adam, son of God.” The +“Gwentian Brut” or “Book of Aberpergwm” +is in doubtful company. The +following seem to be the facts known +about Geoffrey. In 1129 he was at +Oxford, in company with Walter, Archdeacon +of Oxford (not Walter Mapes). +His father’s name was Arthur; and he +was connected with the Welsh lords of +Caerleon. He calls himself “of Monmouth,” +either as being born there, or +as having a connection with the Benedictine +monastery at Monmouth, which +was founded by a Breton, and kept up +connections with Brittany and Anjou. +He may have been archdeacon—but not +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> +of Monmouth. The first version of his +history was finished in or before April, +1139, and the final edition of the History +was completed by 1147. In his later +years he resided at Llandaff. He was +ordained priest in February, 1152, and +consecrated bishop of St. Asaph in the +same month. In 1153 he was one of the +witnesses to the compact between King +Stephen and Henry of Anjou, which +ended the civil wars. He died at Llandaff +in 1153.</p> + +<p>We will now turn to consider the sources +of his History of the Kings of Britain. +Geoffrey says: “In the course of many +and various studies I happened to light +on the history of the Kings of Britain, +and wondered that, in the account which +Gildas and Bede, in their elegant treatises, +had given of them, I found nothing said +of those kings who lived here before +Christ, nor of Arthur, and many others; +though their actions were celebrated by +many people in a pleasant manner, and +by heart, as if they had been written. +Whilst I was thinking of these things, +Walter, Archdeacon of Oxford, a man +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> +learned in foreign histories, offered me a +very ancient book in the Britannic tongue, +which, in a continued regular story and +elegant style, related the actions of them +all, from Brutus down to Cadwallader. +At his request, therefore, I undertook the +translation of that book into Latin.” At +the end of his history he adds: “I leave +the history of the later kings of Wales to +Caradoc of Llancarven, my contemporary, +as I do also the kings of the Saxons to +William of Malmesbury and Henry of +Huntingdon. But I advise them to be +silent concerning the kings of the Britons, +since they have not that book written in +the Britannic tongue, which Walter, +Archdeacon of Oxford, brought out of +Britannia.”</p> + +<p>There has been a good deal of controversy +as to whether this very ancient +book was in Welsh or Breton, but the +first question is, Did it ever exist? Was +Geoffrey a translator, or an inventor, or +a collector of oral traditions current in +Wales or Brittany during his time?</p> + +<p>There can be little doubt that the conclusion +of Thomas Stephens, in the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +“Literature of the Kymry,” is correct—that +“Geoffrey was less a translator than +an original author.” It is very doubtful +whether the Britannic book ever existed, +whether it was not a mere ruse, such as was +often resorted to by mediæval romancers, +and is still a favourite method with +modern historical novelists—to give their +works an appearance of genuineness. It +has been argued against this, that in that +case, Archdeacon Walter must have been +a party to the fraud—which is incredible. +Such an argument implies a large ignorance +of the archdeacons of the twelfth +century—when it was a question solemnly +discussed among the learned—whether +an archdeacon could possibly be saved. +It would be well if there were nothing +worse to bring against them than such +an innocent fraud on the public as this. +But the strongest argument against the +existence of the Britannic book is (not +that it is not extant now, but) that the +historians of the next generation never +saw it. Geoffrey’s History at once created +a tremendous stir in the literary world—nor +was it accepted on trust—but received +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +with suspicion and incredulity. Thus +William of Newburgh, in the latter part of +the twelfth century, calls Geoffrey roundly, +“a saucy and shameless liar.” William, of +course, did not know Welsh, and could not +have made anything out of the Britannic +book, even if he had seen it. This objection +does not apply to Giraldus Cambrensis; +his knowledge of Welsh was indeed slight—but +he had plenty of Welsh-speaking +relatives and friends, and he was himself +a collector of manuscripts. Gerald refers +to “the lying statements of Geoffrey’s +fabulous history,” and implies in a much-quoted +passage that he regarded Geoffrey’s +history as a pack of lies. Speaking of a +Welshman at Caerleon who had dealings +with evil spirits, and was enabled by +their assistance to foretell future events, he +goes on: “He knew when any one told +a lie in his presence, for he saw the devil +dancing on the tongue of the liar. If the +evil spirits oppressed him too much, the +Gospel of St. John was placed on his +bosom, when like birds they immediately +vanished; but when the Gospel was +removed, and the History of the Britons +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> +by Geoffrey Arthur was substituted in its +place, the devils instantly came back in +greater numbers, and remained a longer +time than usual on his body and on +the book.” Geoffrey may very probably +have used some Britannic manuscript, but +it could not have been very ancient; and +he certainly did not translate it, but +used it as he used Gildas and Bede +and Nennius—sometimes quoting their +statements, more generally amplifying +them almost beyond recognition.</p> + +<p>Was Geoffrey merely an inventor? +Sometimes—undoubtedly. The long +strings of names of purely fictitious princes +whom the Roman Consul summoned to +fight against King Arthur, at a time +when in sober history Justinian was +Roman Emperor, are invented by Geoffrey. +And consider too his parodies of the +practice of historians of referring to +contemporary events: an instance of the +genuine article is given in Gerald’s +Itinerary. “In 1188, Urban III. being +pope, Frederick, Emperor of the Romans, +Isaac, Emperor of Constantinople, Philip, +King of France,” &c., &c. Now take +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +Geoffrey’s parodies: “At this time, Samuel +the prophet governed in Judæa, Æneas was +living, and Homer was esteemed a famous +orator and poet.” Or again: “At the +building of Shaftesbury an eagle spoke +while the wall of the town was being +built: and indeed I should have transmitted +the speech to posterity, had I +thought it true, like the rest of the history. +At this time Haggai, Amos, Joel, and +Azariah were prophets of Israel.” One +may be quite sure that passages like these +are not derived from the writings of the +ancients, or from oral traditions. One +can in some cases trace back his statements +and see how much he added to +his predecessors. A good instance is +his account of the conversion of the +Britons under King Lucius, in Bk. IV., +cap. 19 and 20, and V., cap. 1 (<span class="smcap lowercase">A.D.</span> 161). +Geoffrey’s account is circumstantial: King +Lucius sent to the Pope asking for +instruction in the Christian religion. +The Pope sent two teachers (whose names +are given), who almost extinguished +paganism over the whole island, dedicated +the heathen temples to the true God, and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> +substituted three archbishops for the three +heathen archflamens at London, York, +and Caerleon-on-Usk, and twenty-eight +bishops for the twenty-eight heathen +flamens. Now all this is based on a short +passage in Bede: “Lucius King of the +Britains sent to the Pope asking that he +might be made a Christian; he soon +obtained his desire, and the Britons kept +the faith pure till the Diocletian persecution,” +which itself is amplified from an +entry in the <i>Liber Pontificalis</i>: “Lucius +King of the Britains sent to the Pope +asking that he might be made a Christian.” +This last does not occur in the early version +of the <i>Liber Pontificalis</i>, and is irreconcilable +with the history and position of the +papacy in the second century; but is a +forgery, inserted at the end of the seventh +century by the Romanising party in the +Welsh Church—the party desiring to +bring the Welsh Church into communion +with the Roman, and so interested in +proving that British Christianity came +direct from the Pope; and all the talk +about the archflamens and archbishops, +&c., is pure invention. Notice too what +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> +an important part the places with which +Geoffrey is specially connected play in +his history: Caerleon is the seat of an +archbishopric and favourite residence of +Arthur; Oxford is frequently mentioned +though it did not exist until the end of +the ninth century; the Consul of Gloucester +(predecessor of Geoffrey’s patron, Robert, +Consul of Gloucester) makes the decisive +move in Arthur’s battle with the Romans.</p> + +<p>A parallel case is Geoffrey’s account of +Brutus and the descent of the Britons +from the Trojans. The tradition is found +in Nennius, and perhaps dates from the +classical revival at the court of Charlemagne. +It is clearly not a popular +tradition, but an artificial tradition of the +learned; but whilst Geoffrey did not +invent the legend, he invented all the +details—letters and speeches, and hairbreadth +escapes and tales of love and war.</p> + +<p>Probably his detailed accounts of King +Arthur’s European conquests—extending +over nearly all Western Europe, from +Iceland and Norway to Gaul and Italy—are +still more the work of Geoffrey’s +inventive genius, though it is possible +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> +they may rest on early Celtic myths +about the voyage of Arthur to Hades, +as Professor Rhys suggests, or on late +Breton traditions which mixed up Arthur +with Charles the Great.</p> + +<p>Now let us consider Geoffrey as a +gatherer and transmitter of the genuine +oral traditions of the Welsh and Breton +people. Genuine traditions are true history +in the sense that they preserve manners +and customs and modes of thought prevalent +at the time when they became +current. Thus they are on quite a +different level from Geoffrey’s inventions, +though they cannot be taken as containing +the history of any of the individuals to +whom they profess to relate. He tells us +in his preface that the actions of Arthur +and many others, though not mentioned +by historians, “were celebrated by many +people in a pleasant manner and by +heart,” were sung by poets and handed +down from generation to generation, like +the poetical traditions of every people in +primitive times. There can be no doubt +that Geoffrey collected a number of these +old stories and wove them into his narrative. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +Thus, the story of King Lear and his +daughters has the ring of a genuine popular +tradition about it, though the dates and +pseudo-historical setting were probably +supplied by Geoffrey. Again, there were +certainly prophecies attributed to Merlin +current in Geoffrey’s time. But one may +suspect Geoffrey of doing a good deal more +than translate the prophecies of Merlin; +he adapted them; one may even suspect +him of parodying them. “After him shall +succeed the boar of Totness, and oppress +the people with grievous tyranny. Gloucester +shall send forth a lion and shall +disturb him in his cruelty in several battles. +The lion shall trample him under his feet +... and at last get upon the backs of the +nobility. A bull shall come into the +quarrel and strike the lion ... but shall +break his horns against the walls of Oxford.” +“Then shall two successively sway +the sceptre, whom a horned dragon shall +serve. One shall come in armour and +ride upon a flying serpent. He shall sit +upon its back with his naked body, and +cast his right hand upon its tail.... The +second shall ally with the lion; but a +quarrel happening they shall encounter one +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> +another ... but the courage of the beast +shall prevail. Then shall one come with +a drum, and appease the rage of the lion. +Therefore shall the people of the kingdom +be at peace, and provoke the lion to a dose +of physic!”</p> + +<p>Then as to Arthur. In Geoffrey’s history +he appears mainly as a great continental +conqueror—a kind of Welsh Charlemagne. +“Many of the most picturesque and significant +features of the full-grown legend +(as Professor Lewis Jones points out)<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> are +not even faintly suggested by Geoffrey. +The Round Table, Lancelot, the Grail +were unknown to him, and were grafted +on the legend from other sources.” But +he made the Arthurian legends fashionable; +he opened for all Europe the hitherto +unknown and inexhaustible well of Celtic +romance; and it may be said without +exaggeration that “no mediæval work has +left behind it so prolific a literary offspring +as the History of the Kings of Britain.”</p> + +<p>The value of Geoffrey is not in his +fictions about past history, but in his +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +influence on the literature and ideas of the +future. He stands at the beginning of a +new age: he is the first spokesman of the +Age of the new Chivalry. Read his +glowing account of Arthur’s court, where +“the knights were famous for feats of +chivalry, and the women esteemed none +worthy of their love but such as had given +proof of their valour in three several +battles. Thus was the valour of the men +an encouragement for the women’s chastity, +and the love of the women a spur to the +knight’s bravery.” Or, as an old French +version has it, “Love which made the +women more chaste made the knights more +valorous and famous.” We have here a +new conception of love which has profoundly +influenced life and thought ever +since—love no longer a weakness as in +the ancient world, or a sin as it seemed to +the ascetic spirit of the Church, but a +conscious source of strength, an avowed +motive of heroism. And it was round +Arthur and his court that the French +poets of the next generation wove their +romances inspired by this conception—the +offspring of the union of Norman strength +and Celtic gentleness.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> See his paper on Geoffrey of Monmouth +(Transactions of the Cymmrodorion Society, +1899), to which I am much indebted.