Wales; her origins, struggles and later history, institutions and manners

Front matter

* "2;

oo'

■7;,

Introduction

ON no historical subject is the modern mind, saturated as it is with a superficial philosophy of Imperialism, so apt to go astray, and with dire consequences, as on the question of nationalitJ^ Sometimes the term ' nation ' is used even by statesmen and philosophers with a mere territorial or geographical significance, and made to include such widely divergent and utterly unrelated phenomena as, for instance, the Tyrolese and the Germans ; at other times it is used synonymously with the much more modern and artificial term ' state.' The reason for this confusion is obvious. A nation, like most of the simple and elemental things of our experience, does not readily admit of definition, although the phenomenon itself is perfectly easy to recognize. When we take into consideration the nations of the West as we know them to-day, in a more or less complex state of development, we find it almost impossible to discover anything in the nature of a common denominator, a deciding characteristic for all of them. A common racial origin, a distinct language, political independence, peculiar and definite customs and traditions, a homeland with an unbroken and independent history, religious affinity, military unity, have all of them been suggested as distinguishing characteristics, but on application to concrete instances all of them fail. A modern poet came nearer the truth than all the philosophers when he said that " a commxmity of memories and of hopes " is the common characteristic of all nations, but even this loose and spiritual definition requires, if not modification, at least restatement.

Just as certain natural forces when brought into play under certain conditions produce certain characteristic results, so

V also certain historical processes produce well-defined and easily recognizable results called ' nations,'

These processes are always at work, and new nations are being continually called into existence, while old nations decay, disintegrate, and disappear.

Nationality, from an evolutionary point of view, may only be a phase in a particular process of development, starting with the family and ending ultimately with the world-empire ; and, indeed, a certain type of philosopher is never tired of reminding us that in the interests of the human race generally the process needs accelerating : to them the Bmpire is a great deal nearer the ideal than the Nation, a proposition, for many reasons, demanding considerable demonstration, and with which we are not concerned. In this historical study the author's purpose has been to outline the processes which have been at work in the making of a peculiar and characteristic phenomenon — Welsh Nationality,

Some people would very likely deny what to us appears to be an incontrovertible fact, that Wales of to-day is a distinct nation, and in support of their attitude would cite its relationship to the United Kingdom and to the British Empire. They would maintain, and with some truth, that at any rate since the Tudor period it has shared the same fortunes as England. Its political and social system is much the same as that of the United Kingdom generally, and its needs and interests are identical with those of the other territorial units in the kingdom. None of these propositions would be correct without very considerable qualification, but, admitting their strict accuracy for the sake of argument, it is still certain that they are all irrelevant considerations.

Any person not of the country itself but coming into Wales from the outside is immediately conscious of the fact that he has entered a strange country. It may well be that he has come into a district which, like Ireland, speaks the English language ; still none the less will he feel that the people are in some strange and subtle way in permanent contrast with the English people themselves. It would be difficult to define vi

INTRODUCTION

the difference in any detail ; most people would be content to say that it was in atmosphere, which means little or nothing. But we know the causes which have produced the effect — ^the different forces which have been at work in moulding the character of the people of the Principality : they have believed and worked for things of their own ; they have lived and died for their own distinct ideals ; their memories are different, and so, to a large extent, are their dreams and their hopes ; and he who comes to them from other lands and other peoples immediately becomes aware of this independence of soul, if not of political organization.

Then there is a still more important fact. The Welsh people themselves are generally conscious of their independent nationality. It is this consciousness that makes nations. This raised Bohemia from being a mere racial group into the dignity of nationhood. This consciousness of unity and independence at a great poUtical crisis welded together the infinitely diverse elements of the United States and made a nation of the clashing factions. This consciousness kept Norway alive through all diplomacies and political exigencies imtil at last through the medium of literature the whole of Europe awoke to its national existence. It is this inward certainty of the soul that has made Ireland the chief and most difficult problem in British politics for many centuries. More, possibly, than any other force has this wrought miracles in history — ^from the days of the revolt of Israel against the Bmpire down to our times. We may deride and condemn it, as Turkey did with the Balkan States ; we may ignore it, as England did with Ireland ; we may for a time crush it with a tyrant's recklessness, as Austria did with Italy or Germany with Belgium ; in the end it will prove its power and win. Alone it is the supreme test of nationality ; and it exists in modern Wales, and is perhaps stronger to-day than at any other period of the nation's history because it is more universal — because it has captured the soul of the peasantry.

