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Though it is now apparent that a great mingling of the different people took place in Britain for centuries after the initial Anglo-Saxon incursions, in the western peninsular now known as Wales, the majority of the people remained primarily Celt. They were soon to be isolated from their fellow Britons in Cornwall to the south and Cumbria to the north. From the momentous year 616, the date of the Battle of Chester, which divided the Celts the north from those of the southwest, the people of Wales were mostly on their own. They soon began to think of themselves as a distinct nation in spite of the many different rival kingdoms that developed within their borders such as Morgannwg, Powys, Brycheinion, Dyfed and Gwynedd. It is also from this period that we can speak of the Welsh language, as distinct from the older Brythonic.
In a poem dated 633, the word Cymry appears, referring to the country of Wales. Historians see its use signifying the beginnings of a feeling of self-identity among the Britons, desperately trying to hold on to their lands in the face of unrelenting pressure from the Germanic tribes already in possession of most of the eastern half of the British island. It was not too long before the native people themselves came to be known as the Cymry, though outside Wales for many centuries they continued to be known as Britons.
At this point, we should point out that the word Welsh is a later word used by the Saxon invaders perhaps to denote people they considered "foreign" or at least to denote people who had been Romanized. It originally had signified a Germanic neighbour, but eventually came to be used for those people who spoke a different language. The Welsh people themselves still prefer to call themselves Cymry, their country Cymru and their language Cymraeg.
Surviving works in Old Welsh date all the way back to the late seventh century, making them part of the oldest attested vernacular in Europe. Composed either in the northern kingdom of Strathclyde (in present day southwest Scotland, soon to be overrun by invaders from Ireland, speaking Gaelic), or in a north Wales kingdom, the earliest Welsh-language poems are part of what is known as the heroic tradition. Taliesin and Aneirin are the two most well known poets of the old Celtic bardic traditions, regardless of their place of origin.
Aneirin is best remembered for the poem "Y Gododdin," which commemorates the heroics of small band of warriors and their allies at the Battle of Catraeth about 600 AD in which they were defeated by a much larger force of Angles. In the poem, after slaying many times their number of enemies, all except one of the band were killed. Their willingness to die is emphasized as a duty owed their lord in return for his hospitality. According to the poet, their deaths also ensured them everlasting glory.
It is from 731 that the Welsh word Llan appears, signifying a church settlement and usually followed by the name of a saint, for example, Llandewi (St. David) or Llangurig (St. Curig). It was sometimes used by the name of a disciple of Christ, such as Llanbedr (St. Peter) or even by the mother of Jesus, such as Llanfair (St. Mary).
Wales did not adopt St. David (Dewi Sant) as its patron saint until the 18th century, with the reputed date of his death March 1st chosen as the day of a national festival. Very little is known about him for certain except that he lived in the sixth century and probably died in 589. Information concerning his life comes from the Latin "The Life of St. David" written in the late 11th century by Rhigfarch but supplemented by Geraldus Cambrensis around 1200. David's fame as a missionary reached Ireland and Brittany, and from the 12th century the church named for him at Ty Dewi (St. David's) became an important place of pilgrimage.
The visitor to West Wales cannot help but notice that many of the holy shrines lie in valleys, or hollows, often hidden from the sea. One of them, at St. Govan's (left), is placed in a steep, narrow crevice in the coastal rocks themselves, completely concealed. For the sea was the pathway of the marauding Vikings, intent on voyages of plunder and easy pickings from the poorly defended, but richly endowed monastic communities of the Celtic Church. Despite its own hiding place, down in the lovely, sheltered valley of the Glyn, St David's itself, perhaps the holiest spot in Wales, was still plundered in 999 and its Bishop killed.
Place names all round the Welsh coast signify a Viking presence, including Anglesey and Great Orme in the North, and Swansea and Flat Holme and others in the South. In the latter half of the ninth century, the danger presented by the terrifying sight of the long, high-prowed Viking ships and their fierce crews did, however, produce an enormous benefit to Wales. For in Wales, as in England, the need arose for some kind of political unity under strong leaders to defend their own property and that of the Church.
While the various English kingdoms eventually united under Alfred the Great in the face of the threat of complete subjugation by the Kingdom of the Danes, something similar took place in Wales. Sad to relate, its results were not as firmly established or as permanent as they were over the border.
The first leader of importance to emerge among the Welsh was the warrior king Rhodri Mawr (Rhodri the Great). In 855, through skilful alliances and practical marriages, he became king of Powys as well as much of the rest of Wales. Successful in warding off Danish attacks, even killing in battle the Viking leader Gorm, Rhodri gave his country a short but welcome period of unity and stability.
Unfortunately for the future of an independent Wales, Rhodri Mawr's death in 878 was followed by a period of internal strife, and the alliance of his sons with Alfred led to Wales' dependence upon the English king for protection. Dependence upon its stronger neighbor to the east was to be a permanent feature for the rest of the history of Wales, always struggling, but seldom able to break its chains.
Rhodri was killed in battle fighting an English army; it was left to his grandson, Hywel Dda (Howell the Good, right) to re-establish some sort of predominance among the various petty kingdoms of Wales by wisely keeping the peace with his English neighbors through a policy of conciliation. In his reign, lasting from 904-50, Hywel's territories were known as Deheubarth, which united with Gwynedd and Powys to cover most of Wales with the exception of Glamorgan, in the southeast. The only Welsh king to have earned the title "The Good," he is described in the great medieval history, "The Brut Y Tywysogion" (The Chronicle of the Princes) as "the chief and most praiseworthy of all the Britons.".
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