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The current capital of Wales is Cardiff. Historically, Wales did not have a definite capital. In 1955, the Minister for Welsh Affairs informally proclaimed Cardiff to be the capital of Wales. Since 1964, Cardiff has been home to government offices for Wales, and since 1999 it has been the seat of the Senedd.
Between the end of Roman rule and the conquest by Edward I in the late 13th century, Wales was usually divided between four kingdoms. There were only brief periods where the land was dominated by a single ruler, most notably by Gruffydd ap Llywelyn in the 11th century. [1] Rather than being based in a fixed location, Welsh kings would maintain an itinerant court, [2] as was the norm in medieval Europe.
In the past, multiple places have served as a seat of the government of Wales, including:
The ecclesiastical capital of Wales is St Davids, the resting place of the country's patron saint, Saint David.
In the 19th century, Cardiff grew to become the largest settlement in Wales, due to its role as a port for exporting coal from the South Wales Valleys. By 1881, it had overtaken both Swansea and Merthyr Tydfil to become the country's most populous urban area, [6] and in 1905, it received city status. [7] In subsequent years, an increasing number of Welsh national institutions were founded in the city, including the National Museum of Wales (chartered in 1907), Welsh National War Memorial (unveiled 1928), and the Registry Building (1903) of the University of Wales. However, the National Library of Wales (chartered 1907) is located in Aberystwyth. [8] This was partly because the library's founder, Sir John Williams, did not think that Cardiff was a Welsh city in character. [9] The investiture of the Prince of Wales, a ceremony revived in 1911, takes place within the shell of Caernarfon Castle in northwest Wales. Since 1920, the election of the Archbishop of Wales has taken place in Llandrindod Wells, chosen for its central location. [10]
In the 20th century, Welsh local authorities debated where a new capital of Wales should be, with 76 out of 161 opting for Cardiff in a 1924 poll, organised by the South Wales Daily News . [11] The authorities were mostly split between Cardiff and Caernarfon, with a smaller faction supporting Aberystwyth. The discussions stalled and progress was not made until 1950. [11]
The government of the Labour Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, had not named a capital of Wales during his government. Attlee noted that a number of cities made claims to the status, and that the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire did not raise what he considered to be a "domestic issue" with the Government. [12] In his inaugural speech as Lord Mayor of Cardiff, George Williams argued that Cardiff should be considered the capital of Wales. [13] David Llewellyn was elected MP for Cardiff North in 1950 and also campaigned for recognising Cardiff. Campaigning for Cardiff stepped up and the city took steps to promote its 'Welshness'. The stalemate over which city should be the new capital was broken when Cardiganshire County Council decided to support Cardiff and, in a 1955 poll of local authorities, 134 out of 161 voted for the city. [11]
On 20 December 1955, Gwilym Lloyd-George, then Minister for Welsh Affairs and Home Secretary, proclaimed that Cardiff was the capital of Wales, in a reply to a Parliamentary question from David Llewellyn. Lloyd-George said that "no formal measures are necessary to give effect to this decision" [14] The Encyclopedia of Wales says that the decision to recognise the city as the capital of Wales "had more to do with the fact that it contained marginal Conservative constituencies than any reasoned view of what functions a Welsh capital should have".
Cardiff only became a centre of national administration with the establishment of the Welsh Office in 1964, which later prompted the creation of various other public bodies such as the Arts Council of Wales and the Welsh Development Agency, most of which were based in Cardiff.
In a 1997 referendum, Wales narrowly voted in favour of establishing the National Assembly for Wales (now known as the Senedd), although only 44% supported the proposal in Cardiff. [15] [16] Due to the relative lack of support for the Assembly locally, and disagreements between the Welsh Office and Cardiff Council over where it should sit, there was a brief period of speculation that the Assembly would be established elsewhere. [17] [18] However, the Assembly eventually located at Tŷ Hywel in Cardiff Bay in 1999. It has been based there ever since, moving to its present building in 2006. [19]
Owain ap Gruffydd, commonly known as Owain Glyndŵr or Glyn Dŵr, was a Welsh leader, soldier and military commander in the Late Middle Ages, who led a 15-year-long revolt with the aim of ending English rule in Wales. He was an educated lawyer, forming the first Welsh parliament under his rule, and was the last native-born Welshman to claim the title Prince of Wales.
Prince of Wales is a title traditionally given to the male heir apparent to the English and, later, British thrones. The title originated with the Welsh rulers of Gwynedd who, from the late 12th century, used it to assert their supremacy over the other Welsh rulers. However, to mark the finalisation of his conquest of Wales, in 1301, Edward I of England invested his son Edward of Caernarfon with the title, thereby beginning the tradition of giving the title to the heir apparent when he was the monarch's son or grandson. The title was later claimed by the leader of a Welsh rebellion, Owain Glyndŵr, from 1400 until 1415.