We have already said that in the case of the Principality different forces have been at work. It is too commonly

vii thought that since what is generally known as the Conquest of 1282 Wales has travelled historically along the same lines as England. This book will show how misleading such a conception is, how at almost every single great crisis in our history this consciousness of independence of which we have spoken has asserted itself and led the Welsh people a way of their own.

At no time in the history of our civilization has it been more important that a great Empire and its citizens should understand the true import and significance of this kind of individualist development — to see clearly why and how in national life different causes produce different and distinctive results, why and how different moulding forces produce different attitudes and different needs ; and it is on the ground that in this book we find this great and important truth set out that I commend it not only to Welsh readers, who will naturally be deeply interested in it, but also to a much wider circle of readers — to the British public.

Preface

THE history of Wales, which stretches back as far as that of any nation in Europe, and which presents to the student of peoples some most interesting problems, has been singularly neglected by historians until comparatively recent years. The direct ancestors of the Welsh were offering sacrifices to their gods in Britain thousands of years before our era. The Welsh are, indeed, descended from races which conquered a large part of Western Europe, Albion, and Ireland ; their immediate ascendants, the Britons, opposed Caesar's landing and lived long under Rome's government, learning their lessons in Roman schools and pleading before Roman judges ; they fought stubbornly and for centuries against the barbarian Saxons, struggling as few people have had to struggle to preserve a great and widespread civilization. This people, driven back at last by force of overwhelming numbers to the mountains of Cymru, still held the flag of liberty aloft, met in succession and successfully Saxon and Angle and Dane, Norseman and Norman, until at last, worn out and embruted by centuries of warfare, they succumbed to the Norman castle-builders, as more than twelve hundred years before their ancestors had succumbed to the block-houses and forts of Frontinus and Agricola.

A history of such an ancient people should be deeply interesting, yet until the middle of the nineteenth century there were singularly few histories produced relating to Wales or to Welsh movements. With the Annales Cambriae and the Brut y Tywysogion as foundation, the works of cleric chroniclers such as Caradog of I^lancarvan, a few later writers made some effort to tell the story of their country. Humphrey

ix lylwyd, Powel, and Wjnine, working in turn on the primary authorities and editing the work of their predecessor, prevented Welsh history from falling into complete neglect. Some few others, such as Edward lyhuyd in the seventeenth. Pennant and Warrington toward the end of the eighteenth, and Merrick in the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, carried on, in a partial manner, the good work.

As the nineteenth century progressed several fresh workers came into the field. The publication of the Myvyrian ArchcBology of Wales in 1801-7 had supplied subsequent writers with much good material, but it was not until the foundation of the third Cymmrodorion Society in 1873 that any great historical movement took place, although already B. B. Woodward (1853) and Miss WiUiams (' Ysgafell ') (1869) had produced bulky volumes on this subject. From the seventies onward the flow of works upon general and particular Welsh history became more and more considerable. Any adequate notice of modern writers is not possible within the limits of these pages, but every student of Welsh history owes a deep debt of gratitude to the Cymmrodorion Society and to the Cambrian Archaeological Society. Within the last twenty years, thanks largel}^ to the researches conducted by a comparatively small body of enthusiastic scholars, our knowledge of Welsh history has been very greatly extended. Improved texts of the Brut y Tywysogion and the Ancient Laws of Wales have recently been issued, and it may be that the time will soon arrive when Welsh history has a bibliography commensurate with its importance.

In the following pages an attempt has been made to treat of the history of Wales from the earliest times to the present day. The work is, however, chiefly concerned with the doings of the Welsh up to the Act of Union (1535). Thence onward events are surveyed less closely, except that an occasional pause is made for the purpose of noting some great and important national movement.

