TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE:
—Obvious print and punctuation errors were corrected.
A BOOK OF
NORTH WALES
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME
BY S. BARING-GOULD
A BOOK OF DARTMOOR
A BOOK OF THE WEST--TWO VOLUMES
VOL. I. DEVON
VOL. II. CORNWALL
A BOOK OF BRITTANY
BY F. J. SNELL
A BOOK OF EXMOOR
[Illustration: CONWAY CASTLE]
A BOOK OF
NORTH WALES
BY S. BARING-GOULD
WITH FORTY-NINE ILLUSTRATIONS
METHUEN & CO.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON
1903
PREFACE
CONCERNING the purpose and scope of this little book I have but to
repeat what I have said in the prefaces to my other works of the
same nature--_A Book of the West_, _A Book of Dartmoor_, _A Book
of Brittany_--that it is not intended as a Guide, but merely as an
introduction to North Wales, for the use of intending visitors, that
they may know something of the history of that delightful land they are
about to see.
Welsh history is a puzzle to most Englishmen; accordingly I have made
an attempt to simplify it sufficiently for the visitor to grasp its
outlines. Without a knowledge of the history of a country in which one
travels more than half its interest is lost.
I have to return my warmest thanks to kind friends who have helped
me with information, notably the Rev. J. Fisher, B.D., of Cefn, S.
Asaph; Mr. J. E. Griffith, of Bryn Dinas, Bangor; the Rev. E. Evans,
of Llansadwrn; Mr. C. H. Jones, of the Public Library, Welshpool; Mr.
A. Foulkes-Roberts, of Denbigh; Mr. D. R. Daniel, of Four Crosses,
Chwilog; and Mr. R. Williams, of Celynog, Newtown. I am also much
indebted to Mr. R. J. Lloyd Price, of Rhiwlas, for kindly allowing me
to reproduce the portrait of Catherine of Berain in his possession;
and to Mr. Prys-Jones, of Bryn-Tegid, Pontypridd, for sending me a
photograph of the painting. But, indeed, everywhere in Wales I have
met with general kindness and hospitality; and if I have failed to
interest readers in the country and people the fault is all mine. It is
a glorious country, and its people delightful.
S. BARING-GOULD
LEW TRENCHARD, N. DEVON
_May 17th, 1903_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE WELSH PEOPLE 1
II. THE ENGLISH CONQUEST 12
III. ANGLESEY 22
IV. HOLYHEAD 46
V. BANGOR AND CARNARVON 63
VI. SNOWDON 90
VII. LLEYN 106
VIII. CONWAY 125
IX. S. ASAPH 145
X. DENBIGH 163
XI. LLANGOLLEN 183
XII. DOLGELLEY 205
XIII. HARLECH 231
XIV. WELSHPOOL 244
XV. NEWTOWN 271
XVI. MACHYNLLETH 291
ILLUSTRATIONS
FULL PAGE
CONWAY CASTLE _Frontispiece_
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
WELSH WOMEN _To face page_ 8
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
HOLYHEAD AT RHOSCOLYN ” 22
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
SOUTH STACK LIGHT, HOLYHEAD ” 46
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
SOUTH STACK BRIDGE ” 59
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CARNARVON CASTLE ” 74
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
NANT BRIDGE, CARNARVON ” 80
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
BETHESDA ” 85
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
SNOWDON ” 90
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
ABERGLASLYN PASS ” 95
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
LLANBERIS ” 99
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
BEDDGELERT ” 102
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CAPEL CURIG ” 105
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CONWAY CASTLE ” 125
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
PLAS MAWR, EXTERIOR ” 129
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
PLAS MAWR, COURT ” 130
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
CATHERINE OF BERAIN ” 146
From a painting.
RUTHIN CASTLE ” 163
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
LLANGOLLEN BRIDGE ” 183
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
BERWYN ” 184
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
BERWYN, FROM CASTELL DINAS BRAN ” 187
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
THE LADIES OF LLANGOLLEN ” 188
From an old print.