The history of what is now Wales begins with evidence of a Neanderthal presence from at least 230,000 years ago, while Homo sapiens arrived by about 31,000 BC. However, continuous habitation by modern humans dates from the period after the end of the last ice age around 9000 BC, and Wales has many remains from the Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Bronze Age. During the Iron Age the region, like all of Britain south of the Firth of Forth, the culture had become Celtic, with a common Brittonic language. The Romans, who began their conquest of Britain in AD 43, first campaigned in what is now northeast Wales in 48 against the Deceangli, and gained total control of the region with their defeat of the Ordovices in 79. The Romans departed from Britain in the 5th century, opening the door for the Anglo-Saxon settlement. Thereafter, the culture began to splinter into a number of kingdoms. The Welsh people formed with English encroachment that effectively separated them from the other surviving Brittonic-speaking peoples in the early middle ages.
Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, Llywelyn II, also known as Llywelyn the Last, was the native Prince of Wales from 1258 until his death at Cilmeri in 1282. Llywelyn was the son of Gruffydd ap Llywelyn Fawr and grandson of Llywelyn the Great, and he was one of the last native and independent princes of Wales before its conquest by Edward I of England and English rule in Wales that followed, until Owain Glyndŵr held the title during the Welsh Revolt of 1400–1415.
The flag of Wales consists of a red dragon passant on a green and white field. As with many heraldic charges, the exact representation of the dragon is not standardised in law and many renderings exist. It is not represented in the Union Flag.
Machynlleth is a market town, community and electoral ward in Powys, Wales and within the historic boundaries of Montgomeryshire. It is in the Dyfi Valley at the intersection of the A487 and the A489 roads. At the 2001 Census it had a population of 2,147, rising to 2,235 in 2011. It is sometimes referred to colloquially as Mach.
Welsh nationalism emphasises and celebrates the distinctiveness of Welsh culture and Wales as a nation or country. Welsh nationalism may also include calls for further autonomy or self-determination, which includes Welsh devolution, meaning increased powers for the Senedd, or full Welsh independence.
The Principality of Wales was originally the territory of the native Welsh princes of the House of Aberffraw from 1216 to 1283, encompassing two-thirds of modern Wales during its height of 1267–1277. Following the conquest of Wales by Edward I of England of 1277 to 1283, those parts of Wales retained under the direct control of the English crown, principally in the north and west of the country, were re-constituted as a new Principality of Wales and ruled either by the monarch or the monarch's heir though not formally incorporated into the Kingdom of England. This was ultimately accomplished with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542 when the Principality ceased to exist as a separate entity.
Pennal is a village and community on the A493 road in southern Gwynedd, Wales, on the north bank of the River Dyfi, near Machynlleth.
Llywelyn's coronet is a lost treasure of Welsh history. It is recorded that Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, Prince of Wales and Lord of Aberffraw had deposited this crown and other items with the monks at Cymer Abbey for safekeeping at the start of his final campaign in 1282. He was killed later that year. It was seized alongside other holy artefacts in 1284 from the ruins of the defeated Kingdom of Gwynedd. Thereafter it was taken to London and presented at the shrine of Edward the Confessor in Westminster Abbey by King Edward I of England as a token of the complete annihilation of the independent Welsh state.
Welsh republicanism or republicanism in Wales is the political ideology that advocates for Wales to be governed by a republican system, as opposed to the monarchy of the United Kingdom.
Wales in the Late Middle Ages spanned the years 1282–1542, beginning with conquest and ending in union. Those years covered the period involving the closure of Welsh medieval royal houses during the late 13th century, and Wales' final ruler of the House of Aberffraw, the Welsh Prince Llywelyn II, also the era of the House of Plantagenet from England, specifically the male line descendants of Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou as an ancestor of one of the Angevin kings of England who would go on to form the House of Tudor from England and Wales.
Welsh independence is the political movement advocating for Wales to become a sovereign state, independent from the United Kingdom.
The Glyndŵr rebellion was a Welsh rebellion led by Owain Glyndŵr against the Kingdom of England during the Late Middle Ages. During the rebellion's height between 1403 and 1406, Owain exercised control over the majority of Wales after capturing several of the most powerful English castles in the country, and formed a national parliament at Machynlleth. The revolt was the last major manifestation of a Welsh independence before the annexation of Wales into England in 1543.
The Welsh Seal is a seal used by the First Minister of Wales to seal letters patent signed by the monarch giving royal assent to bills passed by the Senedd. The sealed bill is thereby enacted, becoming an Act of Senedd Cymru.
Owain Glyndŵr Day is held annually on 16 September in Wales, as a celebration of Owain Glyndŵr, the last native Prince of Wales and founder of the first Welsh parliament.
The Parliament for Wales Campaign was a political campaign for a Welsh parliament of elected representatives in Wales. This campaign was also known as a "Campaign for a Welsh Assembly".
Welsh devolution is the transfer of legislative power for self-governance to Wales by the Government of the United Kingdom.
A series of Welsh rebellions broke out in the century following the conquest of Wales by Edward I in 1283, which had brought the whole of Wales under the control of the Kingdom of England for the first time. In 1400, Welsh discontent with English rule in Wales culminated in the Welsh Revolt, a major uprising led by Owain Glyndŵr, who achieved de facto control over much of the country in the following years. The rebellion petered out after 1409, and after complete English control was restored in 1415 no further major rebellions occurred.
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