A History of Wales

• Introduction
• Chapter 1 The First Peoples: Prehistoric Wales
• Chapter 2 The Arrival of the Celts and the Roman Occupation
• Chapter 3 The Age of Saints: The Rise of Christianity and the Welsh Kingdoms
• Chapter 4 The Viking Age and its Impact on Wales
• Chapter 5 The Norman Conquest and Welsh Resistance
• Chapter 6 The Era of the Princes: Llywelyn the Great and Llywelyn ap Gruffudd
• Chapter 7 The Edwardian Conquest and the Subjugation of Wales
• Chapter 8 The Glyndŵr Rising: The Last Welsh War of Independence
• Chapter 9 The Tudors: A Welsh Dynasty on the English Throne
• Chapter 10 The Acts of Union and the Assimilation of Wales
• Chapter 11 Religious Change and the Welsh Bible
• Chapter 12 Wales and the English Civil War
• Chapter 13 The 18th Century: Methodism and Cultural Awakening
• Chapter 14 The Industrial Revolution: Coal, Iron, and Slate
• Chapter 15 Radicalism, Protest, and the Merthyr Rising
• Chapter 16 The Growth of Nonconformity and Liberal Wales
• Chapter 17 Wales and the First World War
• Chapter 18 The Interwar Years: Depression and Social Unrest
• Chapter 19 The Second World War and the Welsh Home Front
• Chapter 20 Post-War Reconstruction and the National Health Service
• Chapter 21 The Language Movement and the Rise of Welsh Nationalism
• Chapter 22 Deindustrialisation and the Miners' Strike
• Chapter 23 The Path to Devolution: The 1997 Referendum
• Chapter 24 The Senedd and Self-Governance in the 21st Century
• Chapter 25 Modern Wales: Identity, Culture, and the Future

To speak of the history of Wales is to speak of survival. It is a narrative underpinned by a quiet, yet fierce, determination to endure, often against considerable odds. The modern Welsh language has a phrase, 'Yma o Hyd', which translates to 'Still Here'. Coined in the late 20th century as a song of defiance and cultural pride, it has been adopted with fervour, echoing through the stands of football stadiums and in the hearts of many. The sentiment it captures, however, is ancient. It is the story of a people and a culture that have persisted "in spite of everyone and everything". This book is an exploration of that long and often turbulent journey, tracing the story of the Welsh from the earliest human footsteps in this western corner of Britain to the complexities of its modern identity in the 21st century.

The tale begins in the deep past, long before the name 'Wales' or 'Cymru' existed. The story is etched into the landscape itself, in the ancient burial chambers and the scattered remnants of hillforts. One of the most profound glimpses into this distant era was unearthed in a limestone cave on the Gower Peninsula in 1823: the skeleton of a young man, ceremonially buried and covered in red ochre some 33,000 years ago. Mistakenly identified as a Roman-era woman by its discoverer, the 'Red Lady of Paviland' is, in fact, the oldest known ceremonial burial in Western Europe. This individual, a hunter-gatherer from the last Ice Age, offers a silent testament to the long and continuous human presence in this land.

The arrival of the Celts around 600 BC marked a significant cultural shift, bringing with them iron-working skills and a language that would form the basis of modern Welsh. These Brittonic-speaking peoples established a society of tribes, leaving their mark in the form of impressive hillforts and intricate metalwork. Their world was irrevocably altered by the arrival of the Romans in the 1st century AD. The Roman conquest of Wales was a brutal and protracted affair, but it brought with it roads, forts, and towns, integrating the region into the wider Roman Empire for over three centuries.

When the Roman legions departed Britain in the 5th century, a power vacuum was left in their wake, leading to a period of fragmentation and the emergence of several Welsh kingdoms. It was during this "Age of Saints" that Christianity took root, and a distinct Welsh identity began to form in opposition to the encroaching Anglo-Saxon tribes in the east. It was this separation from other Brittonic-speaking peoples that arguably forged the Welsh nation. For centuries, rulers of kingdoms such as Gwynedd, Powys, and Deheubarth vied for supremacy, occasionally achieving a fragile unity but never a lasting, single political entity.