I am fully conscious of the fact that throughout the work many statements are made dogmatically which in the present

PREFACE

state of our knowledge are highly debatable. Thus I regard the earlier people who lived in Britain as belonging to the Semitic race, I use this term conventionally. Many writers employ the term ' Iberian.' This is unfortunate for two reasons : (i) There is no sufficient ground for connecting the Neolithics of Britain with the Iberian rather than with any other of the so-called Mediterranean races ; (2) the word is misleading, since it turns our attention to the Spanish peninsula for no very obvious or cogent reason. Other writers refer to the Mediterranean races. This has the advantage of being non-committal and the disadvantage of being vague. Others direct our attention to the I^ibyan tribe of the Hamitic family. These last writers seem to be best supported by the available evidence, and I have long pondered a change from ' Semitic ' to ' Hamitic,' especially since I am at pains to show the connexion between Neolithic man and Egyptian culture. The term ' Hamitic ' is, however, vague and liable to be misconstrued, since several negroid races fall within that group. Again, as I point out in the body of the work. Neolithic culture, such as it was, was not improbably connected with that which flowed from the valleys of the Tigris and the Euphrates. This point of view, I think, is best brought into prominence by the use of the term ' Semitic,' but it must be understood that that term is used conventionally to denote men racially connected either with the Hamitics of Egypt or lyibya or with the Semitics proper.

Another point must be made clear. The title ' Briton ' is to-day borne by many peoples in many lands, few of whom, probabl}^ realize that, strictly speaking, it is the Welshman alone who is entitled to that name. When in olden times the Anglo-Saxon chroniclers referred to their enemies the Britons they used the term ' Wealas ' or ' Bret- Wea las.' When in 1870 the German historian von Treitschke spoke of the Frenchmen of Lorraine he used the term ' Walsch,' inelegantly translated in Elsass and Lothringen Past and Present as ' Welsh.' Both terms expressed the same notion

xi of enmity. The Welshman was the Saxon's enemy, but he was a Briton-enemy.

This fact that the Briton, the Briton of that Britain which the Teutons invaded, was the ancestor of the modern Welshman must be borne in mind, otherwise the treatment of the earlier chapters of the book may be regarded as confused. Since this work has been designed in such a manner that an impression, however imperfect, may be obtained of the imderlying causes which have resulted in the development of the Welsh national character, it has been necessary to consider the history of the Welsh people rather than the history of that geographical area now known as Wales. Until the fifth century of our era the Welsh people were mainly found in Britain rather than in Cymru. The earlier chapters are therefore concerned with the inhabitants of Britain as a whole.

A further result flowed from the desire to depict the gradual development of Welsh nationality. In the happiest of circumstances it is not easy to provide an adequate picture of a people by a mere recital of wars, of political events, or of the intrigues or accomplishments of princes and statesmen. When one is considering the history of the Welsh people the difficulties, owing to several causes, chief of which are the scantiness of the original authorities, the nature of their compilation, and the date at which they were reduced to their present form, become almost insuperable. An endeavour has therefore been made to obtain an idea of the character of the ancient Welsh by a consideration of matters other than those which fall within the scope of a political history, using that term in its strictest sense. Their religion, laws, customs, and poetry have at least been glanced at.

The spelling of Welsh names is always a difficulty, and it may aid the non-Welsh reader to follow the plan adopted i£ the following points are made clear :

The forms Gruff ydd, Maredudd, Owain, Howel, Conan, and Ivlywelyn are consistently used. Exception, however, is made in the case of Gruff ydd ap Cynan (instead of Conan) and Gruff wdd (instead of Gruffydd), the son of I^lywelyn the xii

PREFACE

Great (with the consequent spelling of I^lywelyn Prince of Wales' name as lylywelyn ap Gruffudd). The purpose of these variations is to distinguish those important characters from other persons in Welsh history who bore similar names. The spelling of less common names has occasionally been varied also, chiefly because of a difference of period.