</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span></p> + +<h2>III</h2> + +<h3>GIRALDUS CAMBRENSIS</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">G</span>ERALD the Welshman was certainly +one of the most remarkable +men of letters that the Middle Ages produced—remarkable +not merely for the +great range of his knowledge, or the +voluminousness of his writings, but for +the originality of his views and variety of +his interests.</p> + +<p>In this lecture I intend to give first a +general account of his life, and then deal +in more detail with his Itinerary through +Wales.</p> + +<p>We know a great deal about Gerald; he +was interested in many things, and not +least in himself; he was not troubled by +that shrinking sense of his own worthlessness—with +the feeling of being not an +individual, but a part of a community—which +is so characteristic of mediæval +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> +writers, and led them often to omit to +mention their own names.</p> + +<p>Gerald was born about 1146, at Manorbier, +in Pembroke—“the most delightful +spot in Wales.” His ancestry is interesting. +His father was a Norman noble, +holding of Glamorgan, William de Barri +by name; his mother was the daughter of +another Norman noble, Gerald de Windsor +of Pembroke, and the famous Nest, daughter +of Rhys ap Tudor, the Helen of Wales. He +was cousin of the Fitzgeralds who played +so important a part in the conquest of +Ireland, and connected with Richard +Strongbow and the great house of Clare. +He thus “moved in the highest circles,” +and lived in an atmosphere of great deeds +and great traditions.</p> + +<p>He was from the first marked out by his +own inclinations for an ecclesiastical career. +He tells us that when he and his elder +brothers used to play as children on the +sands of Manorbier his brothers built +castles but he always built churches. He +received an elementary education from the +chaplains of his uncle, the Bishop of St. +David’s; he seems to have been slow at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> +learning when a child, and his tutors +goaded him on not by the birch rod, but +by sarcasm—by declining “<i>Stultus</i>, <i>stultior</i>, +<i>stultissimus</i>.” His higher education was +not obtained in Wales, and it is singular +that he does not notice any place of learning +in Wales in all his writings. He studied at +Gloucester, and then at Paris, the greatest +mediæval university. We have it on his +own authority that he was a model student. +“So entirely devoted was he to study, +having in his acts and in his mind, no sort +of levity or coarseness, that whenever the +Masters of Arts wished to select a pattern +from among the good scholars, they would +name Gerald before all others.” Later he +lectured at Paris on canon law and theology; +his lectures, he tells us, were very +popular. He returned thence in 1172, two +years after the martyrdom of Thomas +Becket, whose example and struggle for +the rights of the Church made a deep and +lasting impression on him. Gerald soon +obtained preferment: he held three livings +in Pembroke, one in Oxfordshire, and +canonries at Hereford and St. David’s. +His energy soon made itself felt. He +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> +excommunicated the Welshmen and Flemings +who would not pay tithes; and then +attacked the sins of the clergy. Most of +the Welsh clergy were married, contrary +to the laws of the Church. Gerald hated +a married priest even more than he hated +a monk. The Welsh priest, he says, was +wont to keep in his house a female (<i>focaria</i>) +“to light his fire but extinguish his virtue.” +“How can such a man practice frugality +and self-denial with a house full of +brawling brats, and a woman for ever +extracting money to buy costly robes +with long skirts trailing in the dust?” +Gerald hated women—the origin of all +evil since the world began: observing that +in birds of prey the females are stronger +than the males, he remarks that this +signifies “the female sex is more resolute +in all evil than the male.” Among the +married clergy he attacked was the Archdeacon +of Brecon; and the old man, being +forced to choose between his wife and his +archdeaconry, preferred his wife. Gerald +was made Archdeacon of Brecon. In later +years he had qualms of conscience about +the part he took in this business.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> +Between 1180 and 1194 he was often at +Court and employed in the king’s affairs. +Henry II. selected him as a suitable person +to accompany the young prince John to +Ireland in 1185, and the result was his two +great works—“The Topography,” and +“The Conquest of Ireland,” which are the +chief and almost the only authorities for +Irish history in the Middle Ages. The +former work he read publicly at Oxford on +his return; it was a great occasion: we +must tell it in his own words. “When the +work was finished, not wishing to hide his +candle under a bushel, but wishing to place +it in a candlestick, so that it might give +light, he resolved to read it before a vast +audience at Oxford, where scholars in +England chiefly flourished and excelled in +scholarship. And as there were three +divisions in the work, and each division +occupied a day, the readings lasted three +successive days. On the first day, he +received and entertained at his lodgings all +the poor people of the town; on the second, +all the doctors of the different faculties and +their best students; and on the third, the +rest of the students and the chief men of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +the town. It was a costly and noble act; +and neither present nor past time can +furnish any record of such a solemnity +having ever taken place in England.”</p> + +<p>In 1188 he accompanied the Archbishop +of Canterbury in his tour through Wales to +preach the Third Crusade. With this we +shall deal later.</p> + +<p>He was abroad with Henry II. at the +time of the old king’s death, and has left a +valuable account of his later years in the +book “On the Instruction of Princes.” +His connection with the Court gave him +opportunities for studying the great characters +of the time at close quarters, and +we have from his pen graphic sketches of +many of them. Take this description of +Henry II.: “He had a reddish complexion, +rather dark, and a large round head. His +eyes were gray, bloodshot, and flashed in +anger. He had a fiery face; his voice was +shaky; he had a deep chest, and long +muscular arms, his great round head hanging +somewhat forward. He had an enormous +belly—though not from gross feeding. +Indeed he was temperate in all things, for +a prince. To keep down his corpulency, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> +he took immoderate exercise. Even in +times of peace he took no rest—hunting +furiously all day, and on his return home in +the evening seldom sitting down either +before or after supper; for in spite of his +own fatigue, he would weary out the Court +by being constantly on his legs.”</p> + +<p>The whole is very interesting and full of +life. It occurs in the “Conquest of Ireland,” +and is quoted in several of his other works. +Gerald’s favourite author was Gerald of +Barry, Archdeacon of Brecon.</p> + +<p>The next important episode in his life +was the struggle for St. David’s (1198-1203). +It was really a fight for the +independence of the Welsh Church from +England and its direct dependence on +the Pope. Gerald was elected bishop by +the canons of St. David’s, in opposition +to the will of King John (whose consent +was necessary) and of Hubert Walter, +Archbishop of Canterbury (whose rights +as metropolitan were attacked). Gerald +hastened off to Rome to get the Pope’s +support, taking with him the most +precious offering that he could think of—six +of his own books; for Rome had +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> +a bad name for bribery—and who could +resist such a bribe? But he found it +advisable to supplement his books by +other promises, especially by the offer to +the Pope of tithes from Wales.</p> + +<p>The Pope at this time was Innocent III.—the +greatest of all the Popes—who +brought kings and nations under his feet +and held despotic sway over the Universal +Church, and stamped out heresy in blood. +In the references to him in Gerald’s works +he appears in much more human guise. +We see him after supper unbending and +laughing at Gerald’s anecdotes and cracking +jokes of a somewhat risky character +with the archdeacon. It is clear that the +Pope thoroughly enjoyed the Welshman’s +company, but also that he did not take +him very seriously as an ecclesiastical +statesman. “Let us have some more +stories about your archbishop’s bad +Latin,” he would say, when Gerald was +getting too urgent on the independence +of the Welsh Church or his own right +to the see of St. David’s.</p> + +<p>This archbishop was Hubert Walter, +who was much more of a secular administrator +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +than an ecclesiastic, and whose Latin +though clear and ready might show a +fine contempt for all rules of grammar. +Gerald was a stickler for correct Latin +grammar; he is great on “howlers.” There +is one of his stories, illustrating both the +avarice of the Norman prelates and the +ignorance of the Welsh clergy: A Welsh +priest came to his bishop and said, “I +have brought your lordship a present of +two hundred <i>oves</i>.” He meant “<i>ova</i>”; +but the bishop insisted on the sheep; and +the priest probably rubbed up his Latin +grammar. Gerald had also other patriotic +reasons for his hostility to the archbishop, +who as chief justiciary—<i>i.e.</i>, chief minister +of the king—had recently attacked +and defeated the Welsh between the +Wye and the Severn. “Blessed be +God,” writes Gerald sarcastically to him, +“who has taught your hands to war and +your fingers to fight, for since the days +when Harold almost exterminated the +nation, no prince has destroyed so many +Welshmen in one battle as your Grace.”</p> + +<p>Gerald continued the struggle till 1203, +though deserted by the Welsh clergy. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> +“The laity of Wales,” he said, “stood by +me; but of the clergy whose battle I was +fighting, scarce one.” He was proclaimed +as a rebel, and had some narrow escapes +of imprisonment or worse—escapes which +he owed to his ready wit and which he +delights to tell. At last he gave way, +and during the remainder of his life we +find him at Rome, Lincoln, St. David’s, +revising his works and writing new +ones, modifying some of his judgments +(especially that on Hubert Walter), and +encouraging Stephen Langton in the +great struggle against John. He was +buried at St. David’s, probably in 1223.</p> + +<p>We will now return to the “Itinerary +through Wales” and the “Description of +Wales.” Jerusalem was taken by Saladin +in 1187, and the Third Crusade—the +Crusade of Richard Cœur de Lion—was +preached throughout Europe. In 1188 +Archbishop Baldwin made a preaching +tour through Wales accompanied by Glanville, +the great justiciary of Henry II., +and Gerald of Barry. While the primary +object was the preaching of the Crusade, +the king had an eye to business and saw +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +that the Holy Cause could be utilised for +other purposes; it gave an opportunity +for the assertion of the metropolitan rights +of Canterbury over the Welsh Church, +and for a survey of the country by the +royal officials, which was not possible +under other circumstances. That is why +the archbishop and the justiciar accompanied +the expedition. It is remarkable +that Gerald, the champion of the Welsh +Church, should have given his support to +it; but he had not fully adopted the +patriotic attitude of his later years; and, +with him as with most people of the time, +the rescue of the Holy Sepulchre was, in +theory at any rate, the greatest object in +the world; while further, we must not +forget that the journey had many attractions +for him as an author; it gave him +“copy” for a new book, and the chance +of reading his Irish Topography to the +archbishop. Every day during the +journey the archbishop listened to a +portion of this book, and at the end +took it home to finish. As the journey +lasted at least fifty days, one may calculate +that it took at most an average of three +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> +pages a day to send the archbishop to +sleep.</p> + +<p>The Itinerary (which was later dedicated +to Stephen Langton) contains in the +author’s words an account of “the difficult +places through which we passed, the +names of springs and torrents, the witty +sayings, the toils and incidents of the +journey, the memorable events of ancient +and modern times, and the natural history +and description of the country.”</p> + +<p>The route pursued was as follows: +From Hereford to Radnor, Brecon, Abergavenny, +Caerleon, Newport, Cardiff, +Llandaff, Ewenny, Margam, Swansea, +Kidweli, Carmarthen, Haverford, St. +David’s, Cardigan, Strata Florida, thence +keeping close to the coast, through Bangor +and Chester; and then south by Oswestry, +Shrewsbury, Ludlow, to Hereford.</p> + +<p>The travellers were well received and +entertained both by the Lords Marcher +and the Welsh princes. It was especially +to the Welsh that their attention was +directed, and Welsh princes accompanied +them through their territories. The chief +was Rhys ap Gruffydd (Gerald’s uncle), +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> +prince of South Wales, who was then at +the height of his power, and had been made +chief justice of South Wales by Henry II., +to whom he faithfully adhered. Gwynedd +and Powys were then divided among +several heirs. One of the princes of +Powys, Owain Cyfeiliog, the poet, was +distinguished as being the only prince +who did not come to meet the archbishop +with his people; for which he was excommunicated. +Gerald notes that he was an +adherent of Henry II., and was “conspicuous +for the good management of his +territory.” Perhaps that is why he would +not have anything to do with the Crusade.