What was Medieval Wales really like?
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- Опубліковано 29 сер 2020
- Viking age and Medieval Wales wasn't just a backwater next to Anglo-Saxon England (which didn't really exist for part of the early medieval period anyway) with no sexy archaeology or finds to look at.
The real Medieval Wales was a highly developed society like any other, full of kings, queens and princes, poetry and music, golden treasures, violent medieval battles, and artistic traditions dating back beyond the Romans.
Not to mention King Arthur.
Join Jimmy in digging through the archaeology and history of medieval Wales, and you may even learn a word or two of Welsh along the way!
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I just wanted to let you know that here in the US, there is no bias like that toward the Welsh. There are plenty enough of other biases, but not Welsh. We just kinda see you guys as the ones who held onto all the magic. Well, I do, anyway. 😉
In my experience the American consciousness of Wales doesn't go beyond the fact that it exists, there are sheep, and questionable activities may or may not occur with regards to said sheep. Also the flag's neat.
I come from a wargaming perspective and Americans do tend to believe that your Welsh/British forces should look just like Anglo Saxons only impoverished.
Now the IRISH on the other hand...
(Just kidding; I'm very proud of my Irish American heritage through my grandmother!)
@@Ithirahad We're deeply suspicious of what the Scots and Kiwis do with all their sheep, too.
I swear when I listend to the Welsh National Anthem I thought it was the language JRR Tolkien based Elvish on, it is that otherworldly.
I'm old as hell and born in the US. When asking about my family ancestry, my great aunt told me to just claim to be English. There was family from Ireland and Wales, but the Irish were all drunks and the Welsh were talented artist and poets but had an 'unhealthy melancholy'. So, in the 1950s the bigotry was there. Turns out I'm mostly Irish and Welsh with one English granny. I'm glad! Take that Aunt Ruby.
I saw an interesting statistic recently. The number of people in the United States claiming English heritage dropped massively between the 1950s and the 1990s. It seems that the social pressures changed a lot in that period, such that people with a mixture of ancestry from the UK and Ireland were incentivised to claim English identity in the 50s, but by the 90s were incentivised to claim Scottish, Irish or Welsh. Says something interesting about the changing dynamics of privileged in-group identity in the second half of the 20th century, I am sure.
Unhealthy melancholy lol well put
Same story with me. So glad I came upon your comment. 🌹
Hearing Talesin and Aneirin pronounced like they should be is so, so lovely on the ears!
:3 I does my best!
He says them wrong. He pronounced it Taliesin instead of Taliesyn
@@macsenwyn7223 northwalien.
I'm from the US but spent some time abroad, and I definitely noticed that Brits talk about the Welsh like their poor country cousins! When I learned more about their history later, I was surprised to realize that the Welsh are basically the only people in Britain, and perhaps some of the few people in the world, who have never been displaced. That is, the Welsh now seem to be descended from the first humans ever to wander into that bit of land -- which is truly extraordinary!
That would be amazing, but unfortunately it’s not true. There have been various population replacement level migrations into Europe over the last 10,000 years. Notably Neolithic Anatolian Farmers about 8 to 9,000 years ago and Bronze Age Steppe Nomads about 4 to 5,000 years ago. The Welsh have certainly been there a long time, but they would be genetically very different to the people who were on that land 10,000, or even 5,000, years ago. There are interesting lectures about it on UA-cam from Harvard geneticist Richard Reich. The one on The New Scientist channel is very good.
Not true, the Celts are believed to have originally been from central Europe and displaced many of the more indigenous populations.
The Basque may in fact actually be more like what you're thinking though!
Plenty of Native Americans descend from the first people in America.
Sadly the USA tries to bury this lol
@@willmosse3684 unequivocally incorrect.
Most of the DNA in Britain descends from neolithic people.
Celts were wave of culture and technology. They were not a dominant DNA force. The Celts never called themselves the Celts
@@asdfasdf-dd9lk wrong. Genetic studies in Britain showing much older DNA than later trades people from Central Europe.
Connection to Neolithic DNA does exist in Britain and Eire
I wonder if the "medieval Welsh were poor" comes from England's attempts to squash Welsh culture.
The English attempted to crush Welsh (and Scottish) culture for a long time.
I wouldn't be surprised if something like this was involved.
I mean propaganda against your opponents and areas you've invaded is one of the older tricks in the book.
most likely, I mean they did outlaw our language for alittle over 300 years at one point.