THE PILLAR OF ELISEG ” 190
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
VALE CRUCIS ABBEY ” 191
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
VALE CRUCIS ABBEY FROM WITHIN ” 195
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CADER IDRIS ” 205
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
CADER IDRIS ” 206
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
TORRENT WALK, DOLGELLEY ” 208
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
NULL, TORRENT WALK ” 209
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CADER IDRIS ” 210
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
PISTYLL-Y-CAIN ” 216
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
LYN-Y-GROES, DOLGELLEY ” 224
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
HALFWAY HOUSE, DOLGELLEY ” 226
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
HARLECH CASTLE ” 231
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
CHURCH, MONTGOMERY ” 246
From a photograph by F. Bligh Bond, Esq., F.R.I.B.A.
POWIS CASTLE ” 256
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
OWEN GLYNDWR’S PARLIAMENT HOUSE, MACHYNLLETH ” 291
From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine and Sons, Ltd.
OLD BRIDGE, DINAS MAWDDWY ” 300
From a photograph by Messrs. F. Frith and Co.
LLANEGRYN ” 308
From a photograph by F. Bligh Bond, Esq., F.R.I.B.A.
IN THE TEXT
PAGE
SERIGI. A STATUE AT CAERGYBI 25
S. SEIRIOL. STAINED GLASS, PENMON 31
HOLY WELL, PENMON 35
BASE OF SHRINE, LLANEILIAN 39
CROSS AT LLANBADRIG 41
S. CYBI. STATUE, SOUTH DOORWAY, CAERGYBI 53
DOORWAY, S. CYBI’S WELL 111
BRONWEN’S URN 235
TYSSILIO’S RING AT SAINT-SULIAC 264
GILDAS. A SIXTEENTH-CENTURY STATUE AT LOCMINÉ 279
NORTH WALES
CHAPTER I
THE WELSH PEOPLE
General characteristics--The Iberian race--Linguistic
survivals--Brython and Goidel--Roman conquest--Irish occupation of
Wales--Their expulsion by Cunedda--Saxon occupation of Britain--Causes
of subjection of the Celtic races--The Celt in the Englishman of
to-day--Divisions of Wales.
IT cannot be said that the Welsh have any very marked external
characteristics to distinguish them from the English. But there is
certainly among them a greater prevalence of dark hair and eyes, and
they are smaller in build. This is due to the Iberian blood flowing
in the stock which occupied the mountain land from a time before
history began, at least in these isles. It is a stock so enduring, that
although successive waves of conquest and migration have passed over
the land, and there has been an immense infiltration of foreign blood,
yet it asserts itself as one of predominant and indestructible vitality.
Moreover, although the language is Celtic, that is to say, the
vocabulary is so, yet the grammar reveals the fact that it is an
acquired tongue. It is a comparatively easy matter for a subjugated
people to adopt the language of its masters, so far as to accept the
words they employ, but it is another matter altogether to acquire their
construction of sentences. The primeval population belonged to what is
called the Hamitic stock, represented by ancient Egyptian and modern
Berber. This people at a vastly remote period spread over all Western
Europe, and it forms the subsoil of the French nation at the present
day.
The constant relations that existed between the Hebrews and the
Egyptians had the effect of carrying into the language of the former a
number of Hamitic words. Moreover, the Sons of Israel were brought into
daily contact with races of the same stock on their confines in Gilead
and Moab, and the consequence is that sundry words of this race are
found in both Hebrew and Welsh. This was noticed by the Welsh scholar
Dr. John Davies, of Mallwyd, who in 1621 drew up a Welsh Grammar, and
it is repeated by Thomas Richards in his _Welsh-English Dictionary_ in
1753. He says: “It hath been observed, that our Language hath not a
great many Marks of the original Simplicity of the Hebrew, but that a
vast Number of Words are found therein, that either exactly agree with,
or may be very naturally derived from, that Mother-language of Mankind.”