</p> + +<p>How far was the expedition successful +in its primary object in gaining crusaders? +The archbishop and justiciar had already +taken the cross; they remained true to +their vows and went to the Holy Land, +the archbishop dying at the siege of +Acre, heartbroken at the wickedness of +the army. Gerald himself was the first +to take the cross in Wales, not acting +under the influence of religious enthusiasm, +but (as he says himself) “impelled by the +urgent requests and promises of the king +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> +and persuasions of the archbishop,” who +wanted him to act as historian; but +Gerald, after setting the example, bought +a dispensation and did not go. A number +of the lesser Welsh princes soon took the +cross. The Lord Rhys himself was eager +to do so, but “his wife by female artifices +diverted him wholly from his noble purpose.” +The wives were all dead against +the whole affair. At Hay the wives caught +hold of their husbands, and the would-be +Crusaders had literally to run away from +them to the castle, leaving their cloaks +behind them. A nobler spirit of self-sacrifice +was shown by the old woman of +Cardigan, who, when her only son took +the cross, said: “O most beloved Lord +Jesus Christ, I give Thee hearty thanks +for having conferred on me the blessing of +bringing forth a son worthy of Thy service.” +This son was probably worth more than the +twelve archers of the castle of St. Clears +who were forcibly signed with the cross +for committing a murder; and one may +reasonably look with suspicion on the +sudden conversion of “many of the most +notorious murderers and robbers of the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> +neighbourhood” at Usk. It was this +kind of thing that turned the Holy Land +into a sort of convict settlement.</p> + +<p>The preachers clearly worked hard and +had some trying experiences, and kept up +their spirits by little jokes, which Gerald +retails. They nearly came to grief in +quicksands at the mouth of the river +Neath. “Terrible hard country this,” said +one of the monks next day in the castle +at Swansea. “Some people are never +satisfied,” retorted his companion; “you +were complaining of its being too soft in +the quicksand yesterday.” The mountains +were trying to men no longer in their +youth; after toiling up one the archbishop +sank exhausted on a fallen tree and said +to his panting companions, “Can any one +enliven the company by whistling a +tune?” “Which,” adds Gerald, “is not +very easily done by people out of breath.” +From whistling the conversation passed +to nightingales, which some one said were +never found in Wales. “Wise bird, the +nightingale,” remarked the archbishop.</p> + +<p>One serious difficulty they had was that +none of them, not even Gerald, knew +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> +Welsh sufficiently well to preach in it, +though they generally had interpreters. +The archbishop, who would sometimes +preach away for hours without result, +felt this much more than Gerald. He +declares he moved crowds to tears though +they did not understand a word of what he +was saying. But one may take the words +of Prince Rhys’s fool as evidence (if any +were needed) that ignorance of Welsh +weakened the effect. “You owe a great +debt, Rhys, to your kinsman the archdeacon, +who has taken a hundred or so +of your men to serve the Lord; if he had +only spoken in Welsh, you wouldn’t have +had a soul left.”</p> + +<p>In all about three thousand took the +cross; but the Crusade was delayed, zeal +cooled, and it is probable that comparatively +few went. The <i>Itinerarium Regis +Ricardi</i> mentions, I think, only one exploit +by a Welshman in the Third Crusade; +he was an archer, and so a South Walian.</p> + +<p>This brings me to one of the incidental +notes of great value scattered about the +Itinerary. Speaking of the siege of +Abergavenny (1182), Gerald tells us that +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> +the men of Gwent and Glamorgan +excelled all others in the use of the +bow, and gives curious evidence of the +strength of their shooting. Thus the +arrows pierced an oak door four inches +thick; they had been left there as a +curiosity, and Gerald saw them with their +iron points coming through on the inner +side. He describes these bows as “made +of elm—ugly, unfinished-looking weapons, +but astonishingly stiff, large, and strong, +and equally useful for long and short +shooting.” Add to this that the longbow +was not a characteristic English weapon +till the latter part of the thirteenth century, +that the first battle in which an English +king made effective use of archery (at +Falkirk, 1298), his infantry consisted +mainly of Welshmen; and there can be +little doubt that the famous longbow of +England, which won the victories of Creçy +and Poitiers and Agincourt, and indirectly +did much to destroy feudalism and villenage, +had its home in South Wales.</p> + +<p>Gerald was also a keen observer of +nature, and his knowledge of the ways of +animals is extensive and peculiar. Perhaps +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> +even more marked is his love of the +supernatural; he could believe anything, +if it was only wonderful enough—except +Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History. But +I must confine myself to one story—the +story of the boy in Gower who (as the root +of learning is bitter) played truant and +found two little men of pigmy stature, and +went with them to their country under the +earth, and played games with golden balls +with the fairy prince. These little folk +were very small—of fair complexion, and +long luxuriant hair; and they had horses +and dogs to suit their size. They hated +nothing so much as lies; “they had no +form of public worship, being lovers and +reverers, it seemed, of truth.” The boy +often went, till he tried to steal a golden +ball, and then he could never find fairyland +again. But he learnt some of the fairy +language, which was like Greek. And +then Gerald compares words in different +languages, and notes how, for instance, the +same word for <em>salt</em> runs through Greek and +British and Irish and Latin and French +and English and German, and the fairy +language, which suggests a close relation +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +between all these peoples in past ages. It +is very modern; and it is not without +reason that Gerald has been called “the +father of comparative philology.”</p> + +<p>In his “Description of Wales” Gerald +describes the manner of life and characteristics +of the people. All are trained +to arms, and when the trumpet sounds the +alarm, the husbandman rushes as eagerly +from his plough as the courtier from his +court. Agricultural work takes up little +of their time, as they are still mainly in a +pastoral stage, living on the produce of +their herds, and eating more meat than +bread. They fight and undergo hardships +and willingly sacrifice their lives for their +country and for liberty. They wear little +defensive armour, and depend mainly on +their mobility; they are not much good at +a close engagement, but generally victors +in a running fight, relying more on their +activity than on their strength.</p> + +<p>It was the fashion to keep open house +for all comers. “Those who arrive in the +morning are entertained till evening with +the conversation of young women and the +music of the harp; for each house has its +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> +young women and harps allotted for the +purpose. In each family the art of playing +on the harp is held preferable to any other +learning; and no nation is so free from +jealousy as the Welsh.” After a simple +supper (for the people are not addicted to +gluttony or drunkenness), “a bed of rushes +is placed along the side of the hall, and all +in common lie down to sleep with their +feet towards the fire. They sleep in the +thin cloak and tunic they wear by day. +They receive much comfort from the +natural heat of the persons lying near +them; but when the underside begins to +be tired with the hardness of the bed, or +the upper one to suffer from the cold, they +get up and go to the fire; and then +returning to the couch they expose their +sides alternately to the cold and to the +hardness of the bed.”</p> + +<p>Gifted with an acute and rich intellect +they excel in whatever studies they pursue, +notably in music. They are especially +famous for their part-singing, “so that in +a company of singers, which one very +often meets with in Wales, you will hear +as many different parts and voices as there +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> +are performers,”(!) and this gift has by long +habit become natural to the nation.</p> + +<p>“They show a greater respect than +other nations to churches and ecclesiastics, +to the relics of saints, bells, holy books, +and the cross; and hence their churches +enjoy more than common tranquillity.”</p> + +<p>He then goes on to the other side of +the picture: “for history without truth +becomes undeserving of its name.” “These +people are no less light in mind than in +body, and by no means to be relied on. +They are easily urged to undertake any +action, and as easily checked from prosecuting +it.... They never scruple at +taking a false oath for the sake of any +temporary advantage.... Above all +other peoples they are given to removing +their neighbours’ landmarks. Hence arise +quarrels, murders, conflagrations, and +frequent fratricides. It is remarkable that +brothers show more affection to each other +when dead than when living; for they +persecute the living even unto death, but +avenge the dead with all their power.”</p> + +<p>Finally, as a scientific observer of politics, +he discusses how Wales may be conquered +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> +and governed, and how the Welsh may +resist.</p> + +<p>A prince who would subdue this people +must give his whole energies to the task +for at least a whole year. He must divide +their strength, and by bribes and promises +endeavour to stir up one against the other, +knowing the spirit of hatred and envy +which generally prevails among them. +He must cut off supplies, build castles, and +use light-armed troops and plenty of them; +for though many English mercenaries perish +in a battle, money will procure as many +more; but to the Welsh the loss is for the +time irreparable. He recommends that all +the English inhabitants of the Marches +should be trained to arms; for the Welsh +fight for liberty and only a free people +can subdue them. His advice to the +Welsh is: Unite. “If they would be +inseparable, they would be insuperable, +being assisted by these three circumstances—a +country well defended by nature, +a people contented to live upon little, a +community whose nobles and commoners +alike are trained in the use of arms; and +especially as the English fight for power, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +the Welsh for liberty; the English hirelings +for money, the Welsh patriots for +their country.”</p> + +<p>I hope I may persuade some who do +not yet know Gerald to make his acquaintance, +and to read either his works on +Ireland and Wales, translated in Bohn’s +library, or Mr. Henry Owen’s brilliant +and delightful volume, “Gerald the +Welshman,” my indebtedness to which +I wish to acknowledge. Gerald tells us +many miracles; but he has himself performed +a miracle as wonderful as any he +relates; he has kept all the charm and +freshness of youth for more than seven +hundred years.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 399px;"> +<img src="images/mwspl02th.png" width="399" height="500" alt="" /> +<span class="link"><a href="images/mwspl02.png">See larger image</a></span> +</div> + +<p class="caption">CASTLES & RELIGIOUS HOUSES. (12<sup>th</sup> & 13<sup>th</sup> Centuries)</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> + +<h2>IV</h2> + +<h3>CASTLES</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">W</span>ALES is pre-eminently the land +of castles. There are between +thirty and forty in Glamorgan alone. +The accompanying map, though it is by +no means exhaustive, shows the general +lie of the castles, which may be divided +into three groups, having as their respective +bases Chester, Shrewsbury, and Gloucester. +But though there is some evidence of an +organised plan for the conquest of Wales +in the time of William Rufus, it is useless +to look for any great and general system +of offence or defence, because most of the +castles were not built by a centralised +government with any such object in view, +but by individuals to guard their own +territories and protect their independence +against either their neighbours or the +English king. The great age of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +castle-building was between 1100 and 1300. +Castles play a very small part in the +fighting in Wales till the end of the eleventh +century. Before that time indeed there +were few stone castles anywhere; the +usual type, even of the early Norman +castles, was a moated mound surrounded +by wooden palisades. One hears for +instance of a castle being built by William +the Conqueror in eight days. An example +of this early type of fortress was Pembroke +Castle at the end of the eleventh century, +“a slender fortress of stakes and turf,” +which had the good fortune to be in +charge of Gerald of Windsor, grandfather +of Giraldus Cambrensis. It stood several +sieges, which shows that the siege engines +of the Welsh were of a very poor and +primitive type. One of these sieges was +turned into a blockade, and the garrison +was nearly reduced by starvation. The +constable had recourse to a time-honoured +ruse. “With great prudence he caused +four hogs which still remained to be cut +into small pieces and thrown down among +the enemy. The next day he had recourse +to a more refined stratagem: he contrived +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> +that a letter from him should fall into the +hands of the enemy stating that there was +no need for assistance for the next four +months.” The besiegers were taken in +and dispersed to their homes.</p> + +<p>The characteristic types of castles in the +twelfth century were the rectangular keep +and the shell keep; in the thirteenth the +concentric castle. Of the two last we have +splendid examples in Cardiff and Caerphilly. +Of rectangular keeps there are very few in +Wales—Chepstow is the only important +one—though there are several on the +borders, notably Ludlow. The square +keep seems to us most characteristic of +Norman military architecture; the Tower +of London, Rochester, Newcastle, Castle +Rising, are well-known examples, and there +are many more in a good state of preservation; +there are many more solid square +keeps than shell keeps well preserved, but +this is simply due to the greater solidity +of the former; the shell keeps were far +more numerous in the twelfth century; +and the reasons for this are obvious—the +rectangular keep was much more expensive +to build, and it was too heavy to erect on +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> +the artificial mounds on which the Norman +architects generally founded their castles.