Beware of modern political nationalism in action. The rewriting of history by the Marxist left goes on apace.
@@Reignlief I love that you bought this up. Entire language outlawed and so many people aren't aware of the cultural removal that happened. Even the naming culture has changed due to that, first names go to middle etc.
That’s a part of it yes, it was a two pronged attack by the Catholic Church and the Germanic Royal lineage, for many reasons over many centuries but essentially was all about rewriting history in their own image and to discredit the history of those who had claims to certain historical events they didn’t want future generations to learn about and in so carry on the true history of Britain.
We have to remember, the “Welsh” are actually the British because the Welsh are the native Brits. You had a small pocket of Picts in the highlands of Scotland but other than that, the rest of Britain was what we now know as wales and the Welsh for centuries
British history as we know it and are taught it is based on lies, history from the perspective of the Germanic tribes who invaded it and wrote their own version of history in order to big themselves up an inflate their own egos and also it was essentially self propagandising, they wanted history to look favourably on them when in reality, the truth is very different.
The term “Celt” is an example of this, a term created in the 18th century was a successful attempt to put down and denigrate the different complex cultures and traditions and languages of Britain and Ireland into one box, to make out that they were backwards compared to the Germanic invaders.
I know people use the term Celt as some kind of pride thing but I don’t, I think it’s offensive and we shouldn’t embrace the term because it doesn’t do us justice, it’s grabbing onto a lie when we should be saying, no!! That is not who we are, we are considerably better and more than that fake narrative created as a means to put us down and belittle us and our history.
Our legacy is not Celtic, it’s far greater, our role in world history is far greater than the one that was concocted for us by those who wanted to put us down.
The fake narrative also benefited the church too so they were complicit in pushing the lies because it hid things they didn’t want to be written in history because it contradicted the things they were preaching at the time.
For example the 562AD comet disaster than wiped out millions upon millions of Brits and was what left Britain vulnerable to invasion by the likes of the Angles and Saxons and Jutes etc and ultimately led to the overpowering of the Brits which then led to the Norman Invasion.
Why was this significant, well, firstly, the church at the time said that no rock could fall from the sky, this event disproved that, so they had to cover it up and destroy any written account of the event, of which they were largely for the most part successful and secondly, because the event caused the majority of Britain to be inhabitable and which left Britain basically undefended, allowing to Germanic tribes to invade pretty much untested, that wasn’t glamorous enough for the history books.
The Brits had successful held all invaders at bay even the Romans for decades, Britain was notorious for being nigh on impossible to invade and settle, so for propaganda purposes, they couldn’t let the history books say they successfully invaded Britain without any resistance because that’s like bragging at beating a one armed blind man at a game of boxing, there is no honour in that, you want history to say that they were David defeating Goliath because that makes a better more heroic story, so that’s what they did and they created the dark ages version of history and the church were happy to oblige and play along with it because it meant no talk of the rock falling from the sky, it was win win for both sides and that’s just one example of a major historical event in British history that was white washed by the establishments in order to further their own agendas and resulted in the false history which is still protected to this day, despite the shed loads of evidence that verifiably contradicts what’s the history books claim, they would rather knowingly continue the lie than to accept and admit that what we are taught is a lie.
I would say it’s the biggest cover up and lie in possibly the whole of history!
My great-grandmother read to me from the Four Branches of the Mabinogion and the tales from the Red Book of Hergest. I found them totally interesting and I can't imagine how anyone would think the medieval Welsh were poor, uncouth, illiterates.
They were certainly not, unlike the Sausage eating Heathens from Schleswig Holstein, Wales is Bollocks Cymru is the name " Brotherhood " for all you Cornish fans, you spoke the Cymric Brythonic Celtic as did every other Celt in Britain!
I thoroughly enjoyed this, thank you.
The Welsh aren't alone, the Cornish have been ignored too. The only thing most people know is King Arthur & Tintagel castle which is garbage anyway - thank you English Heritage. English Heritage & the National Trust have mismanaged some of our best sites & others have been ignored completely. I grew up very close to what was thought to be an Iron Age hillfort but nothing has been done to explore it in my lifetime (50+); if I recall rightly the only finds in the county museum from this site date from the 1930s.
Indeed, and in the period Cornwall and Wales were simply Britons. Alas!