The following is a list of EngUsh equivalents for Welsh names, taken in the main from the recently published Llyfr Baglan of John Williams (edited by J. A. Bradney, F.S.A.) :

Cadwgan = Cadogan Goronwy or

Grono = Stephen Gruffydd or Gruffudd =

Griffith Gwilym = William leuan, leun = Evan lorwerth = Edward Maredudd = Meredith Meurig = Merrick

Owain = Owen = Eugene Price = ap Rice (or Rhys) Rhydderch or

Rhodri = Roderick Rhys = Rees or Reece Rinallt = Reginald Tewdwr = Tudor =

Theodore Vychan «= Vaughan =

lyittle (or ' the Junior ')

Nest, a common feminine name, comes from nes, nessa, ' near,* ' nearest,' and probably meant ' dear.'

Welsh names are sometimes lengthy, men identifying themselves by reference to their father and grandfather.

* Ap,' meaning ' son of,' is a late form, being a corruption of

* map,' ' mab,' and is sometimes written ' ab.' It is connected with the Goidelic or Gaelic ' mac' For daughter, following John Williams, the contraction 'vz,' which comes from ' verch ' or ' ferch,' meaning ' daughter,' is used.

The spelling of place-names has been checked with Professor Lloyd's History of Wales, but if errors or inconsistencies exist the fault is mine.

Among the many works to which I am indebted for information, the following have been found particularly useful :

(i) On the ancient period : Monumenta Historica Britannica, Dr. T. R. E. Holmes' Ancient Britain ; Sir John Rhys' Celtic Britain and Celtae and Galli ; Professor Haverfield's Military

xiii

Aspects of Roman Wales ; Sir John Rhys and Sir David Brynmor Jones' The Welsh People ; the late Dr. Hodgkin's Political History of England, vol. i ; Mr. E. W. B. Nicholson's Keltic Researches ; Dr. P. W. Joyce's A Social History of Ancient Ireland ; Mr. T. W. RoUeston's Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race ; Sir Norman lyockyer's Stonehenge ; Mr. E. M. Nelson's The Cult of the Circle-Builders ; M. Roessler de Graville's UArt Celtique ; M. Dichelette's Manuel d'Archeologie prehistorique ; Mr. J. Romilly Allen's Celtic Art in Pagan and Christian Times ; and the various antiquarian journals, in particular Archceologia, Archceologia Cambrensis, and the Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion.

(2) On the middle period : Pre-eminently Professor Lloyd's History of Wales, selections from which have been used by the courtesy of the author and the publishers, Messrs. Longmans, Green, and Co. The Brut y Tywysogion and the Annates Cambriae have formed the basis for the whole of this period, except the life of Gruffydd ap Cynan, for which I have used Hanes Gruffydd ap Cynan (edited by Mr. Arthur Jones). Also Sir H. C. Hoare's translation of the Itinerary of Giraldus Cambrensis ; Dr. Henry Owen's Gerald the Welshman ; Gualteri Mapes de Nugis, etc. (edited by T. Wright) (a later edition, edited by Dr. James, has recently been published) ; Professor Skene's Four Ancient Books of Wales ; Mr. G. T. Clark's Mediceval Military Architecture ; Sir R. W. Payne-Gallwey's Projectile-throwing Engines of the Ancients ; Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion and Y Cymmrodor (particularly Mr. Nicholson's article on Genealogies).

Upon the Arthurian legends works by the following authors have been found of great value : Miss Jessie L. Weston, Sir John Rhys, Mr. Alfred Nutt, Dr. Leo Landau, Mr. Stuart Glennie, Mr. W. W. Comfort, and Mr. W. H. Dickinson. Lady Charlotte Guest's translation of the Mabinogion has been used, in conjunction with Mr. Alfred Nutt's Mabinogion and Sir John Rhys' articles in the Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion.

(3) On the last period : The Statutes at Large ; the Calendar xiv

PREFACE

and Patent Rolls ; Sir H. Ellis' Original Letters ; Miss C, A. J. Skeel's The Council of the Marches in Wales ; Mr. J. A. Wylie's History of England under Henry IV (and the recently published part on Henry V) ; Thomas Pennant's Tours in Wales ; Mr, A. G. Bradley's Owen Glyndwr ; ' Owen Rhoscomyl's ' article in the Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion ; Sir John Rhys and Sir David Brynmor Jones' The Welsh People ; David Bowel's Historic of Cambria ; Mr. H. T. Evans' History of England and Wales ; Mr. O. M. Edwards' Wales ; ' Maelog's ' Poems of Davyth ap Gwilym ; Edward Jones' Poetical Relicks of Welsh Bards ; and the Rev. W, M. Morris' The Renaissance of Welsh Literature.