The arrival of the Normans in the 11th century heralded a new and formidable challenge. The Norman conquest of Wales was a piecemeal but relentless process, characterised by the construction of imposing castles and the establishment of Marcher Lordships along the border. This period also saw the rise of iconic Welsh leaders, such as Llywelyn the Great and his grandson, Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, who for a time managed to unite the Welsh principalities and stake a claim to a unified Wales. The ambition of these native princes ultimately ended in the late 13th century with the Edwardian conquest. King Edward I of England's military campaigns led to the death of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd in 1282 and the subjugation of Wales. The Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284 brought Wales under English law and administration, a move symbolised by the construction of a ring of massive castles designed to assert English dominance.

Despite this conquest, the spirit of resistance was not extinguished. The most significant Welsh revolt against English rule erupted in the early 15th century, led by the charismatic Owain Glyndŵr. His rebellion, which for a time established an independent Welsh state with its own parliament, remains a potent symbol of Welsh nationhood and the desire for self-determination. Though ultimately unsuccessful, the Glyndŵr Rising left an indelible mark on the Welsh psyche.

A new chapter in the Anglo-Welsh relationship began with the rise of the Tudor dynasty. Henry Tudor, who had Welsh ancestry, ascended to the English throne as Henry VII in 1485, in part with Welsh support. His son, Henry VIII, oversaw the Laws in Wales Acts of 1536 and 1542, which formally incorporated Wales into the Kingdom of England. These Acts, often referred to as the Acts of Union, abolished the separate Welsh legal system and made English the official language of administration. While this move brought Welsh representatives to the English Parliament for the first time, it also began a long process of anglicisation that would have profound consequences for the Welsh language and culture.

The translation of the Bible into Welsh in 1588 was a landmark event that helped to preserve the language at a time when its official status was in decline. This, coupled with the later rise of religious nonconformity and the Methodist revival of the 18th century, helped to shape a distinct Welsh cultural identity rooted in language and religion.

The 18th and 19th centuries witnessed a transformation of Wales on an unprecedented scale. The Industrial Revolution turned parts of the country, particularly the south Wales valleys, into a global powerhouse of coal and iron production. The landscape was dramatically reshaped by mines, ironworks, and canals, and the population swelled with migrants from rural Wales and beyond. This period of intense industrialisation brought with it immense wealth for some, but also social upheaval and conflict, leading to workers' uprisings such as the Merthyr Rising of 1831 and the Chartist Newport Rising of 1839.

The 20th century was a period of profound change and challenge for Wales. The two World Wars had a significant impact, as did the economic depression of the interwar years, which hit the industrial heartlands of Wales particularly hard. The post-war era saw the creation of the National Health Service, a brainchild of Welsh politician Aneurin Bevan, which had a transformative effect on the lives of ordinary people. The second half of the century was marked by deindustrialisation and the decline of the coal industry, culminating in the bitter miners' strike of the 1980s.

Alongside these economic shifts, the 20th century also saw a resurgence of Welsh political and cultural consciousness. The investiture of Prince Charles as Prince of Wales at Caernarfon Castle in 1969 was met with protests, highlighting a growing sense of national identity. A movement to protect and promote the Welsh language gained momentum, leading to the passage of Welsh Language Acts in 1967 and 1993, which gave Welsh equal status with English in the public sector. This period also saw the rise of Welsh nationalism as a political force, with Plaid Cymru, the Welsh Nationalist Party, gaining its first Member of Parliament in 1966.

The journey towards self-governance has been a long and often faltering one. A referendum on devolution in 1979 was decisively rejected. However, by the late 1990s, the political climate had changed. In 1997, a second referendum on devolution was held, and this time the Welsh people voted, albeit narrowly, in favour of establishing a National Assembly for Wales. The Assembly, now known as the Senedd or Welsh Parliament, first convened in 1999, marking the beginning of a new era of self-governance for Wales.