The fact is that these words, common to both, belong radically to
neither, but are borrowed from the tongue of the Hamitic people.
This original people, which for convenience we will call Iberian,
migrated at some unknown period from Asia, and swept round Europe,
whilst a second branch colonised the Nile basin and Northern Africa,
and a third streamed east and occupied China and Japan.
The master idea in the religion of this people was the cult of
ancestors, and the rude stone monuments, menhirs, cromlechs, and
kistvaens they have left everywhere, where they have been, all refer to
commemoration of the sacred dead. The obelisk in Egypt is the highly
refined menhir, and the elaborate, ornamented tombs of the Nile valley
are the expression of the same veneration for the dead, and belief
in the after life connected with the tomb, that are revealed in the
construction of the dolmen and kistvaen.
This same people occupied Ireland. It was a dusky, short-statured race,
with long heads, and was mild and unwarlike in character.
Then came rushing from the East great hordes of fair-haired,
round-headed men, with blue eyes. Their original homes were perhaps
the Alps, but more probably Siberia. This new race was the Celt. It
was divided into two branches, the Goidels and the Brythons, and the
Goidels came first. Considerable difference as well as affinity exists
between the dialects spoken by each. Where a Brython or Britton would
speak of his head as “pen,” the Goidel or Gael would call it “ceann,”
pronouncing the _c_ hard, as _k_. So “five” in Manx is “queig,” but in
Welsh “pump.” A like difference was found in Italy, where the Roman
would name a man Quinctius (Fifth), but a Samnite would call him
Pontius.
The Gael is now represented by the Irish, the Manx, and the
Highlander: the Britton, so far as language goes, by the Welsh and
Breton.
Where such names are found as Penmon in Anglesey, Pentire in Cornwall,
Pen-y-gent in Yorkshire, there we know that the Britton lived long
enough to give names to places. But where we find Kenmare, Kentire,
Kinnoul, there we know that the Gael was at home.
Now we find it asserted that the Goidels overran Wales before they
swept into Ireland, and that the Brittons penetrated as a wedge into
Powys between two masses of Goidels.
But the place-names in North and South Wales are purely British, and
not Gaelic. That the latter were at one time in both North and South
Wales is indubitable, but they were not there long enough to stamp the
mountains and rivers, the headlands and lakes, with names in their
tongue. That was done by the Brittons who overflowed the whole of Wales
from north to south.
Owing to the weakness of Britain, that had been in part Romanised, and
which was ill-defended by a few legions, the island became a prey to
invaders. It was fallen upon from all sides.
The Irish or Scots, as they were then called, poured down upon the
western coast; the Picts broke over the wall from the north, and the
Scandinavians and Germans invaded the east and north-east.
In 240 the Irish king Cormac MacAirt invaded Britain and assumed a
nominal sovereignty over it. It was probably about this time that the
Irish Gaels effected a lodgment on the coast of Wales and occupied
Anglesey and all the northern fringe of the fair lands by the sea and
the whole of Southern Wales.
That they were in the land we know, not only from the testimony of
Welsh ancient writers, but from the number of inscribed stones they
have left behind them, some with the Ogam script, bearing distinctly
Irish names. All these inscribed stones belong to the period after the
occupation from Ireland, and none go back to an earlier date, and give
any grounds for supposing that the original population of North and
South Wales were Gaels. The Scots or Irish held these parts till an
event took place which led to their expulsion.
The incursions of the Picts had made residence in the land between
the Roman walls, _i.e._ from the Clyde to Solway Firth, altogether
unendurable, and a chief there named Cunedda, with his sons and a great
host of followers, descended on North Wales to wrest it from the Irish.
This they succeeded in doing. Cunedda and his sons were Brittons. After
a series of contests they drove the Irish first out of Gwynedd, and
then out of Anglesey. Finally they turned them bag and baggage out
of South Wales as well. Thenceforth the Gaels never again obtained a
foothold for any length of time in Wales.