For the Note on coins Sir John Evans' British Coins has been almost entirely relied upon. On the laws of Wales, to which some prominence is given, the Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales (Record Commission) , together with Mr. Frederick Seebohm's Tribal System in Wales, have been mainly used.

I must express my thanks to the Right Honourable Ellis J. Grifl&th, K.C., M.P., for his Introduction to the book ; the Right Honourable Sir Frederick Pollock, Bart., K.C., for permission to use parts of certain articles which had appeared from my pen in the Law Quarterly Review ; Mr. J. Travis Mills, M.A., for much helpful criticism when the work was in proof stage and before ; Professor Haverfield for permission to use his map of Roman Wales; Major-General Sir Francis Lloyd, D.S.O., for permission to reproduce the portrait of Humphrey Llwyd in his possession ; Mr. John Ballinger, M.A., Librarian of the National Library of Wales, for help in obtaining a reproduction of the twelfth-century Grail manuscript and for various suggestions as to other illustrations ; Mr. C, C. Wood for help in revising the proofs and in compiling the Index ; the Assistants in the Coin and Manuscript Departments of the British Museum for making casts of coins and adding identifying notes thereon, and for making casts of seals ; and, finally, my wife for much help and assistance,

GILBERT STONE

IvONDON, 19 1 5

XV

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Origins i

Pre-Glacial Period : Neolithic Man : Pre-Goidelic Races : Life of Neolithic Man : The Bronze-users : The Goidels.

Chapter I

A FEW years ago history was based on evidence purely documentary, or at least on legends, which, owing to their generality or their inherent probability, had been treated for a long time as containing true germs of history, although transmitted from man to man by word of mouth in the form of a story or a poem. To-day history, even a short and simple history having no pretension to completeness, would be regarded as imperfect if it failed to take note of those dim, remote ages, until lately called prehistoric, which are gradually, by the aid of the pickaxe of the excavator and the studies of the ethnologist, philologist, and astronomer, being brought nearer and nearer to us in living, though not, of course, in mathematical time.

1 Excavations which have been made in caves and riverbeds and elsewhere have brought to light the remains of a race which inhabited the island of which Wales forms a part tens of thousands of years ago. For convenience and to hide our ignorance we term this race Palaeolithic man. Of him we need say nothing save that he hunted with stone implements of a rude sort, that he was a drawer of pictures, that he was a savage knowing no culture — a cave-dweller who lived on his cunning as a hunter rather than on his skill as a tiller of the soil or as a shepherd of flocks. An account of Palaeolithic man, though not impossible, is undesirable in this history, since between him and us lies the Glacial period, which, without doubt, swept away completely and for thousands of years all traces of human life from that part of the world which lies north of the Thames. No particle of Palaeolithic blood can

A I turn to life one thought in any man who lives in England or in Wales to-day. The same cannot be said of Neolithic man. From his entry on the stage of history the story is a continuous one. Atavism doubtless places him occasionally in our midst to-day. Competent authorities have, indeed, suggested that the modern Frenchman is . nearer akin in temperament to the Neolithic than to the Gallic race. In the same way the Welshman of to-day can trace himself back to pre-Celtic times. With this race, therefore, our history must commence^

Neolithic Man

(The men of the New Stone Age came into this island some time, we know not when, after the ice had receded to the normal north. The influx is to be assigned, not to a year, but to centuries or millenniums of years. All through our account of this period it must be remembered that man was ever changing, possibly ever progressing. Tribes rose to power and fell into servitude. Races died out or merged with other races. The period which elapsed between the commencement and the end of the Neolithic period is greater than that which separates the building of the Great Pyramid from the bridging of the Menai Strait.^ Notwithstanding this, however, it is necessary in the present state of our knowledge to treat the period as though it extended over but a few years. We must regard the age, for the purpose of description, as one which knew not change.