This book will delve into these and many other stories, exploring the figures and events that have shaped this small but resilient nation. It is a history of princes and rebels, of poets and preachers, of miners and politicians. It is a story of a people who, despite centuries of external pressure and internal division, have maintained a distinct identity, culture, and language. It is the story of how, through it all, they are 'still here'.

The story of the Welsh people does not begin with Wales, or indeed with the Welsh. It begins in a time so remote that the very shape of the land was different. To picture the landscape of the earliest human occupation is to imagine a place both familiar and profoundly alien. For vast stretches of the Palaeolithic, or Old Stone Age, what is now Wales was a peninsula of mainland Europe, a stark, windswept tundra on the edge of enormous ice sheets. Great rivers, now lost beneath the sea, carved valleys through a plain that connected it to the continent, and across this bleak terrain roamed herds of mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, and giant deer, prey for the lions, hyenas, and wolves that shadowed them.

Into this formidable world stepped the first humans. The earliest firm evidence for their presence comes from Pontnewydd Cave in the Elwy Valley of Denbighshire. Excavations here have unearthed teeth and a fragment of a jawbone belonging to an early form of Neanderthal, dating back an astonishing 230,000 years. These remains, representing at least five individuals including children and adults, make Pontnewydd the most north-westerly site in all of Eurasia for early hominid remains from this period. Alongside the bones, archaeologists found simple stone hand axes and the remains of butchered animals, painting a picture of a small, resilient group using the cave for shelter during a warmer interglacial period, before the ice once again advanced and forced them away.

Neanderthals were not our direct ancestors but a parallel branch of the human family tree. Short, powerfully built, and highly adapted to the cold, they persisted in and around Wales for tens of thousands of years. Other traces of their existence have been found, such as later hand axes, dating to between 60,000 and 35,000 years ago, discovered at Coygan Cave in Carmarthenshire. Yet their footprint on the landscape is faint, erased by successive glaciations that scoured the land, burying or destroying the remnants of their camps. They were transient hunters, following the herds, their lives dictated by the advance and retreat of the ice.

A new chapter began with the arrival of our own species, Homo sapiens. The most dramatic evidence of their appearance was found not by an archaeologist, but by a fossil hunter and cleric in 1823. In one of the limestone caves of the Gower Peninsula, William Buckland discovered a human skeleton stained with red ochre and accompanied by grave goods including ivory rods and shell beads. Buckland, constrained by the biblical timescales of his era, declared it to be the remains of a Roman-era woman, a customs officer's wife perhaps, or a witch. He named her the 'Red Lady of Paviland'. Modern science has told a very different story. The skeleton is, in fact, male, a young man who lived and died around 33,000 years ago. His interment is now recognised as the oldest known ceremonial burial in Western Europe. This was not a simple disposal of a body, but a ritual-laden farewell, a testament to the complex beliefs and social bonds of these hunter-gatherer people who lived on the edge of the ice.

As the last great Ice Age reached its zenith, around 20,000 years ago, the ice sheets became so vast that they likely rendered Wales uninhabitable for a time. But as the climate warmed and the glaciers finally began their long retreat around 12,000 BC, life returned. This new era, the Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age, saw a radically altered landscape. The melting ice caused global sea levels to rise, flooding the low-lying plains that connected Britain to Europe. By about 7000 BC, the peninsula of Wales had become part of an island, its coastline roughly assuming the shape we know today. The tundra gave way to dense forests of birch, pine, and eventually oak, and the herds of mammoth and woolly rhino were replaced by red deer, wild boar, and aurochs.

