Wallace and Glyndwr will rise with their people!

Owain Glyndwr Day Sept. 16th!

Dafydd ap Gwilym

15th September

On Saturday 15th September 1984 a memorial stone was unveiled by a Prifardd to mark the site in the churchyard at Talley where a deeply-rooted tradition asserts that the poet Dafydd ap Gwilym (ca.1315-ca.1350) lies buried. For many centuries the rival claims of Talley and Ystrad Fflur have been debated as the burialplace of Wales’ foremost poet.
Tradition has it that he was born at Brogynin, Penrhyn-coch (at the time Llanbadarn Fawr parish), Ceredigion. His father, Gwilym Gam, and mother, Ardudfyl, were both from noble families. As one of noble birth it seems Dafydd did not belong to the guild of professional poets in medieval Wales, and yet the poetic tradition had been strong in his family for generations. It is believed that about one hundred and seventy of his poems have survived, though many others have been attributed to him over the centuries. His main themes were love and nature. The influence of wider European ideas of courtly love, as exemplified in the troubadour poetry of Provençal, is seen as a significant influence on Dafydd's poetry.
He was an innovative poet who was responsible for popularising the metre known as the "cywydd" and first to use it for praise. But perhaps his greatest innovation was to make himself the main focus of his poetry. By its very nature, most of the work of the traditional Welsh court poets kept their own personalities far from their poetry. Dafydd's work is full of his own feelings and experiences. His main theme is love, and many of his poems are addressed to women, but particularly to two of them, Morfudd and Dyddgu. He is also recognised as very fine nature poet.

Oliver Evans - inventor of the automobile

13th September
Born on this day 1755 in Newport, Delaware, to a family of Welsh settlers
Oliver Evans - inventor of the automobile
...

At the end of the 18th century Philadelphia had become a very busy port, but the harbour was prone to silting up, so Evans was Evans was commissioned by the Philadelphia Board of Health to help dredge out the city's dockyards. In 1804, he designed and built the Oruktor Amphibolos (Amphibious Digger), but at 15 tons and 30 feet long, it was a challenge in itself to get it to the dockyards. On the first attempt it had collapsed in Philadelphia's Centre Square, proving too heavy to be pulled by horses, so Evans, who had and had built steam engines for the flour industry previously used one of his steam engines to transport the monstrous digger to the docks. In so doing he had created the first automobile. He was however unable to capitalise on his invention, due to difficulty in getting financial support and patents and it was left to men such as richard Trevithick, to further the development of steam powered transport.
Evans also designed a refrigeration machine which ran on vapor in 1805 and as such is often called the inventor of the refrigerator, although he never built one and his design was modified by Jacob Perkins, who obtained the first patent for a refrigerating machine in 1834.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Evans

On 9th September 1953, Welsh poet and playwright Dylan Thomas handed the barely completed script for the play for voices Under Milk Wood to the BBC before embarking on a reading tour of the United States. His intention was to revise the script before its first broadcast. However, Dylan died during the American tour and was never able to edit the play.
An omniscient narrator invites the audience to listen to the dreams and innermost thoughts of the inhabitants ...of a fictional small Welsh fishing village Llareggub ("bugger all" backwards). They include Mrs Ogmore-Pritchard, relentlessly nagging her two dead husbands; Captain Cat, reliving his seafaring times; the two Mrs Dai Breads; Organ Morgan, obsessed with his music; and Polly Garter, pining for her dead lover. Later, the town awakens and, aware now of how their feelings affect whatever they do, we watch them go about their daily business.

There is no doubt that Dylan based many of these characters on the inhabitants of Laugharne, a small seaside town in Carmarthenshire where Dylan had lived for several years. It is the author of this post's small claim to fame that the character of Captain Cat was based on Great Uncle Johnny, a retired sea Captain who was almost blind, and who spent many hours conversing with Dylan Thomas in Laugharne.