@@TheWelshViking Yeah if you think reenacting early medieval Wales can be rough try Cornwall!
For some reason people really believe the region where (from 300AD or so) the majority of Europes Tin came from was some poor backwater. They ignore the proactive settlement of Brittany by SW Britons and the clear signs of trade links and settlement by Vikings and Irish too.
God, Last Kingdom says we don't even know not to put holes in our shields!
I know you say not looking at Facebook but we are working hard at Morvleydh to change that:
Www.facebook.com/Morvleydh
@@BrotherJing1 Cornwall tends to get the shitty end of the stick when it comes to the English and British viewing them as their own national identity. I've always viewed them as incredibly individual and it's awful that even Last Kingdom didn't bring them up well. I love Bernard Cornwell but that's a giant error.
@@MH-gc2hr yeah the book is better then the series at least...those stupid wicker shields with holes in the middle haunt my dreams
English Heritage is still hanging onto Battle as the location where Harold lost his crown. We now have enough evidence to discredit this but they ignore it. So they won’t have a hope in the west.
I blame the English: Prince of Wales indeed. And have you ever contemplated the fact that Wales has an awesome dragon on their flag, while England's flag is the cross of St. George?
Badass dragon flag, gold mines, delicious singing, King Arthur, Ioan Gryffydd, the Mabinogion, Diana Wynne Jones.
We just rock, honestly.
@@TheWelshViking We do - don't we ^-^
@@hetrodoxly1203 Wessex! \m/
@@hetrodoxly1203 The Red Dragon is a symbol that predates the Normal English one. There are historical theories the white vs red was Norman vs Welsh.
st george the dragon killer
French person here, the only contact I've had with medieval Welsh culture is the Mabinogion, and those stories translate such a high and epic quality to me, it has never occurred to me that people thought of medieval Wales as kind of backwards and poor.
me: immediately goes to look at books and into medieval Wales.
I am from Coventry and my public schooling did not mention Wales in the medieval period, like it never existed. Ashamed to admit it never crossed my mind.
I watched this amazing five part documentary series on UA-cam a few years back, it covers the history of Wales from cavemen to now. Great info on the medieval period in there. Here's the first episode, if that interests you. ua-cam.com/video/hfKYqjempvc/v-deo.html
Honestly my schools didn't either down south (Kent), if not for my family I'd be clueless. It's a really great deep dive on what makes up the British people that has a lot of fun culture too and I'd say not as boring as the Normans with their kings.
So, I'm over a year late, but I've had an interest in Welsh folklore ever since reading the Chronicles of Prydain as a child and then finding out where its inspiration came from. In fact, the first book I wrote is a historical fantasy set in late 4th century Roman Wales (or what would now be Wales, obviously). It makes me sad that Wales doesn't get the recognition it deserves, especially considering that the Arthurian legend, once you disentangle Charlemagne from it, has its origins there. Also, Brythonic languages sound so much prettier than old English, but that's neither here nor there.
Anyway, I only recently found your channel but I absolutely love the quality of your content. If you're reading this, thanks Jimmy! If you're not reading this, thanks all the same.
I have found there is this English bias towards Welsh culture even still. The idea that it has a culture at all is a surprise or a punch line of some very bad jokes. It stems from the utter lack of education on Welsh history taught. Colonisers are not keen on explaining their thief and murder.
Growing up in North Wales and moving to England was quite a culture shock. Things like poetry, music and art are the backbone of Welsh school experience. In England these are "rich people things". I enjoy your channel quite a bit and it is good to hear Welsh.
Same, Lucy. I remember moving to England and the culture shock was real!
Diolch yn fawr am rhannu’ch brofion :)
That's weird; where I live in America, I've been reminded on a near daily basis for my entire life that people who colonized the Americas were genocidal, racist, slave driving thieves and rapists, and told that because I look like those people, that I should bear a certain amount of guilt for their crimes against humanity, even though not a single one of my ancestors had a single thing to do with the settlement of the Americas.
Do you guys feel biculturally British & Welsh, then? & not English?
(like those of South or East Asian descent, they are Indian/ Pakistani/ Chinese & British, but not fully "English"...?)
Genuinely would love to know.
@@Jumpoable I'm British that doesn't make me Welsh. I could be Indian and South Asian. But i'm not Pakistani
As an American with Welsh ancestry this is fascinating to learn. Is it perhaps a particularly English prejudice? It makes me think I should learn to speak Welsh, too!