Ceredig, son of Cunedda, gave his name to Ceredigion or Cardigan;
Meirion, grandson of Cunedda, has bequeathed his to Merioneth.
The contest began between 400 and 450, and the complete sweeping out
of the Gael was not accomplished till the beginning of the following
century. But by this time the invasion of Britain by the Jute, Angle,
and Saxon had begun on a large scale, and as the Teutonic warriors
advanced, burning and slaying, they rolled back the unfortunate
Brittons westward.
After the whole of Eastern Britain had been taken and occupied, the
line of demarcation between Celt and Teuton ran from the Firth of Forth
along the backbone of the Pennine Range to the Forest of Arden, and
thence to Salisbury and to the sea by Christchurch. But the invaders
pressed on. In 577 the Brittons were defeated at Deorham, near Bath,
and those of Wales were cut off from their brethren in Devon and
Cornwall. In 607 they met with a signal reverse at Chester, and they
thenceforth were separated from the Brittons in Strathclyde. Still the
unsatiated Anglo-Saxons pressed on, and the Brittons finally retained
only the mountains of Wales as their last refuge. Many, indeed, fled
over the sea and occupied and colonised Armorica, to which they gave
the name of Lesser Britain or Brittany.
The borderland was the scene of bloody skirmishes for centuries. Till
784 Shrewsbury had been accounted the capital of the British kingdom of
Powys, but then Offa took the city and advanced the English frontier to
the Wye. He then constructed a dyke or bank with a moat that ran from
the estuary of the Dee to the mouth of the Wye, as a limit beyond which
no Welshman might pass.
Mona received an English colony under Egbert, and acquired its new name
of Anglesey. Some time after the battles of Deorham and Chester the
refugees began to call themselves Cymry.
The name implies “compatriots,” and well describes those of the same
blood from all parts of Britain, now united in a common overthrow, and
in a common resolution to hold for ever their mountain fastnesses to
which they had been driven.
We may halt to inquire how it was that this great and heroic people,
to which belong some of the finest qualities that are found in man,
a people in some respects more gifted than that which dispossessed
it, should have been so completely routed by invaders from across the
stormy North Sea. The Gaul had been of precisely the same Brythonic
stock, and he had allowed himself to be buffeted by Cæsar and brought
to his knees. Cæsar was sharp-witted enough to detect at a glance
the defects in character and in political organisation of the Gauls,
and to take advantage of them. Cæsar could always reckon on tribal
jealousies, and consequently on setting one clan against another; and
there was not a tribe in which there were not traitors, who, offended
in their self-esteem, were ready to betray those of their own race
and household, to wipe off some petty slight, to avenge some personal
grudge. Precisely the same cause led to the ruin of the Brittons when
opposed to Germanic invaders, and, as we shall see in the sequel, the
same cause again acted throughout the long struggle with the English
kings.
The divisions in Wales opened the door for Norman and English
adventurers to come in and possess the land, and for the monarch to
obtain an ever-strengthening grip on the land.
A brother was always ready to go over to the foe to gain some mean
advantage; one sept was ever prepared to side with the national foe if
it thought thereby to humble another sept, or to acquire through this
means a few more cows and a little more pasture.
When Jute, Angle, or Saxon crossed the North Sea they were in the
same political condition as were the Welsh; they also were tribally
organised. But they quickly learned the lesson never to be taken to
heart and acted on by the Britton, that of subordination of individual
interests to the common good. The English kingdoms became consolidated
into one; the British chieftains remained to the end disunited.
In feudal France province was opposed to province, in much the same
way, till the strong hand of Richelieu consolidated the monarchy.
Even in Armorica, Lesser Britain, to which crowds of refugees had
escaped, the lesson was not acquired. Attacked from the east by the
Franks, ravaged along the sea-coast by the Northmen, they could not
combine. The princes turned their swords against each other in the face
of the common foe.
