Cymru/Wales

Wales on the map

Wales The Last of the Celts ch 5, ch 6 An introduction to Wales, the Welsh and the

Welsh language The part played by the language in any

consideration of Wales in the past and the present.

Wales: a quick look at the past Wales came under English military rule in

1282 (following the death of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd). The battle at Cilmeri. Edward I.

Welsh law vied with English law. 1400 Rebellion of Owain Glyndwr, ‘Prince of

Wales’. The uchelwyr, land-owning class of native

Welsh.

Wales: a quick look at the past Perchentyaeth- householdership: aristocratic

obligations to uphold social hospitality, but also a delight in ancestry, honour, and cultivication of the Welsh language.

Very large number of houses built between 1430-1580.

Poets were the ‘carpenters of praise’. Their belief in a ‘deliverer of the Britons/Welsh’.

Wales: a quick look at the past Henry Tudor (half English, a quarter French,

a quarter Welsh). His grand-father was Owain Tudur of Penmynydd, Anglesey (NW Wales).

Thomas Cromwell and the Act of Union 1536 (on the statute books until 1993).

Good governance to Wales; forbade the use of Welsh in official circles.

Wales: a quick look at the past Unlike Scotland, Wales did not succeed in

retaining its legal system, nor did it have an established educational system of universities.

Yet, the sense of cultural, linguistic and social continuity is very strongly felt after 1536 until the modern period.

Wales: a quick look at the past Charting the course of Welsh history in such a

complex period as the 20th century is not an easy task.

Industrialization: it was a mistake to depend almost entirely in SE and NE Wales on coal-production.

Lloyd George, Aneurin Bevan and James Griffiths- the socialist ideal in Wales. Welfare state.

Wales: a quick look at the past The dominance of the (British) Labour Party

in industrial Wales, and the declining Liberal Party in rural Wales.

The beginnings of parliamentary nationalism. Plaid Cymru.