</p> + +<p>The keep of Cardiff Castle is one of the +most perfect shell keeps in existence. It +is built on a round artificial mound, surrounded +by a wide and deep moat—the +mound and moat being, of course, complements +of each other. Such mounds and +moats are common in all parts of England, +and in Normandy. They are not Roman, +nor British, nor are they, as Mr. G. T. +Clark maintained, characteristic of Anglo-Saxon +work. They are essentially Norman, +and a good representation of the +making of such a mound may be seen in +the Bayeux Tapestry, under the heading—‘He +orders them to dig a castle.’ When +was the Cardiff mound made? Perhaps +the short entry in the Brut gives the +answer: “1080, the building of Cardiff +began.” It would then be surrounded by +wooden palisades, and surmounted by a +timber structure, as a newly made mound +would not stand the masonry. The shell +keep was probably built by Robert of +Gloucester, and it was probably in the +gate-house of this keep, that Robert of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> +Normandy was imprisoned. A shell keep +was a ring wall eight or ten feet thick, +about thirty feet high, not covered in, and +enclosing an open courtyard, round which +were placed the buildings—light structures, +often wooden sheds, abutting on the ring +wall—such as one may see now in the +courtyard of Castell Coch. The shell keep +was the centre of Robert’s castle, but not +the whole. From this time dated the +great outer walls on the south and west—walls +forty feet high and ten feet thick +and solid throughout. The north and +east and part of the south sides of the castle +precincts are enclosed by banks of earth, +beneath which, the walls of a Roman camp +have recently been discovered. These +banks were capped by a slight embattled +wall. Outside along the north, south and +east fronts was a moat, formerly fed +by the Taff through the Mill leat stream +which ran along the west front. The +present lodgings, or habitable part of the +castle built on either side of the great west +wall, date mostly from the fifteenth century. +The earlier lodgings were, perhaps, on the +same site—though only inside the wall; a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> +great lord did not as a rule live in the +keep, except in times of danger.</p> + +<p>The area of the enclosure is about ten +acres—more suited to a Roman garrison +than to a lord marcher of the twelfth +century. That the castle was difficult to +guard is shown by the success of Ivor +Bach’s bold dash, <i>c.</i> 1153-1158. Ivor ap +Meyric was Lord of Senghenydd, holding +it of William of Gloucester, the Lord of +Glamorgan, and, perhaps, had his headquarters +in the fortress above the present +Castell Coch. “He was,” says Giraldus +Cambrensis, “after the manner of the +Welsh, owner of a tract of mountain land, +of which the earl was trying to deprive +him. At that time the Castle of Cardiff +was surrounded with high walls, guarded +by 120 men at arms, a numerous body +of archers and a strong watch. Yet in +defiance of all this, Ivor, in the dead of +night secretly scaled the walls, seized the +earl and countess and their only son, and +carried them off to the woods; and did not +release them till he had recovered all that +had been unjustly taken from him,” and a +goodly ransom in addition. Perhaps the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> +most permanent result of this episode was +the building of a wall 30 feet high between +the keep and the Black Tower—dividing +the castle enclosure into two parts and +forming an inner or middle ward of less +extent, and less liable to danger from such +sudden raids.</p> + +<p>Cardiff Castle was much more than a +place of defence; it was the seat of +government. The bailiff of the Castle +was <i>ex officio</i> mayor of the town in the +Middle Ages. The Castle was also the +head and centre of the Lordship of +Glamorgan. This was divided into two +parts—the shire fee or body, and the +members. The shire fee was the +southern part; under a sheriff appointed +by the chief Lord: the chief landowners +owed suit and service—<i>i.e.</i>, they attended +and were under the jurisdiction of the +shire court held monthly in the castle +enclosure, and each owed a fixed amount +of military service—especially the duty of +“castle-guard”—supplying the garrison +and keeping the castle in repair. There +are indications of the work of the shire +court in some of the castle accounts +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> +published in the Cardiff Records, <i>e.g.</i>, in +1316, an official accounts for 1d., the price +of “a cord bought for the hanging of +thieves adjudged in the county court: +stipend of one man hanging those thieves +4d.” The “members” consisted of ten +lordships (several of which were in the +hands of Welsh nobles): these were much +more independent; each had its own court +(with powers of life and death), from +which an appeal lay to the Lord’s court at +Cardiff: generally they owed no definite +service to the Lord (except homage, and +sometimes a heriot at death), but on failure +of heirs the estate lapsed to the chief Lord. +At Cardiff Castle the Lord had his +chancery, like the royal chancery on a +small scale—issuing writs, recording services +and grants of privileges, and legal +decisions: practically the whole of these +records have been lost—and our knowledge +of the organisation of the Lordship +is mainly derived from the royal records +at times, when owing to minority or +escheat, the Lordship was under royal +administration. The Lord of Glamorgan +owed homage, but no service to the king; +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> +and (though this was sometimes disputed +by his tenants and the royal lawyers), no +appeal lay from his courts to the king’s +court. The machinery of government +was probably more complete and elaborate +in Glamorgan than in any other +Marcher Lordship.</p> + +<p>Caerphilly Castle had not the political +importance of Cardiff, but far surpasses +it as a fortress. By the strength and +position of Caerphilly, one may measure +the power of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd after +the Barons’ War and before the accession +of Edward I. The Prince of Wales had +extended his sway down as far as Brecon, +and Welshmen everywhere were looking +to him as the restorer of their country’s +independence. Among them was the +Welsh Lord of Senghenydd, one of +the chief “members” of Glamorgan, and +his overlord probably saw reason to +suspect his loyalty. An alliance between +him and Llywelyn would open the lower +Taff Valley to the Welsh prince and give +him command of the hill country north of +Cardiff. It was on the lands of the lord +of Senghenydd that Gilbert de Clare, Earl +of Gloucester, built Castell Coch and Caerphilly.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 361px;"> +<img src="images/mwspl03th.png" width="361" height="500" alt="" /> +<span class="link"><a href="images/mwspl03.png">See larger image</a></span> +</div> + +<p class="caption">CARDIFF CASTLE. (12<sup>th</sup> Century)<br /> +<br /> +CAERPHILLY CASTLE. (13<sup>th</sup> Century)</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> +Caerphilly is described by the latest +historian of the Art of War as the +grandest specimen of its class; it represents +the high-water mark of mediæval +military architecture in this country, and +was the model of Edward I.’s great castles +in the north. It illustrates the influence +of the Crusades on Western Europe, +being an instance of the “concentric” +system of defences, of which the walls +of Constantinople afford the most magnificent +example, and which the Crusaders +adopted in many of their great fortresses +in the East.</p> + +<p>Caerphilly Castle consists of three lines +of defences, and the way in which these +supplement each other shows that the +work in all essentials was designed as +a great whole; it did not grow up bit by +bit. There are of course many evidences +of alterations and rebuilding at later times; +the buildings in the middle ward, on the +south side, seem to be later additions; the +hall appears to have been enlarged, and +the tracery of the windows suggests the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> +fourteenth century; the state-rooms to the +west of the hall have been much altered; +but such alterations as appear are confined +to the habitable part of the castle, and do +not affect it as a military work. It has +been suggested that the castle may have +been greatly enlarged in the latter years +of Edward II., when it played an important +part in connection with the +division of the Gloucester inheritance +and the younger Despenser’s ambitions. +There are a number of notices of the +castle in the chronicles and public records +of that time, but apparently no references +to any building operations. And the +unity of plan is evidence that the whole +dated from the same time.</p> + +<p>The castle is built on a tongue of gravel +nearly surrounded by low, marshy land, +forming a sort of peninsula; a stream +on the south running eastwards to the +Rhymny; and two springs on the north. +By damming these waters and cutting +through the tongue of gravel an artificial +island was secured for the site of the +castle. The inner ward, or central part +of the castle, consists of a quadrangle +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> +with a large round tower at each corner: +in the centre of the east and west side +are massive gate-houses defended by +portcullises; from the projecting corner +towers all the intervening wall was commanded. +The gateways communicate +with the second line of defence or middle +ward. This completely encircles the +inner ward, on a much lower level; it is +a narrow space bounded by a wall, with +low, semi-circular bastions at the corners; +it is commanded at every point from the +inner ward; the narrowness of the space +would prevent the concentration of large +bodies of assailants or the use of +battering-rams, and communication is at +several points stopped by walls or buildings +jutting out from the inner ward. The +middle ward had strong gate-houses at the +east and west ends, and was completely +surrounded by water—east and west by +a moat, north and south the moat widens +into lakes: note how on the north a +narrow ridge of gravel has been used +to ensure a water moat on that side, in +case there was not enough water to flood +the whole lake. These lakes form part +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +of the third line of defence or outer ward, +which includes also on the west the “horn-work” +and on the east the grand front. The +horn-work is about three acres in extent, +surrounded by a wall 15 feet high, which +is of the nature of an escarpment, the +ground rising above it. It is entirely surrounded +by a moat, and connected with +the middle ward on one side and the +mainland on the other by drawbridges. +It would probably be used for grazing +purposes, and thus would be of great +value to the garrison; but so far as the +actual defences of the castle are concerned, +a lake would have been much +more effective; the nature of the ground +would however have prevented this. The +horn-work was intended to cover the only +side upon which the castle was open to +an attack from level ground, and to occupy +what would otherwise have been a dangerous +platform.</p> + +<p>The eastern side of the outer ward—the +grand front—is a most imposing structure. +It is a wall about 250 yards long, and in +some parts 60 feet high, furnished with +buttresses and projecting towers from +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +which the intervening spaces are easily +commanded, culminating in the great gate-house +near the centre, and terminating at +both ends in clusters of towers which +protect the sally-ports. On the outside +is a moat spanned by a double drawbridge. +The northern part of this front, +which was probably occupied by stables, +would in dry weather be the least defensible +part of the castle; but it was +cut off from the rest by an embattled wall +running from the gate-house to the inner +moat and pierced only by one small and +portcullised gate. The southern half +was more important and stronger. It +crossed the stream at the dam, the walls +being 15 feet thick where subjected to the +pressure of the water, and the strong +group of towers at the end—on the other +side of the stream—guarded the dam on +which the safety of the castle largely +depended; the wall and towers here form +a semicircle, curving back into the edge +of the lake, so as to avoid the danger of +being outflanked.</p> + +<p>On the inside of the grand front were +various buildings, such as the mill. This +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> +eastern line was divided from the middle +ward by a moat 45 feet wide—a space +which is too wide to be spanned by +a single drawbridge, and as there are no +signs of the foundations of a central pier, +it seems probable that the bridge rested +on a wooden support, which could be +removed when necessary, and the assailants +plunged into the moat below.</p> + +<p>There are a large number of interesting +details connected with both the military +functions of the castle and its domestic +economy. There were at least four exits +(not counting the two water-gates); this +would give the garrison opportunities of +harassing assailants by sallies, and would +make a much larger army necessary in +order to blockade the castle; contrast the +single narrow entrance to the Norman +keep—high up in the wall and visible to +all outside. The water-gates are worth +studying, especially the methods of protecting +the eastern water-gate—two grates +with a shoot above and between them. One +should notice, too, the “splaying” of the +outer wall, by which missiles from the top +would be projected outwards; and also the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> +use of the mill-stream to carry away the +refuse of the garderobe tower. And there +are many other points, to which one would +like to call attention, if time allowed.