From the remains which have been found in burial-places, cromlechs, barrows, caves, and elsewhere, we shall attempt later on a description of Neolithic culture. Before doing so, however, it is desirable to put shortly before the reader the various steps in the genealogy of the Welsh race from the post-Glacial period up to the commencement of the Roman invasion.

|_The earliest ancestors were, as we have said. Neolithic man. The earlier members of this group would seem to have been short men whose average height was not more than 5 feet

4 iuclies.^ Their heads were long and narrow and the cast of face mild. Even before bronze was introduced — that is to say, before 2000 B.C. — they were conquered by a broad-headed

CoAST-i,rtsrE OP Wai<es in the Neowthic Age

{A. Sam Badrig)

From ArchcEologia Cambrensis, by permission of the Cambrian

Archaeological Association.

race who were thick-set but short in stature. These in turn were conquered, possibly shortly after the introduction of bronze, by a round-headed people of robust build, tall and

^ The women's average height was 4 feet 10 inches. This suggests that they were the 'hewers of wood and drawers of water,' a stunted growth showing a hard life.

savage-looking. All this had happened long before the Goidels — the earlier branch of the Celtic race — had removed westward from the Continent to Britain. These Goidels, the direct ancestors of the modern Gael, first crossed the western strait in about the middle of the Bronze Age — that is to say, about 1000 B.C., or perhaps later. They in turn were followed and dispossessed of southern Britain by the Brythons, the direct ancestors of many of the inhabitants of modern Wales, shortly after the commencement of the Iron Age. The period of their coming is generally assigned to the fourth century B.C. It was this people who ruled in Britain, at least in southern Britain, when Caesar stepped on to our shores^,,

Having shortly described the races which honoured this island with their presence in those early times, it is desirable to retrace our steps and consider generally their nature. In the account which follows we group the first three races under one head. We thus make the tripartite division of Neolithic man, the Goidel, the Brython.

The Pre-Goidelic Races

It is a matter of some difficulty to decide of what race the nien were who inhabited Britain before the Goidel came. Sometimes the word Pict is used. This term is not, however, very satisfactory, since it means simply a painted man — as does Scotti ^ — and refers to the custom of the inhabitants of south-eastern Britain in Caesar's time, who tattooed themselves with figures of birds, beasts, and fishes. When Caesar referred to woad-painted men he was talking of Brythons, and clearly distinguished between these Brythons and the men of the hinterland, whom he described as a pastoral, nomadic people, having their wives in common, and living in a state of complete barbarity. Whether Caesar was quite just to them in this last particular we shall have to consider_j

From what we have said, it will be observed that the terms Picts and Scots are unfortunate expressions. They are made more so by the fact that in later times they acquired a specialized

^ Now doubted ; possibly Scotti = ' the Ancient People.'

Pi<ATE I. Figurine de Brassempouy

meaning, referring to the men of Caledonia and Ireland. We shall therefore in the remaining part of this chapter abandon the use of these terms and refer to the Semitic ^ race.

'The researches of Sir Norman Lockyer and his band of helpers into the astronomical significance of Stonehenge and the other circles of Britain, together with the independent mathematical investigation carried on by B. M. Nelson at Hestinsgarth in the Shetlands and elsewhere, taken in conjunction with the philological discovery made by Professor Morris Jones that Welsh is exactly paralleled so far as its syntax is concerned with Egyptian and Berber and the pre- Celtic languages of the Hamitic family — allied to the Semitics — have proved, we think conclusively, that from about 3600 B.C. at latest Britain was inhabited by a race connected by blood with the Babylonians or Egyptians and in close contact until at least 1300 B.C. with Egyptian culture and Egyptian priestcraft. The subject being an interesting one, and one which has only received attention within very recent years, we shall consider the matter at some length in the chapter following. For our present purposes it is desirable to add that the evidence of folk-stories, superstitions, and legends, together with the researches before mentioned, suggest that these people were a stone-using people ; that they inhabited well-nigh the whole world from the Himalayas to the Orkneys, excepting Scandinavia, Germany, and Russia ; that they were skilled in mathematics and astronomy and worshipped Baal and Astarte or Venus. They were non-Celtics, and were possibly a matriarchal and not a patriarchal people>i.