Hedd Wyn was a Welsh-language poet who was killed on the first day of the Battle of Passchendaele during World War I. He was posthumously awarded the bard's chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod. Evans, who had been awarded several chairs for his poetry, was inspired to take the bardic name Hedd Wyn from the way sunlight penetrated the mist in the Meirionnydd valleys.
In Welsh culture, an eisteddfod is an institution and festival with several ranked competitions, including in poetry and music. The term eisteddfod, which is formed from the Welsh morphemes: eistedd, meaning 'sit', and fod, meaning 'be', means, according to Hywel Teifi Edwards, "sitting-together." Edwards further defines the earliest form of the eisteddfod as a competitive meeting between bards and minstrels, in which the winner was chosen by a noble or royal patron.
The National Eisteddfod of Wales is the largest of several eisteddfodau that are held annually, mostly in Wales. Its eight days of competitions and performances are considered the largest music and poetry festival in Europe. Competitors typically number 6,000 or more, and overall attendance generally exceeds 100,000 visitors, the highest recently being 118,000 attending the 2022 festival. The 2018 Eisteddfod was held in Cardiff Bay with a fence-free 'Maes'. In 2020, the event was held virtually under the name AmGen; events were held over a one-week period.
Richard Davies (Mynyddog) was a popular Welsh-language poet, singer, and Eisteddfod conductor. The original source of the name Mynyddog is from Newydd Fynyddog, a hill near his home. Another submission is the name comes from Mynyddog Mwynfawr, a character in an early Welsh poem. Use of an adopted Welsh-language pseudonym or bardic name is common among Welsh poets.
David Jenkins was a Welsh composer, best known for his choral works and hymn tunes.
Twm o'r Nant was the pseudonym of a Welsh language dramatist and poet, Thomas Edwards, also known as Tom of the Dingle. He was famous for anterliwtau, which he performed mainly round his native Denbighshire.
David George Lloyd was a Welsh singer. Lloyd, a tenor, was noted for being one of the first Welsh solo singers to seek a broader audience beyond Wales, in the concert halls and recording studios of England, mainland Europe, and North America.
Robert Jones Derfel was a Welsh poet and political writer.
Elfael was one of a number of Welsh cantrefi occupying the region between the River Wye and river Severn, known as Rhwng Gwy a Hafren, in the early Middle Ages. It was divided into two commotes, Is Mynydd and Uwch Mynydd, separated by the chain of hills above Aberedw. In the late medieval period, it was a marcher lordship. However, after the Laws in Wales Act 1535, it was one of the territorial units which went to make up the county of Radnorshire in 1536.
Goronwy Owen was one of the 18th century's most notable Welsh poets. He mastered the 24 traditional bardic metres and, although forced by circumstances into exile, played an important role in the literary and antiquarian movement in Wales often described as the Welsh 18th-century Renaissance.
Walter Davies, commonly known by his bardic name Gwallter Mechain, was a Welsh poet, editor, translator, antiquary and Anglican clergyman.
Daniel Protheroe, was a Welsh composer and conductor, born at Cwmgiedd, Brecknockshire. After success at the National Eisteddfod at a young age, he immigrated to the US, where he was educated. He is best known for composing Calvinist Methodist hymns.
William Rhys-Herbert (1868-1921) was a Welsh composer, conductor, organist and pianist. He composed numerous operettas for performance in schools, and also published songs, partsongs, and cantatas.
The Gwyneddigion Society was a London-based Welsh literary and cultural society. The original society was founded in 1770 and wound up in 1843. It was briefly revived in 1978. Its proceedings were conducted through the medium of Welsh.
Robert Rees was a Welsh tenor and musician. He was a successful competitor at eisteddfodau for which he adopted the pseudonym Eos Morlais, and in 1867 he won the main prize as a vocalist at the National Eisteddfod of Wales. He was recognised as one of the leading Welsh soloists of his time.
Ben Davies was a 19th-century Welsh poet, and an Independent minister. He grew up in Dolgam, a farm where he received some early education at the local school. At the age of 13 however he entered employment as a miner in a local coal mine.
The Reverend John Davies was a Welsh Congregational Minister, writer, linguist and poet. One source has Davies' date of death listed as 10 December 1884, separately noting that it was his funeral service that was conducted on 16 December 1884.
Bethany was a Calvinistic Methodist/ Presbyterian Church of Wales chapel in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire, Wales, from 1881 to 2023.
David Watkin Jones, also known by his bardic name Dafydd Morganwg, was a Welsh poet, historian and geologist. He is remembered as the author of numerous works, especially Yr Ysgol Farddol, considered by many later poets as the main text for Welsh prosody.