</p> + +<p>The history of Caerphilly in the +Middle Ages need not detain us long. +It was besieged by Llywelyn in 1271, +while it was being built. Llywelyn +declared he could have taken it in three +days if he had not been persuaded to +submit the dispute to the arbitration of +the king. It is clear that the castle was +not finished; shortly after this Gilbert de +Clare obtained license from the king to +“enditch” the castle: such license was +not, as a rule, required in the Marches +(as it was in England) and was only +necessary now because the king was acting +as arbitrator. The Earl of Gloucester +kept possession. We next hear of it in +1315, when it resisted the attack of +Llywelyn Bren. It was then in the +hands of the king, pending the division +of the Gloucester inheritance among the +three co-heiresses. In 1318 Caerphilly, +with the rest of Glamorgan, was granted +to the younger Despenser, who perhaps +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> +enlarged the hall and made the other +alterations referred to above. Edward II. +was there for a few days when flying for +his life; had he trusted to Caerphilly, +instead of fleeing further through South +Wales, he might have saved his head and +his crown; at any rate, there would have +been a great siege to add to the history +of mediæval warfare. The king’s adherents +held out in Caerphilly for months, +and only surrendered when, the king +being dead, there was nothing more to +fight for, and they were allowed to go +free. Happy is the castle which has no +history. The perfection of Caerphilly as a +fortress saved it from serious attacks.</p> + +<p>In conclusion, I will give two illustrations +of the relations between the garrison +of a castle and those outside. The first +refers to Swansea. There is a curious +Charter of King John to the good men +of Swansea, in which he releases them +from the “custom of eating” forced on +them by the men of the castle. This +would be a solid variation of the liquid +scot-ales or free drinks which officials +and garrisons were in the habit of exacting +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> +from their neighbours, and which were +among the most persistent grievances in +the Middle Ages.</p> + +<p>The second concerns Builth, and is +taken from the Patent Rolls of Edward II. +in 1315. Builth was then in the hands +of the king, to whom the townsfolk +appeal for redress of grievances. The +community complain that, though they are +only bound to carry timber to the castle +twice a week, they are often forced to +carry it three times a week and more, +and victuals too; and the men of the +castle compel them to plough their lands +and cut their corn, and hold them to +ransom if they refuse; and they carry +away from the houses of the said complainants +divers kind of victuals—lambs, +geese, hens, &c.—and pay only one quarter +of their value, or nothing at all; and +though the complainants gave the keeper +of the castle £120 that they might be free +from such oppressions, he took the money +and oppresses them just the same. Further, +the courts which the people have to +attend are multiplied; and recently the +court was held at a time when so great +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> +a flood had happened that neither horsemen +nor footmen could approach the +court, and so thirty-six men and women, +fearing the cruelty of the bailiffs, entered +a boat and were overwhelmed in the rush +of the river. And one night men of the +castle, maliciously seeking occasion against +the commonalty of the town, went out of +the castle and pretended to besiege it and +shot arrows at it; and then secretly re-entered +the castle and declared the townsfolk +had been attacking the castle. And +on this account many burgesses were +imprisoned in the castle and ill-treated, +and their swine maliciously killed. And +things are so intolerable that many of the +greater burgesses have left the country, +and the residue, without speedy remedy, +cannot remain.</p> + +<p>Life was evidently dull in a castle: +one had to play practical jokes to relieve +the monotony; and life was anything but +pleasant outside a castle. The castles of +Wales are much more attractive to us +to-day than they were to those who lived +in them or round them six or seven +hundred years ago.</p> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p> + +<h2>V</h2> + +<h3>RELIGIOUS HOUSES</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>N speaking of the Religious Houses +in Wales I shall deal with those +which flourished in the twelfth and thirteenth +centuries—the period we have +hitherto been studying—though it is +tempting to go back to the glories of +the old Welsh monasteries of the sixth +century, such as Llantwit Major and +Bangor Iscoed, whose dim memories must +always exercise a strong fascination. The +monasteries of this early type had fallen +on evil days in Wales, as in Ireland and +elsewhere, before the twelfth century, +many had been wiped out by the Danes; +and those that remained seem to have lost +the spirit of life (save in a few distant +islands or inaccessible mountains), and +made no struggle for existence against the +vigorous invasion of the new monasticism.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> +We shall be concerned with two kinds +of religious houses—namely, the houses of +monks and the houses of friars. And, +first, let us consider in briefest outline the +main course of development of the religious +orders in the Roman Church. The Rule +of St. Benedict (†541) was adopted by all +monks: the essential features of it were +prayer, labour, silence, a common life and +common property. But among the early +Benedictines each monastery was independent +and self-governing, though an +abbey might have priories in some measure +connected with it. The result was that in +the course of time the discipline and life of +monasteries varied infinitely; and there +was no co-operation for self-defence among +the various monasteries. Hence in the +tenth century arose the Cluniac order—the +first attempt at organisation—the +Abbot of Clugny became head of a vast +number of monasteries in different countries +of Europe; the priors of these owed +allegiance to the Abbot of Clugny, were +appointed by him, and paid revenues to +the head abbey and the general fund of the +Order. This organisation was thus +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> +monarchical—despotic; the Abbot of Clugny +was a pope of monasticism. The movement +acquired enormous influence on the +Church as a whole, getting control of the +papacy, insisting that the Church should +be independent of the State, and that +celibacy of the clergy should be practically +enforced. But the Cluniacs instead of withdrawing +from the world began to dominate +it, losing many of the essential features +of monasticism. Hence another reform +movement arose about 1100, that of the +Cistercian Order, which is associated with +the name of St. Bernard. This aimed at +reviving the Benedictine rule in all its +strictness, insisting especially on manual +labour. Cistercian houses were founded +in desolate places, as far removed from +populous centres as possible. But the +Order differed from the early Benedictines +in organisation. Each Cistercian house +was independent and self-governing, electing +its own abbot; but all the abbots were +bound to come together at stated times for +general assemblies or chapters, and these +general assemblies were the supreme governing +body in the Order. Thus unity was +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +established; the organisation was close, +but not monarchical; the Order was a +great federation. This is the highest +point reached in monastic development.</p> + +<p>But about the time of the Crusades +another ideal made itself felt. Hitherto +the religious man withdrew from the +world: but, as an old chronicler put it, +“God found out the Crusades as a way +to reconcile religion and the world”—was +it not possible to serve God <em>in</em> the +world? The knight did it; he went on +fighting, but he fought for the Holy +Sepulchre. The Military Orders (Templars +and Hospitallers) combined the life +of a monk with the life of a soldier. The +Regular or Augustinian Canons combined +the life of a monk with the life of a parish +priest. And this ideal—new to the Middle +Ages—received its highest realisation in the +Dominican and Franciscan friars. The +monk left the world in order to become +religious; the friar aimed at making the +world religious. The monk’s main object +was to save his own soul; the friar’s, to +save the souls of others.</p> + +<p>We will now turn to the monasteries in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> +Wales. Of the older Benedictine houses +there were about fifteen, almost all in South +Wales, and all except one were not abbeys +but priories, or cells, <i>i.e.</i>, they were dependent +on some abbey elsewhere. A number +of them belonged to some foreign abbey, +especially the earliest. This was the case +with the Priory of Monmouth, founded by +the Breton Wihenoc, which belonged to +the Abbey of St. Florence of Saumur +(Anjou); and this was the case too with +the priories of Abergavenny and Pembroke. +These “alien priories” were simply used +by the abbeys abroad as sources of +revenue; they were foreign, unpopular, +and during the French war in the fourteenth +and fifteenth centuries most of them +were suppressed and their revenues +appropriated by the Crown. The same +applies to the three Cluniac cells established +in Wales, such as St. Clears, which +seems only to have contained the prior +and one monk, who did not live with much +strictness, though Gerald of Barry says +the Cluniacs here were better than they +were abroad, and not nearly so bad as +the Cistercians. The life of monks in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> +these outlying cells, where they were not +under any supervision, and where there +was no “public opinion” of the monastery +to keep them straight, was generally very +lax; they lived liked laymen, looking after +the estates (generally wasting them), and +without much regard to their vows: “they +lived like beasts,” says Gerald. Thus the +Lord Rhys had to eject the monks from +one cell, because of the charges brought +against them by the fathers and husbands +of the surrounding district, who declared +that they would leave and go to England +if the evil was not stopped.</p> + +<p>Another class of houses were those +founded as priories or cells of English +abbeys. Thus the Priory at Brecon was +a cell of Battle Abbey, founded by Bernard +of Newmarch, and largely endowed by the +Braoses; Ewenny, founded by Maurice +de Londres, was a cell to St. Peter’s, +Gloucester. All these of course, like the +alien priories, were founded by the Norman +conquerors, and for two purposes: Firstly, +for the souls of the founder and his family, +a very necessary provision; the Normans +were in their way a devout people and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> +made sacrifices to win the favour of +heaven. William de Braose used to give +his clerks “something extra” for inserting +pious expressions in his legal documents. +Secondly, these houses also served as +castles and stations for garrisons. Take, +for instance, Ewenny; it is much more +like a castle than a religious house, with +its great embattled walls and towers, and +magnificent gate-house furnished with a +triple portcullis and “shoots,” or holes in +the roof above for pouring molten lead on +the assailants’ heads. The De Londres +family were businesslike as well as pious; +Ewenny’s prime object was to help them +to gain heaven, it also helped them to gain +the earth. The close and constant connection +which these houses maintained +with their mother abbeys in England and +abroad always kept them Anglo-Norman +in sympathies—foreign garrisons. But +while recognising this aspect of the monastic +houses in Wales, one must avoid exaggerating +it, as, <i>e.g.</i>, Mr. Willis Bund does. +He regards all the monasteries as founded +solely with this political object: “to +represent,” he says, “a Welsh prince as +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> +founder of a religious house in South +Wales after 1066 is representing him as +the worst of traitors. Bad as the Welsh +chieftains were, even they would have +hesitated to introduce into their country +what were really Norman garrisons;” +and he rejects the idea of a Welsh prince +founding Strata Florida. Now these +remarks are only applicable to those +religious houses which were dependencies +on some English or foreign abbey; they +do not apply to the Cistercian monasteries, +all of which were practically equal and +self-governing; each elected its own head +and was not under foreign dictation. +While the whole Cistercian Order formed +an united body for purposes of monastic +life and discipline, each abbey identified +itself in a very remarkable way with the local +or national aspirations of the people round, +from whom its monks were drawn. Some +of the Cistercian monasteries in Ireland +refused to admit any Englishman. Some +of the Cistercian abbeys in Wales were +the warmest supporters of Welsh independence.</p> + +<p>The Welsh princes felt the need of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> +providing for the safety of their souls +just as the Norman barons did, and the +souls of both parties needed a great deal +of saving. Further, the Welsh were not +cut off from the great movements of the +world; they felt like every other country +in Europe the waves of religious enthusiasm, +which resulted in the twelfth century +in the spread of the Cistercians, in the +thirteenth century in the spread of the +friars. In the twelfth century the acts +most pleasing to God were generally +thought to be taking the Cross and +endowing a Cistercian monastery. Again, +though many of the Welsh chiefs were +mere creatures of impulse, there were +others who looked to the future. The +Lord Rhys was an acute man of the world, +who was not averse to improving his +property. He possessed great tracts of +mountain land, which was practically +worthless; he saw Cistercian monks +elsewhere, not exactly making such tracts +blossom like the rose, but, at any rate, +utilising them for pasture land, keeping +flocks of sheep, becoming the great wool-growers +for all Europe; why should he +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> +not hand over his worthless property to +Cistercians, and by so doing lay up for +himself treasure in heaven and on earth? +Mr. Willis Bund says, “How unnatural +for any Welsh prince to found a Cistercian +abbey!” Surely it was the most natural +thing in the world.</p> + +<p>The Cistercians had far greater influence +in Wales than any other monastic order. +The Cistercian abbeys were Aberconway, +Basingwerk, Valle Crucis, Strata Marcella, +Cymer, Strata Florida, Cwm Hir, Whitland, +Neath, Margam, Llantarnam, +Tintern, Grace Dieu, Dore. We have in +Gerald a very unfavourable and prejudiced +witness on the Cistercians. He tells with +pious horror and human satisfaction the +story of the abbot of Strata Marcella, who +was a great founder of nunneries, and at +length eloped with a nun (he soon repented +and came back to his abbey, preferring the +bread and water of affliction to the nun). +Gerald had a personal grudge against the +Cistercians; wanting to raise money he +had pawned his library to the monks of +Strata Florida, and when he tried to +redeem the books they declared they had +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> +bought them, and would not give them +up.