The people of the Mesolithic were adaptable and resourceful. They were still hunter-gatherers, but their toolkit was more refined than that of their Palaeolithic predecessors. They produced microliths, small, sharp blades of flint or chert, which could be set into wooden or bone handles to create arrows, spears, and other composite tools. Evidence of their lives is scattered across Wales, often concentrated in coastal areas which offered a rich variety of resources. One of the earliest dated sites is Nab Head in Pembrokeshire, occupied around 9,200 years ago. Many of these coastal camps would have been miles inland at the time of their occupation. In the north, a significant site at Rhuddlan has yielded thousands of stone tools and, more unusually, decorated pebbles that represent some of the earliest art found in Wales. No Mesolithic houses have been found, suggesting a mobile lifestyle, perhaps following the seasonal movements of animals from the coasts to the uplands.

Around 4000 BC, a profound change swept across Britain, one of the most significant in human history: the Neolithic Revolution. This was not a single event, but a gradual process that saw the adoption of farming. This new way of life, which had spread across Europe from the Middle East, involved clearing forests to plant crops like wheat and barley, and raising domesticated animals such as cattle, sheep, and pigs. For the first time, people were not just harvesting from the land but actively shaping and controlling it. This fundamental shift brought with it a host of other innovations, including the ability to make pottery, which was essential for storing grain and cooking new types of food.

The transition from a nomadic hunter-gatherer existence to a settled agricultural life is still not fully understood. It may have been driven by the arrival of new people from the continent, or perhaps it was the adoption of new ideas and technologies by the existing Mesolithic population. Whatever the mechanism, the impact was transformative. Farming required a completely different relationship with the land, one tied to the seasons of planting and harvesting. It allowed for, and eventually necessitated, a more sedentary lifestyle, leading to the creation of the first permanent settlements. One of the earliest known examples in Wales is a village of wooden longhouses near Llanfaethlu on Anglesey, dating to around 4000 BC.

Perhaps the most enduring legacy of the Neolithic people is their monumental architecture. Across the landscape of Wales, they erected remarkable structures of earth and stone, monuments that have survived for six millennia and continue to inspire awe. These megalithic tombs, known as dolmens or cromlechs, were built as communal burial places. They represent an enormous investment of time and labour, suggesting a society with complex social structures and deeply held beliefs about life, death, and ancestry.

One of the most spectacular and famous of these is Pentre Ifan in Pembrokeshire. Here, a massive capstone, five metres long and weighing an estimated 16 tonnes, is delicately balanced on the tips of three tall upright stones. This elegant stone skeleton is all that remains of what was once a large tomb covered by a cairn of stones nearly 40 metres long. The stones that form the chamber were quarried from the nearby Preseli Hills, the same source of the famous 'bluestones' used in the construction of Stonehenge. Elsewhere, tombs reveal other secrets. At Tinkinswood, near Cardiff, excavations of another huge chambered tomb uncovered the remains of about 50 individuals, confirming their use for communal burial.

These monuments were more than just tombs; they were ceremonial centres for the scattered farming communities. Their construction often displayed remarkable sophistication. Bryn Celli Ddu ('the Mound in the Dark Grove') on Anglesey is a passage grave where a long, stone-lined corridor leads to an inner chamber. The entire passage is precisely aligned so that on the summer solstice, the longest day of the year, the first rays of the rising sun shine directly down the corridor to illuminate the chamber's interior. Such alignments suggest a deep understanding of celestial cycles, which would have been vital for an early agricultural society.

The tomb of Barclodiad y Gawres ('the Giantess's Apronful'), also on Anglesey, is notable for another reason. Inside its cruciform chamber, several of the stones are decorated with pecked carvings of spirals, zig-zags, and lozenges. This prehistoric art is very similar in style to that found in the great passage tombs of the Boyne Valley in Ireland, such as Newgrange, indicating a shared cultural and religious world that spanned the Irish Sea. At the centre of the main chamber at Barclodiad y Gawres, archaeologists found the remains of a fire, over which a bizarre stew had been poured, containing wrasse, eel, frog, and shrew, before being covered with limpet shells. This strange deposit hints at complex rituals performed within the tomb, a final feast for or with the dead.