Alan Barbetorte, godson of Athelstan, had not been fostered in
England without having drunk in that which made England strong. When
he returned to Armorica he succeeded in forcing his countrymen to
combine in a supreme effort to hurl the pirates back into the sea,
and naturally enough succeeded, by so doing, in freeing the land from
them. But after his death all went back into the same condition of
internal jealousies and strife. Throughout the Middle Ages Brittany was
a battlefield, the dukes and counts flying at each other’s throat, some
calling themselves partisans of the English, some of the French, but
all seeking personal aggrandisement only.
[Illustration: WELSH WOMEN]
Not till 1490 did peace and unity reign in Brittany, just five years
after Henry Tudor became King of England, and put a stop to the strife
in Wales. The late Mr. Green, in his _The Making of England_, laid
stress on the important part that the Latin Church played in promoting
the unity of the English race. But neither in France nor in Germany,
there least of all, did it serve this end, and it was probably less the
work of the Church that England became one than the peculiar genius of
the Anglo-Saxon race. For a while we see it divided into three great
forces--the Northumbrian, the Mercian, and the West Saxon--contending
for the mastery, but each actuated by the dominating belief that so
only could England thrive and shake off her enemies.
Mr. Green perhaps overrates the Anglo-Saxon, and thinks that the
Britton disappeared from the soil before him as he advanced. At first,
indeed, those who landed from their German keels proceeded to ruthless
extermination. But as they advanced they ceased to do so; they were not
themselves inclined to till the soil, they were content to spare their
captives on condition that they became their slaves, and they certainly
kept the women for themselves. Gildas, a contemporary, says that “some,
being taken in the mountains, were murdered in great numbers; others,
constrained by famine, yielded themselves up to be enthralled by their
foes; others, again, escaped beyond the seas.”
The English of to-day are a mixed race, and there is certainly a great
deal more of British and Iberian blood in our veins than some have
supposed. The Anglo-Saxon possessed rare qualities, perseverance,
tenacity, and power of organisation; yet some of the higher qualities
of our race, the searching intellect, the bright imagination, and
idealism, are due to the spark of living fire entering into the
somewhat heavy lump of the Germanic nature through contact with the
Celt.
Wales was formed into three main divisions--Gwynedd, Powys, and
Deheubarth--but in this volume we have only to do with the two former.
Each had its independent prince, but as according to Welsh custom every
principality was divided up among all the sons of a prince on his
death, this led to endless subdivisions, to fraternal quarrels, and
fratricides. Moreover, the boundaries were incessantly shifting. The
king of Gwynedd was recognised as the Gwledig, or Over-King, and the
supremacy remained in the family of Maelgwn till 817, when it died out
with Cynon Tyndaethwy. His daughter Esyllt married Mervyn Vrych, king
of Powys, who by this means united both portions of North Wales under
his sceptre.
Rhodri the Great, son and successor of Mervyn, moreover, acquired
South Wales by his marriage with Angharad, daughter of Meurig, king of
Ceredigion. Thus by a series of marriages all Wales was united under
one sovereign and an unrivalled opportunity offered for consolidation,
and sturdy united opposition to encroachment from England. Unhappily
the chance was allowed to slip. On the death of Rhodri, Wales was
divided among his three sons (877): Anarawd obtained Gwynedd, Cadell
became king of Deheubarth, and Mervyn was placed in possession of
Powys. In 1229 Powys was subdivided into Powys Vadog and Powys
Wenwynwyn. In addition to the main divisions there were a number of
small principalities, whose princes were engaged in incessant strife
with one another and with the sovereign who claimed supreme rule
over them. They sided now with the English, then those in Gwynedd
would throw in their lot with the princes of the south. It was these
intestine divisions, never appeased, that exhausted the strength of the
country and made way for the conquest by the English.