</p> + +<p>The Cistercians certainly drove hard bargains, +and insisted on their rights to the +uttermost farthing. In reading the history of +any of these Cistercian houses—the history, +say, of Margam by Mr. Trice Martin—one’s +first feeling is one of disappointment: +it is nearly all about property. When one +looks through to find evidences of spiritual +influence one finds instead prosecutions +for poaching. Did they have schools and +teach the youth of the country round? I +have found no evidence of it. Why +should they? Monks never professed to +be learned men or to be teachers. Many +were both, but it was a disputed question +whether they were not in this contravening +their rule. At any rate, it was going outside +their duty. Their business was to +serve God—to perform divine services—and +in the intervals to keep out of mischief +by manual labour, and to perform works of +charity. Margam was specially famous for +this last.</p> + +<p>Margam Abbey was founded by Robert +of Gloucester, in 1147, and the brother of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> +St. Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, the most +important man in Europe in his time, came +over to arrange about the establishment of +the house. It was endowed with lands by +both English and Welsh, such as the Earl +of Gloucester and the Lord of Senghenydd. +William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, +granted the monks freedom from toll in all +his boroughs in Wales and Ireland. The +Braoses gave them the privilege of “buying +and selling freely all manner of merchandise +without toll” in Gower, and they +had the right to all wrecks along the coast +near Kenfig. We find the abbot asserting +his fishing rights sometimes by excommunicating +poachers, sometimes by the +more effective method of haling them +before the Shire Court at Cardiff and +getting them fined 3d. a head. The +monks of Margam obtained also a footing +in Bristol through the Earls of Gloucester, +a great commercial advantage to them for +the sale of their wool both in England and +abroad.</p> + +<p>Their lands and privileges were not +always, of course, free gifts. Thus in the +twelfth century Gilbert Burdin grants land +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> +to Margam, and in return the abbot gives +20s. to the grantor, a gold coin to his wife, +and red shoes to each of his children. In +1325 John Nichol, of Kenfig, gave his property +to the abbey in return for a life +annuity. He was to receive daily one loaf, +two cakes, and a gallon of beer; also +6s. 8d. for wages, four pairs of shoes (price +12d.), a quarter of oats, and pasture for +two beasts.</p> + +<p>The annual revenue of Margam was +returned as 500 marks in 1383, but before +that time the abbey had suffered severely +from inundations, sea and sand covering +whole villages and much of the best property +of the house; and the finances were +in a bad way. These were improved by +grants of the tithes of parish churches—a +favourite form of gift to a monastery, but +a great scandal. The rectorial tithes were +paid to a monastery, while the monks at +best put in some under-paid vicar to look +after the parish. Generally, wherever there +is a vicar instead of a rector in England or +Wales the explanation is the appropriation +of the tithes by a monastery.</p> + +<p>What did Margam do with its income? +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> +The first charge was the support of about +forty monks and forty lay brethren. Next +there were the construction and keeping in +repair of the church and other monastic +buildings; and, thirdly, the expense of +charity and hospitality. The monasteries +were the hotels of the Middle Ages, except +that they made no charges, and Margam +was celebrated for its hospitality for centuries. +Gerald, the enemy of monks, says: +“This noble abbey was more celebrated for +its charitable deeds than any other of that +order in Wales. And as a reward for that +abundant charity which the monastery had +always, in times of need, exercised towards +strangers and the poor, in a season of +approaching famine their corn and provisions +were divinely increased, like the +widow’s cruse of oil.” Two centuries +later we find the Pope bearing witness +to the well-known and universal hospitality +of the Abbey of Margam. It was +placed on the main road between Bristol +and Ireland, at a distance from other places +of refuge, and so was continually overrun by +rich and poor strangers, the poor evidently +preponderating. In this connection I will +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> +give one instance of wise charity on the +part of these monks from the end of the +twelfth century. Hugh, son of Robert of +Llancarven, gives the abbey some land in +return for “four marks of silver and a young +ox, given to him in his great need by the +Abbot.” The monastery performed some +of the services of the modern bank.</p> + +<p>Strata Florida presents some different +characteristics. Like most Cistercian +houses, it lay off the beaten track. It +was founded in 1164 by the Lord Rhys, +near the site of an older monastery. It +was endowed with large expanse of lands, +mostly mountain pastures, and the monks +soon began building their church and refectory +and cloister. The monastery was +completed in 1201, when “the monks came +to the new church, which had been erected +of splendid workmanship.” The architectural +details of this church are peculiar and +almost unique. Mr. S. W. Williams notices +especially the large amount of interlacing +work in the carving, which one sees in the +old Celtic crosses, and which is so characteristic +of Celtic art. The convent seems to +have become very soon essentially Welsh. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> +Nearly all the abbots have Welsh names. +It was the burial-place of the princes of +South Wales; but as they were, after the +Lord Rhys, quite unimportant, its political +interest is connected with the princes of +Gwynedd. When in the thirteenth century +the princes of North Wales were attracting +the allegiance of the South Welsh also +they found Strata Florida a convenient +place for important political assemblies. +It was here that Llywelyn ap Iorwerth +summoned all the Welsh chiefs to do +homage to his son David. The monastery +suffered damage during the wars of +Edward I., who in 1284 granted it £78 +for repairs. But it suffered the worst +injuries during the rebellion of Owen +Glyndwr, when the English troops used +it as a barracks, and stabled their horses in +church and choir.</p> + +<p>The patriotic tone of Strata Florida is +expressed in the Welsh chronicles written +there. The later part of the <i>Annales +Cambriæ</i> was written there, and the Brut y +Tywysogion. At Margam also a chronicle +was composed which has been preserved. +When an abbey decided to begin a chronicle, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> +the first step was to borrow a chronicle +from some other house; thus Margam, +founded by Robert of Gloucester, copied +out the Chronicle of William of Malmesbury, +which was dedicated to Robert of +Gloucester. The monks of Strata Florida +copied out the earlier portion of the <i>Annales +Cambriæ</i>. These chronicles of course only +became of historical value when they +become independent and contemporary. +They do not confine themselves to the +monastery or local history, but relate +events of general interest—to the whole of +Britain and to all Europe—intermixed +with notices of the burning of a monastic +barn or the death of the local abbot. +Knowledge of the great world came to an +abbey through the travellers who stayed +there; through political or ecclesiastical +assemblies held there; and through public +documents sent to the monks for safekeeping +or to be copied. We generally do +not know who wrote these chronicles; they +were rather the work of the community than +of the individual monks. “Every year (so +runs a regulation on the subject) the volume +is placed in the <i>scriptorium</i>, with loose sheets +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> +of paper or parchment attached to it, in +which any monk may enter notes of events +which seem to him important. At the end +of the year, not any one who likes, but he to +whom it is commanded, shall write in the +volume as briefly as he can what he thinks +of all these loose notes is truest and best to +be handed down to posterity.” “Thus it +was that a monastic chronicle grew, like a +monastic house, by the labour of different +hands and at different times; but of the +heads that planned it, of the hands that +executed it, no satisfactory record was +preserved. The individual is lost in the +community.”</p> + +<p>Coming now to the Friaries in Wales, +we find ourselves in a different atmosphere. +The friars were not troubled with +questions of property: they had none; +they depended for their livelihood on the +alms of the faithful. Again, speaking +generally, one may say that while the +Benedictine priory is found under the +shadow of a castle, and the Cistercian +abbey in the heart of the country, the +friaries were built in the slums of the +towns. As there were few towns in Wales, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> +the houses of the Mendicant Orders were +not numerous or important. The Dominicans +(or Black Friars) had houses at +Bangor, Rhuddlan, Brecon, Haverfordwest, +and Cardiff; the Franciscans (or Grey +Friars) at Cardiff, Carmarthen, and Llanfaes; +the Carmelites (or White Friars) at +Denbigh; and the Austin Friars at Newport +in Monmouthshire. It is remarkable that +the Dominicans had more houses in Wales +than the Franciscans; though the Franciscans—the +mystic apostles of love—were +more in sympathy with the Celtic spirit +than the Dominicans, the stern champions +of orthodoxy. Francis of Assisi strove to +reproduce again on earth the life of Christ—in +the letter and in the spirit; and the +religious poetry of Wales in the thirteenth +century is saturated with Franciscan feeling—full +of intense realisation of the childhood +and suffering of Christ, the humanity +of God. This may be illustrated by the +following poem by a Welsh friar of the +thirteenth century, Madawc ap Gwallter:—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A Son is given us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A kind Son is born ...<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Son to save us,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The best of Sons.<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> +<span class="i0">A God, a man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the God a man<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With the same faculties.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A great little giant,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A strong puny potentate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of pale cheeks.<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Richly poor<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our father and brother,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Exalted, lowly,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Honey of minds;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the ox and ass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lord of life<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies in a manger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a heap of straw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As a chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Clothed in tatters;<br /></span> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Velvet He wants not,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor white ermine—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To cover Him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around His couch<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rags were seen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Instead of fine linen.”<br /></span> +</div> +</div> + +<p>I do not know the dates of the foundations +of the Welsh Franciscan houses; the +dates given in Mr. Newell’s scholarly +“History of the Church in Wales” are +impossible. Llanfaes is said to have been +established by Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, and +Franciscan influence would come to Wales +through Thomas the Welshman, Bishop +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> +of St. David’s (1247), who had been +lecturer to the Franciscans at Oxford, and +was famous for his piety and learning. +Another Franciscan I wish to mention is +Friar John the Welshman, who in his old +age was employed to negotiate with the +Welsh in 1282. He had studied and +taught at Oxford and Paris, and made a +creditable show beside such intellectual +giants as Thomas Aquinas and Roger +Bacon, his contemporaries. The widespread +and lasting popularity of his works +is shown by the large number of manuscripts +and early printed editions which have come +down to us. But his chief interest and life-work +was the popularisation of knowledge +in the service of morality. He devoted +his energies to training up lecturers who +should go to the Franciscan friaries in the +chief towns in England and Wales and +teach friars and clergy the art of popular +preaching. Friar John of Wales was one +of the chief inspirers of the “University +Extension” movement of the Middle Ages. +These popular preachers or lecturers did +not do much for the advancement of sound +learning, because they did not study any +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> +science for its own sake, but only for the +moral lessons they could find in it. But, +to rouse some intellectual interest in the +people at large, and stimulate their moral +sense, was a work not unworthy of the +universities; and this aim was to some +degree attained. One of the favourite +ways of spending a holiday in the Middle +Ages was to go and hear a friar preach. +Here is a summary of a friar’s sermon +constructed after the method of Friar John +of Wales, on the relative merits of the Ass +and the Pig.