 

Today is the feast day of Saint Dunod

7th September

Today is the feast day of Saint Dunod

Saint Dunod - was a late 6th - early 7th century Abbot of Bangor on Dee, who attended the meeting of Welsh Bishops with Saint Augustine of Canterbury at 'Augustine's Oak' and is the only... Welsh ecclesiastic mentioned by name by Bede.

Saint Augustine and the meeting at Augustine's Oak;

Before the withdrawal of the Roman legions Britannia had already converted to Christianity and had been in regular contact with Rome, however after the pagan Anglo Saxons invaded c449 and the subsequent expansion of their Kingdoms in England, Christianity was mainly restricted to Wales and Cornwall and the Christian church developed in relative isolation from Rome, it was centred on monasteries instead of bishoprics, it had a different calculation for the date of Easter and the style of the tonsure haircut that clerics wore was different.

In 595 Pope St. Gregory the Great decided to send missionaries to Britain (known as the Gregorian mission), to try and bring the Christian Britains back into the fold and also to try and convert the pagan Anglo Saxons. He chose Augustine, a respected prior of a monastery in Rome, along with thirty monks to carry out his mission and in 597 Augustine arrived in Britain and held a meeting with the Anglo Saxon King Ethelbert, who although did not convert immediately, was impressed enough to let them continue to preach, however Ethelbert did convert later that year along with thousands during a christmas day mass,

Augustine was consecrated Bishop of Cantebury, he is considered the "Apostle to the English" and a founder of the English Church. As Augustine mission continued succesfully and more missionaries arrived from Rome, they consecrated pagan temples for Christian worship and turned pagan festivals into feast days of saints.

However Augustine failed to extend his authority to the Christians in Wales and Cornwall and as Pope Gregory had decreed that these Christians should also submit to Augustine, in 603, Augustine and Ethelberht summoned all the British bishops to a meeting, at Augustines's oak on the border between Somerset and Gloucestershire.

These bishops retired early to confer with their people, who, according to Bede, advised them to judge Augustine based upon the respect he displayed at their next meeting. When Augustine failed to rise from his seat on the entrance of the British bishops, they refused to recognise him as archbishop and the old Church chose isolation over reconciliation. But perhaps the more significant factors preventing an agreement,were the deep differences between Augustine and the British church and the fact that Augustine's efforts were sponsored by an Anlgo Saxon king, whose Kingdoms were aggressively expanding to the west.

Strata Florida Abbey ( Abaty Ystrad Fflur)

Strata Florida Abbey ( Abaty Ystrad Fflur) is a former Cistercian abbey situated just outside Pontrhydfendigaid, near Tregaron.

Shortly after the Norman invasion of Wales, a monastery, from which the present Abbey takes its name, was fo...unded on the banks of the Afon Fflura, a short distance from the present site, by a group of Cistercian monks from Whitland Abbey

Benedictine houses were usually established near Norman castles, but because they were seen as instruments of conquest, they failed to make any real impression on the local Welsh population. The Cistercians, in contrast, sought out solitude in the mountains and moorlands. Their austere discipline and emphasis on pastoral farming fitted in well with the local Welsh stock-rearing economy.

The present Abbey was founded around 1164 A.D, by the Lord Rhys, who because of pressure from the Normans, transferred his patronage from St Davids to Strata Florida and it is why many of his descendants were buried there.

By 1184 Strata Florida had increased in status and authority and its influence was felt throughout Wales. It is believed that it is at Strata Florida the most important primary historical source for early Welsh history, the Brut y Tywysogion was compiled.

Around 1238, Prince Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (Llywelyn the Great), held a council at Strata Florida, at which he made the other Welsh Princes swear that they would acknowledge his son Dafydd as his rightful successor.

In 1401, Strata Florida Abbey was the military base of king Henry IV and his son, later to become Henry V, during the early years of the rebellion of Owain Glyndwr.

Strata Florida was dissolved in the 1540s during Henry VIII's dissolution of the monastries

Strata Florida was left to deteriorate until the arrival of the railways in the late 19th century, when it became more accessible as a place of pilgrimage..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strata_Florida_Abbey