Short History of Wales | Page 4

periods I
may mention Rhys' Celtic Britain, Owen Rhoscomyl's Flame Bearers
of Welsh History, Henry Owen's Gerald the Welshman, Bradley's
Owen Glendower, Newell's Welsh Church, and Rees Protestant Non-
conformity in Wales. More elaborate and expensive books are
Seebohm's Village Community and Tribal System in Wales, Clark's
Medieval Military Architecture, Morris' Welsh Wars of Edward I.,
Southall's Wales and Her Language. In writing local history, A. N.
Palmer's History of Wrexham and companion volumes are models.
If you turn to a library, you will find much information about Wales in
Social England, the Dictionary of National Biography, the publications
of the Cymmrodorion and other societies. You will find articles of great
value and interest over the names of F. H. Haverfield, J. W.
Willis-Bund, Egerton Phillimore, the Honourable Mrs Bulkeley Owen
(Gwenrhian Gwynedd), Henry Owen, the late David Lewis, T. F. Tout,
J. E. Lloyd, D. Lleufer Thomas, W. Llywelyn Williams, J. Arthur Price,
J. H. Davies, J. Ballinger, Edward Owen, Hubert Hall, Hugh Williams,
R. A. Roberts, A. W. Wade-Evans, E. A. Lewis. These are only a few
out of the many who are now working in the rich and unexplored field
of Welsh history. I put down the names only of those I had to consult in
writing a small book like this.
The sources are mostly in Latin or Welsh. Many volumes of chronicles,
charters, and historical poems have been published by the Government,
by the Corporation of Cardiff, by J. Gwenogvryn Evans, by H. de Grey
Birch, and others. But, so far, we have not had the interesting
chronicles and poems translated into English as they ought to be, and
published in well edited, not too expensive volumes.
OWEN EDWARDS LINCOLN COLLEGE, OXFORD.

CHAPTER I
--WALES

Wales is a row of hills, rising between the Irish Sea on the west and the
English plains on the east. If you come from the west along the sea, or
if you cross the Severn or the Dee from the east, you will see that
Wales is a country all by itself. It rises grandly and proudly. If you are a
stranger, you will think of it as "Wales"--a strange country; if you are
Welsh, you will think of it as "Cymru"--a land of brothers.
The geologist will tell you how Wales was made; the geographer will
tell you what it is like now; the historian will tell you what its people
have done and what they are. All three will tell you that it is a very
interesting country.
The rocks of Wales are older and harder than the rocks of the plains;
and as you travel from the south to the north, the older and harder they
become. The highest mountains of Wales, and some of its hills, have
crests of the very oldest and hardest rock--granite, porphyry, and basalt;
and these rocks are given their form by fire. But the greater part of the
country is made of rocks formed by water--still the oldest of their kind.
In the north-west, centre, and west--about two-thirds of the whole
country,--the rocks are chiefly slate and shale; in the south-east they are
chiefly old red sandstone; in the north-east, but chiefly in the south,
they are limestone and coal.
Its rocks give Wales its famous scenery--its rugged peaks, its romantic
glens, its rushing rivers. They are also its chief wealth-- granite, slate,
limestone, coal; and lodes of still more precious metals--iron, lead,
silver, and gold--run through them.
The highest mountain in Wales is Snowdon, which is 3,570 feet above
the level of the sea. For every 300 feet we go up, the temperature
becomes one degree cooler. At about 1,000 feet it becomes too cold for
wheat; at about 1,500 it becomes too cold for corn; at about 2,000 it is
too cold for cattle; mountain ponies graze still higher; the bleak upper
slopes are left to the small and valuable Welsh sheep.
There are three belts of soil around the hills--arable, pasture, and
sheep-run--one above the other. The arable land forms about a third of

the country; it lies along the sea border, on the slopes above the Dee
and the Severn, and in the deep valleys of the rivers which pierce far
inland,--the Severn, Wye, Usk, Towy, Teivy, Dovey, Conway, and
Clwyd. The pasture land, the land of small mountain farms, forms the
middle third; it is a land of tiny valleys and small plains, ever fostered
by the warm, moist west wind. Above it, the remaining third is stormy
sheep-run, wide green slopes and wild moors, steep glens and rocky
heights.
From north-west to south-east the line of high hills runs. In the
north-west corner, Snowdon towers among a number of heights over
3,000 feet. At its feet, to the north-west, the isle of Anglesey lies. The