</p> + +<p>“The pig and the ass live not the same +life: for the pig during his life does no +good, but eats and swills and sleeps; but +when he is dead, then do men make much +of him. The ass is hard at work all his +days and does good service to many; but +when he dies, there is no profit. And that +is the way of the world. Some do no good +thing while they live, but eat and drink +and wax fat, and then they are dragged off +to the larder of hell, and others enrich +themselves with their goods. Whereby I +know that those, who for God’s sake live +the life of holy poverty, shall never lack +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> +substance, because their heavenly Father +has pigs to kill. For as the good man +before the season will kill a pig or two to +give puddings to his children, so will our +Lord kill those hardened sinners before +their time, and give their goods to the +children of God. So the psalmist says: +‘The bloodthirsty and deceitful men shall +not live out half their days,’ because they +do no work to keep their bodies healthy. +Nothing is so healthful for body and soul +as honest work. Work is the life of man, +the guardian of health; work drives away +sin, and makes people sleep well at night. +Work is the strength of feebleness, the +health of sickness, the salvation of men,—quickener +of the senses, foe of sloth, +nurse of happiness, a duty in the young +and in the old a merit. Therefore it is +better to be an ass than a pig.”</p> + +<p>One of the most able of these “extension +lecturers” was another Welshman—probably +a native of Cardiff—Friar John David, +whose lectures at Hereford were so successful +that after a year both the friars and the +clergy of the city declared he was indispensable, +and petitioned for his reappointment. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> +He became the head of the Franciscan +province of England, and lies buried +among the ruins of the church of the Grey +Friars in Cardiff.</p> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125"><!-- duplicate title --></a></span></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126"><!-- blank page --></a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p> + +<h2>VI</h2> + +<h3>LLYWELYN AP GRUFFYDD AND THE BARONS’ WAR</h3> + + +<p><span class="dropcap">T</span>HROUGHOUT the twelfth and +thirteenth centuries the history of +England and the history of Wales are so +closely bound up together that it is impossible +to study either apart from the +other. In illustration of this general +statement I will ask you to consider briefly +the history of twelve years, from 1255 to +1267—a period of special interest to us, +because these are the years in which +Llywelyn’s power was founded and built +up.</p> + +<p>In 1255 occurred three events of great +importance to Wales: (1) Llywelyn overthrew +his brothers in battle; (2) Edward +Longshanks took possession of his Chester +estates; (3) Edmund Crouchback was +formally proclaimed king of Sicily.</p> + +<p>1. David, younger son of Llywelyn ap +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> +Iorwerth, died in 1246, leaving no descendants, +and the Principality was seized +by the three sons of his elder brother +Gruffydd—Owain the Red, Llywelyn, and +David. For some years they held +together, because Henry III. opposed the +accession of any of them, claiming the +Principality as a lapsed fief under a treaty +made with the last prince, David ap +Llywelyn. But after a time the king +accepted the homage and recognised the +rights of the sons of Gruffydd. Being +thus freed from direct hostility of the +English king, the joint rulers soon +quarrelled, and came to open war in 1255. +“By the instigation of the devil,” says +the Brut y Tywysogion, “a great dissension +arose between the sons of +Gruffydd—namely, Owain the Red and +David on the one side, and Llywelyn on +the other. And thereupon Llywelyn and +his men awaited without fear, trusting in +God, at Bryn Derwin the cruel coming +of his brother accompanied by a vast +army, and before the end of one hour +Owain was taken and David fled, after +many of the army were killed and others +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +captured, and the rest had taken to flight. +And then Owain the Red was imprisoned; +and Llywelyn took possession of the +territory of Owain and David without +any opposition.” Thus Gwynedd was +united under one ruler.</p> + +<p>2. It was the policy of Henry III. to +collect the earldoms into the hands of his +relations. Thus the great palatine earldom +of Chester, having lapsed to the +Crown through failure of heirs, was granted +in 1254 to the king’s eldest son, Edward. +Besides Chester and its dependencies +Edward received Montgomery and the +royal lands in South Wales (Cardigan +and Carmarthen), Ireland and Gascony—in +fact all the territory outside England +over which the king had rights. These +possessions were calculated to give the +heir to the throne a varied experience and +splendid training in the art of government. +Edward was in need of such training, as +the story of his early years shows. He +was only sixteen years of age in 1255, but +in the Middle Ages men lived short lives +and matured very early. Edward was +married in 1254, and had much experience +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> +in war and statesmanship before he was +twenty. It was a wild time, and young +Edward was among the wildest spirits; +as he rode through the country, accompanied +by his two hundred followers—mostly +rollicking and arrogant foreign +adventurers—who robbed and devastated +the land, and thrashed and even mutilated +passers-by for fun, people looked forward +with great fear to the accession of such a +ruffian. A few years of responsibility, +and failure, soon changed him into the +noblest and most law-abiding of the +Plantagenets. It was Wales which gave +him his first lesson. He first tried his +hand at the reorganisation of the “Middle +Country,” making it “shire-land,” introducing +the English law and administrative +system; the same policy was put in force +in Cardigan and Carmarthen, which formed +one shire with a Shiremoot and the usual +institutions of an English county. Some +Welshmen had already petitioned the king +for the introduction of English law into +Wales, complaining that by Welsh law +the crime of the guilty is visited on the +innocent relations. At best it was a task +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> +which required very careful management, +and Edward and his advisers were as +yet quite unfitted for it, prone as they +were to violent methods, having an +insolent contempt for all customs and +habits which differed from those to +which they were used, and all classes +except their own. The result is thus +expressed by the Welsh chronicler: After +Edward returned to England, “the nobles +of Wales came to Llywelyn, having been +robbed of their liberties and made captives, +and declared they would rather be killed +in war for their liberty than suffer themselves +to be trampled on by strangers. +And Llywelyn was moved at their tears, +and invaded the Middle Country and subdued +it all before the end of the week.” +In this work Llywelyn was assisted by +descendants of Rhys, the princes of South +Wales, who in Cardigan suffered from +Prince Edward’s policy in the same way +as the men of the Middle Country or Four +Cantreds. This union of North and South +Wales is one of the special characteristics +of the struggle under Llywelyn ap +Gruffydd. That the Welsh of the North +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +should join those of the South was, notes +Matthew Paris, “a circumstance never +known before.” And Llywelyn was +statesman enough to see the importance +of this union and take steps to strengthen +it. After recovering the Middle Country, +he marched south, took possession of +Cardigan and Builth—then a possession +of the Crown, though in the custody of +Mortimer—and gave these districts to +Meredydd, grandson of the Lord Rhys, +to hold as vassal—a wise measure, +intended to bind the South to him by +common interests. Matthew Paris, who +holds up the Welsh resistance to tyranny +as an example to the English, puts in +Llywelyn’s mouth a striking speech in +favour of unity: “Let us then stand firm +together; for if we remain inseparable we +shall be insuperable”—the very words of +Gerald of Barry, whose advice had borne +some fruit. But Meredydd soon proved +a traitor, and the failure of Henry III.’s +campaign in 1257 was less due to the +union of the Welsh than to the disunion +of the English.</p> + +<p>3. This brings us to the third event +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> +referred to above—the proclamation of +Edmund as King of Sicily. The Pope +was trying to conquer Sicily, but wanted +some one else to pay the war budget. +After trying various people he induced +Henry III. to accept the crown of Sicily +for Edmund and promise enormous sums +for the payment of the papal armies, and +pledge his whole kingdom as security for +the payment. This, coming on the top of +many years of misgovernment and a long +series of extortions, led directly to the +crisis of the reign—the revolution known +as the Provisions of Oxford in 1258, by +which the powers of government were +taken away from the Crown and given to +committees of barons.</p> + +<p>The disaffection against Henry III. at +once made itself felt in the Welsh war. +“Those who had promised the king +assistance did not come;” and when the +whole knighthood of England were called +out to meet at Chester, only “manifold +complaints and murmurs were heard.” +We might have expected the Marcher +Lords at any rate to rally round the king; +but they were not disposed to assist in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> +building up a royal power in Wales which +would endanger their independence, and +were glad enough to stand by and see +the scheme thwarted. Some of them +even went so far as to send secret +information to the Welsh prince. The +king had to retreat ingloriously, pursued +by Llywelyn, and followed by the +derisive sneers of the enemy. It may +interest some of us to note that in this war +the English army fought, as often, under +the Dragon standard; probably the +Dragon made in 1244 by Edward Fitz +Odo, the King’s goldsmith, who was commanded +to make it “in the manner of a +standard or ensign, of red samit, to be +embroidered with gold, and his tongue to +appear as though continually moving, and +his eyes of sapphire or other stones +agreeable to him.” This was in 1257; +the king was still less able to attack +Llywelyn in 1258 and the following years, +and had to agree to an ignominious truce.</p> + +<p>Almost the whole English baronage +under the leadership of Simon de Montfort, +Earl of Leicester, and Richard de +Clare, Earl of Gloucester, combined +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +against the king, who was only supported +by the royal family and those of +his foreign relations to whom he had +given earldoms and baronies and +bishoprics in England or Wales. If +Llywelyn had contented himself with +occupying the royal lands in Wales—the +territories granted to Edward—and with +seizing Powys, which held to the English +king, he would have had nothing to fear +at this time from the English baronage, +and the Crown was powerless to resist. +It is clear from the English chroniclers +that there was a genuine admiration for +the Welsh resistance on the part of the +English people. “Their cause,” says +Matthew Paris, “seemed a just one even +to their enemies.” But Llywelyn attacked +the great Marcher Lords; it was difficult +for a champion of Welsh patriotism to +avoid doing so—it may be also that +Llywelyn failed to grasp thoroughly the +political situation in England, as he certainly +failed to grasp it after the accession +of Edward I. The first to suffer severely +from him was Roger Mortimer, lord of the +Middle March; thus Llywelyn drove him +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> +out of Gwerthrynion and Maelienydd, and +added these territories to his own. Successes +like these roused great enthusiasm +among the Welsh gentry, though they +excited the alarm and jealousy of some of +the princes (such as Meredydd, and +Llywelyn’s brother David, who “by the +instigation of the devil” deserted the +cause and went over to the English). +But the good men of Brecon revolted from +their lord, the Earl of Hereford, and +adhered to Llywelyn, who came down and +received their homage in 1262.</p> + +<p>The general situation was altered by +these events. It became clear to the +Lords Marchers that their power was +endangered by Llywelyn’s success, and +that they must make common cause with +Prince Edward. The Lords Marchers +began to form the royalist party. Thus +Mortimer, who in 1258 was among the +leaders of the baronial opposition to the +Crown, was in 1260 acting with the king +against the barons. The Mortimers were +the most directly affected of all the +Marchers by the successes of Llywelyn, +not only because their territories lay near +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> +Gwynedd, but because nearly all their lands +lay in or close to the Marches; they had all +their eggs in the same basket, while the +other leading Lords Marchers had large +possessions elsewhere, from which they +drew the bulk of their revenues, using +their March lands as a recruiting-ground +for their troops. Thus to the De Clares +their estates in Kent were probably worth +more as a source of income than the +whole of Glamorgan; and they also had +estates in Hertford and Suffolk and +Hampshire, and elsewhere; the Fitzalans +were great landowners in Sussex; the +Bohuns of Hereford had broad acres in +Huntingdon, Essex, and Hertford. To +these men the limitation of the royal +powers—especially of the power of taxing, +and the king’s right to employ foreigners +in places of trust—was more important +than the checking of Llywelyn’s advance, +which certainly weakened the king and +made it easier to enforce constitutional +rights against him.</p> + +<p>Still we have here one of the causes +which broke the unity of the baronage, +which created a royalist party, and led to +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> +open war. This has hardly been enough +emphasised. It is generally said that the +question on which the barons split was the +question of the recognition of popular +representation in the government of the +country—the question, in a word, of a +House of Commons—Simon de Montfort +being the leader of the popular cause, +Richard de Clare, Earl of Gloucester (till +his death in July, 1262), the leader of the +oligarchic party, which aimed merely at +transferring the royal power to a committee +of barons. This was undoubtedly the most +important cause of the quarrel, because +it was a question of principle big with +results for the future, affecting the whole +course of English history, while the +attitude which the barons ought to take +towards Llywelyn was merely for the +barons a matter of political tactics. But +it is probable that the latter loomed larger +in the eyes of contemporaries—certainly +in the eyes of most of the Lords +Marchers.