The Neolithic period also saw the development of the first large-scale industries. The need for effective tools to clear the dense primordial forests led to the creation of 'axe factories'. Certain types of hard volcanic rock were highly prized for their ability to be shaped and polished into durable axe heads. Quarries at sites like Graig Lwyd near Penmaenmawr in North Wales produced thousands of these polished stone axes, which were then traded far and wide. Their discovery at archaeological sites across Britain is a testament to the extensive networks of contact and exchange that existed 5,000 years ago.

Around 2500 BC, a new technology arrived in Britain: metallurgy. The discovery that certain rocks could be heated to extract metals, first copper and later tin to be alloyed into bronze, heralded the start of the Bronze Age. This new material was revolutionary. Bronze was harder than stone, could be cast into complex shapes, and, crucially, could be melted down and reused. While stone tools continued to be used for everyday tasks, bronze was reserved for high-status items: finely crafted axes, daggers, and ornaments.

The production and control of these prestigious metal objects appear to have led to significant social changes. While Neolithic society seems to have been relatively egalitarian, with an emphasis on communal projects like the great tombs, the Bronze Age saw the emergence of a more hierarchical society, led by a powerful warrior elite. This shift is reflected in burial practices. The tradition of communal burial in chambered tombs declined, replaced by individual burials under round barrows or stone cairns. These graves often contained rich offerings, such as bronze weapons, intricate pottery, and personal ornaments, signifying the wealth and status of the deceased.

The most spectacular example of Bronze Age wealth ever found in Wales, and indeed in Europe, came from just such a burial mound. In 1833, workmen quarrying stone from a barrow known as Bryn yr Ellyllon ('Goblins' Hill') near Mold in Flintshire, uncovered a crushed sheet of solid gold. When reconstructed, it was revealed to be a magnificent ceremonial cape, weighing over half a kilogram and decorated with intricate repoussé patterns that mimic strings of beads and folds of cloth. Dating to between 1900 and 1600 BC, the Mold Gold Cape is a masterpiece of prehistoric craftsmanship. The person buried wearing it, thought to be of slight build, perhaps a young woman, must have been an individual of immense importance. The cape itself would have severely restricted arm movement, suggesting it was worn only on special ceremonial occasions, where its shimmering surface would have been a dazzling display of power and divinity.

The raw materials for the Bronze Age boom came from the earth itself. The copper ore needed to make bronze was mined on a truly industrial scale at the Great Orme, near Llandudno. Here, Bronze Age miners, using stone hammers and bone picks, dug a complex network of tunnels and shafts deep into the hillside, following the veins of copper. It is estimated that this was the largest copper mine of its time in the world, with its products being traded not just within Britain but across Europe. The tin, meanwhile, was likely imported from Cornwall and perhaps the continent, further evidence of the sophisticated long-distance trade routes of the period.

For much of the Bronze Age, people lived in small, unenclosed farmsteads, typically consisting of one or more roundhouses. Towards the end of the period, however, from about 1000 BC, the climate began to worsen, becoming colder and wetter. This may have put pressure on upland farming communities and led to increased competition for resources and land. It is around this time that we see the first evidence for defended settlements. Initially, these were simple enclosures protected by wooden palisades, but as the centuries progressed, they would evolve into one of the most iconic features of the Welsh landscape: the hillfort.

The transition to the Iron Age, from around 800 BC, was marked by the adoption of a new, more common metal. Ironworking technology allowed for the mass production of stronger, more durable tools and weapons. This period saw the construction of hundreds of hillforts across Wales, often in dramatic, strategic locations commanding wide views over the surrounding countryside. Sites like Tre'r Ceiri on the Llŷn Peninsula, with its formidable stone ramparts enclosing the remains of over 150 houses, or Pen Dinas overlooking Aberystwyth, speak of a society that was becoming increasingly organised, populous, and perhaps, more violent. These fortified settlements, which would have been bustling centres of trade, craft, and community life, represent the culmination of millennia of prehistoric development. They were the strongholds of the people who would, in the next chapter of our story, be confronted by the legions of Rome.