</p> + +<p>Hence it came about that, when war +actually broke out in the spring of 1263, the +elder of the Lords Marchers fought on the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> +side of the king—such as Roger Mortimer +and Humphrey de Bohun—though the +younger men—young Gilbert of Gloucester +and Humphrey de Bohun, the son of +Hereford—remained under the spell of +Simon de Montfort’s fascination and high-minded +enthusiasm. The war began in +the Welsh Marches, Simon attacking +the forces of Edward of Chester and Roger +Mortimer—the principal royalists. As +these were also the most formidable +enemies of the Welsh, Llywelyn at the +same time attacked them from the other +side, the baronial party and Welsh co-operating, +though without any formal +alliance or friendly feelings. Thus in +1263 the baronial army besieged Shrewsbury, +which defended itself till “a countless +host” of Welshmen, came up and began +to attack it from the other side; the town +then surrendered to the barons lest it +should fall into the hands of the Welsh.</p> + +<p>This campaign led to a very great +defection from the baronial side: the Lord +Marchers generally—such as Clifford and +Fitzalan—deserted Simon, who appeared +as a traitor to the country. How great +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> +the defection is shown by Simon’s words: +“Though all should leave me, yet with +my four sons I will stand true to the just +cause, which I have sworn to uphold for +the honour of the Church and the good of +the kingdom; I have been in many lands, +pagan and Christian, but in none have I +found such faithlessness as in England.”</p> + +<p>The royalists were now the strongest +party in the Marches, and in 1264 Edward +and Mortimer gained a number of successes +over the troops of Simon and Llywelyn +(who seem to have been acting together) +and captured Brecon. But they were +called off to the main seat of war in the +Midlands, and Simon inflicted a crushing +defeat on the royalists at Lewes, in Sussex, +1264. It appears that Welsh archers +fought in Simon’s army, but these would +be South Welsh, not North Welsh, the +troops of Gilbert de Clare, not those of +Llywelyn. The Marchers who escaped +from Lewes were followed up by Simon, +and being encircled by his forces and those +of Llywelyn, submitted in December, 1264.</p> + +<p>But Simon in the hour of triumph was +now near his fall, which was made inevitable +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> +by the defection of Gilbert de Clare +and whole of the Gloucester interest. The +causes of the quarrel as given in the +chronicles are mainly personal. Simon, +with all his greatness, was quick-tempered +and overbearing, inclined to seize power +for himself, and perhaps even avaricious; +one may infer this from the statement of a +friendly chronicler, William Rishanger: +“his habitual prayer to God was that he +would save him from avarice and covetousness +of worldly goods.” But, apart from +merely personal questions, it is to be +noticed that the closer the relations +between Simon and Llywelyn became, +the less cordial became his relations to +Gilbert de Clare. Thus when Simon +co-operated with Llywelyn in bringing +Mortimer and the Marchers to submission in +December, 1264, Gilbert began to intrigue +with them; and soon after the famous parliament +of 1265 had transferred to Simon +the earldom of Chester—thus relieving +Llywelyn of his most dangerous neighbour, +Prince Edward—Gilbert definitely joined +Mortimer and Edward. The meeting +between the three at Ludlow is very +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> +important; for Prince Edward now, at +the instance of Gloucester, definitely +pledged himself to the cause of reform +and good government. It may be said +for the Red Earl of Gloucester that in +deserting Simon he did not desert his +cause. To ensure the future of English +liberties it was no longer necessary to +support De Montfort: “henceforth it +was not Simon but Edward who best +represents the cause of orderly national +progress.”</p> + +<p>A few days after the desertion of +Gloucester Simon made his first formal +treaty with Llywelyn, ceding to him +Hawarden, Ellesmere, Montgomery, Maud’s +Castle, a line of fortresses along the eastern +border, recognising his right to the title of +Prince of Wales, and to the homage of all +the Welsh barons, while Llywelyn engaged +to supply Simon with five thousand spearmen +and raid the estates of Mortimer and +De Clare. The first part of the campaign +of Evesham was carried out in Gwent. +Prince Edward held the line of the +Severn, separating Simon at Hereford +from his English partisans. Simon, while +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> +waiting for his English supporters to concentrate, +entered Monmouthshire, where +Llywelyn’s spearmen joined him and +ravaged the Gloucester estates, trying to +entice the royalists into Wales. Edward +followed; but—his pupil in war as in +politics—the young prince outgeneralled +him at every point, and Simon only +escaped at Newport by hurried flight +across the river, burning the bridge behind +him. He kept the Usk between him and +his enemy, but this involved a long march +north, through mountains and barren +country, and he got back to Hereford +with a half-starved army, only to find +the line of the Severn held more strongly +than ever. We cannot follow out the rest +of the campaign, marked as it was by +brilliant strategy on the part of the young +Edward, which proved him a born master +of the art of war. In the final battle all +the advantages were on his side, and one +cannot blame the spearmen of Gwynedd +for trying to save themselves by flight at +the “murder of Evesham.” The body of +the great Earl of Leicester was shamefully +mutilated by the conquerors, and his head +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> +sent as a fitting present to Matilda de +Braose, wife of Roger Mortimer.</p> + +<p>The struggle continued for two years both +in England and Wales. In England +Simon’s adherents held out owing to the +severity of the terms which the victorious +party insisted on. They are known as +“The Disinherited,” and their cause was +championed by the two enemies—Llywelyn +and Gilbert de Clare. The “Brut” +states that in 1267, “Llywelyn confederated +with Earl Clare; and then the +earl marched with an immense army to +London; and through the treachery of the +citizens he got possession of the Tower. +And when King Henry and his son +Edward heard of this they collected an +immense army and marched to London +and attacked it, and upon conditions they +compelled the earl and citizens to submit.” +“The Annals of Winchester,” a contemporary +English chronicle, relate the same +event, but omit any mention of Llywelyn: +“Earl Gilbert took London, and the Disinherited +flocked to him as to their saviour; +peace was settled in June, and many of the +Disinherited were pacified at the instance of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> +the Earl of Gloucester.” It is clear that +each of these rivals posed as champion of +the Disinherited, but for opposite reasons. +Llywelyn’s object was to encourage their +resistance and keep England divided by +civil war; Gilbert’s to insist on better +terms in order to induce them to yield. +Gilbert was successful in bringing about +peace and reform. The Disinherited were +allowed to pay a fine instead of losing all +their property, and many of the legal +reforms demanded by the baronial party +at the beginning of the struggle were +embodied in the Statute of Marlborough. +And now the Earl of Gloucester employed +his resources in strengthening his Glamorgan +lordship to resist the threatened +invasion of Llywelyn by building Castell +Coch and Caerphilly.</p> + +<p>Llywelyn continued his victorious career +as long as war lasted. In 1266 he inflicted +a crushing defeat on Mortimer at Brecon. +In the autumn of next year, when peace +had been established in England, he came +to terms, through the mediation of the +papal legate, in the Treaty of Montgomery. +Llywelyn kept the four cantreds of the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> +Middle Country; also Cydewain, Ceri, +Gwerthrynion, Builth, and Brecon. But +Maelienydd was restored to Roger Mortimer, +though Llywelyn reserved his right +to appeal to the law against this article. +Further, the Prince of Gwynedd received +the hereditary title of Prince of Wales, and +was recognised as overlord of all the +Welsh barons in Wales, except Meredydd +ap Rhys, who remained immediate vassal +of the King of England: his territories +therefore in the Vale of Towy were withdrawn +from the power of Llywelyn. The +Prince of Wales in return did homage +and agreed to pay him 25,000 marks +by instalments. The treaty is less +favourable to Llywelyn than that of 1265. +His rights in Deheubarth were curtailed, +and he gave up his claims to Ellesmere +and Montgomery, and possession of +Maelienydd.</p> + +<p>The papal legate who arranged the +treaty is not to be congratulated on his +draftsmanship. Many things were left +undecided, and a series of disputes arose. +Thus Llywelyn seems to have claimed +suzerainty over the Lord of Senghenydd +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> +as one of the “Welsh barons,” though +that term was surely only meant to include +the Welsh barons who held directly of the +king, not the vassals of the Lord of +Glamorgan. But it is evident that +Llywelyn did not try to abide by the +treaty. He continued to intrigue with +the English barons, posing as the successor +of Simon de Montfort, and failing +to see that Edward I. was the political +heir of the great earl. He tried to throw +off the suzerainty of England, with the +result that he lost the independence of his +country. He lived in an atmosphere of +enthusiasm and flattery, and failed to +realise the limits of his power. The bards +by whom he was surrounded exercised a +“highly pernicious influence in practical +concerns,” and ill-repaid his generosity +by urging him to attempt the impossible.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“His bards are comely about his tables,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I have seen him generously distributing his wealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And his meadhorns filled with generous liquors.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I never returned empty-handed from the North.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bards prophesy that he shall have the government and sovereign power;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Every prediction is at last to be fulfilled.”<br /></span> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> +But if Llywelyn lacked the hard head +of the practical statesman, if he did not, +like his grandfather, merit the title of “the +Great,” he will always remain an attractive +and striking figure in history; he possessed +qualities which made him an ideal representative +of the Cymric race in the +Middle Ages:—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A bold and bounteous lion—the most reckless of givers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man whose anger was destructive; most courteous prince;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man sincere in grief, true in loving,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perfect in knowledge.”<br /></span> +</div> +</div> + + +<p class="center" style="padding-top: 7em; padding-bottom: 3em; font-size: small;">UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.</p> + + +<table width="50%" cellspacing="0" style="margin-bottom: 3em;" summary="Titles of interest"> + <tr> + <td class="tdcb"><big>SOME WELSH BOOKS.</big></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdlint"><b>WALES.</b> By <span class="smcap">Owen M. Edwards</span>. Crown +8vo, cloth, 5s. (“The Story of the +Nations” Series.)</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdlin"><b>THE WELSH PEOPLE.</b> By <span class="smcap">John +Rhys</span>, M.A., and <span class="smcap">David Brynmor-Jones</span>, +Q.C., M.P. Third Edition, +revised. Demy 8vo, cloth, 16s.</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdcb">THE WELSH LIBRARY.</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdlint">Edited by <span class="smcap">Owen M. Edwards</span>, Author of +“Wales.” Each volume Foolscap 8vo. +2s. Cloth, 1s. Paper.</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdlin"><b>Vols. 1-3. THE MABINOGION.</b><br /> +(<i>In Preparation.</i>)</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdc">LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN.</td> + </tr> +</table> + + + + +<div class="bbox"> +<p><b>Transcriber's Note</b></p> + +<p>Minor typographic errors in punctuation and variations in hyphenation have been corrected without note.</p> + +<p>The following amendments have been made:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>Page <a href="#Page_vi">vi</a>—Cymry amended to Kymry—"... Thomas Stephens, “Literature of the +Kymry”; ..."</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_21">21</a>—harminously amended to harmoniously—"... and a prince of North +Wales working harmoniously together."</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_34">34</a>—FitzHamon amended to Fitzhamon—"... daughter and heiress of +Fitzhamon, conqueror of Glamorgan."</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_37">37</a>—Caradog amended to Caradoc—"... attributed to Caradoc of +Llancarven, on which his biographers ..."</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_80">80</a>—omitted word 'the' added—"... fighting in +Wales till the end of ..."</p> + +<p>Page <a href="#Page_84">84</a>—Senghennydd amended to Senghenydd—"Ivor ap Meyric was Lord of +Senghenydd, ..."</p> +</div> + +<p>The illustration on page <a href="#Page_88">88</a> (Cardiff and Caerphilly Castles) has been moved +so that it is not in the middle of a paragraph.</p> + +<p>Gaps in page numbering are due to duplicated titles, which have been removed, and +blank pages.</p> + +<p>Advertising material has been moved to the end of the text.</p> +</div> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mediæval Wales, by A. 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