You should! Please do! We’d love to have you in the gang!
Traditionally, I would say yes, but I have to say that many English people simply aren’t taught about Wales and its history.
I have to say, other than the history my favorite part of your videos is when you speak Welsh. Its such a beautiful language and i'm glad that people are keeping it alive. ^.^
I know people that didn't even realize Wales is an actual country. They thought it was an English county.
*loads rpg with holy intent*
Who?
I heard people say that sometimes and I got really annoyed 😂😂😂
*Calls upon Ddraig Goch with rebellious intent*
I know a london guy who night think Wales was a real county and more just an area of England. He even had a towel with the Welsh flag on it. Took him to Saint Fagans to sort that out lol
Subbed, completely agree, as someone that's Welsh born and bred and proud of their heritage, it's incredibly insulting to hear people portray Welsh people in such a discriminatory manner.
Thanks for this. As a Madog research fellow working on the Welsh contributions to medicine and deep diving into the Meddygon Myddfai I came across the kings gifting clothing/fabric to doctors so it's nice to have a tertiary resource for that as well. Diolch. (also the Meddygon Myddfai are a fascinating side venture into Medieval Wales between the reality and the folklore behind their story)
It's a shame growing up in Wales, going to wsh stream schools and studying history up to a level that we were never really taught about Welsh history and culture. In Welsh lessons we learned about the stories of Branwen and Cantre'r Gwaelod from the Mabinogion, and Taliesin was maby mentioned once or twice untill a level when he is actually covered but as it is an optional subject by then very phew in our school study it.
History was worse as we only studied 1 unit in year 12 where we had to consider the affect of the Tudor monarchy on the people of Wales which is an optional unit that can be swapped with the Russian revolution.
In primary school we also learnt about Santes Dwinwen (Welsh patron Saint of love), Owain Glyndwr (who was our local historical figure), and Dewi Sant for 1 day each every year untill we reached high school
It is appalling that we are seen as a proud national who are proud of our heritage and yet our history is not taught in schools
Yep, I remember those choices in school. Communism or the Tudors. Nothing on the actual kingdoms of medieval Wales, nothing on the development of our long and storied culture.
But you might get one of the Mabinogion if you’re lucky!
Ofnadwy, ‘de?
Keep spreading it out there though, and I promise to do the same :)
You were lucky to learn about Owain Glyndwr in primary school! I'd heard the name, but I knew nothing about him until about three years ago when I decided to look into it myself - and I'm now in my 40s! We never learned anything about him in school, despite being only a few miles from where he lived. For me in school history lessons in the 1990s, Wales began as a country in the late 1800s. It didn't exist before then.
I went through English medium and didn't even realise we had our own language until secondary school, although I will say things do appear to be a lot better on that regards with my nephews & nieces going through the same school. My children are attending Welsh language medium and they are learning quite a bit more, especially about their local history etc they even mention the Celts which I only learnt about from trips to museums with my family. My main welsh history education was Rebecca, Merthyr, Chartists in Newport and some stuff on the pre-fabs after the second world war.
I agree, I did history until I finished secondary (might do it at uni) and it was not a lot of Welsh. Don't get me wrong I love learning a bit of history from other countries. But when you do ww2 and only get a little brief description of Wales in the 40s and a statistic here and there...that's not correct. When your history of medieval Wales is that there's castles and there was Owain Glyndwr....that's also not right. I know more English history than I do of Wales and Its embarrassing.
Also I love the Mabinogion of Branwen because my name is Branwen 😅 had a book with illustrations that were a little scary for 5 year old me.
Well, if it makes you feel better, I'm American and I was just learning about Owain Glyndwr. I'm also a little bit obsessed with the Merlin character. So it is out there. One must go a bit deeper to finally get to Welsh history but it is a rich and fascinating history.
I love a good history rant. God knows I got off on enough of them myself if the various topics of my own history wheelhouses even vaguely get mentioned. Then I have to put another coin into the "lecturing about history when nobody asked" jar. :D
Speaking of coin, congrats on getting monetized!
As a massive fan of Gaelic & Brythonic languages, I'm absolutely delighted to hear there's such an extensive collection of old Welsh poems in existance. Looking forward to read all of that (when my knowledge of Welsh extends beyond singing along to 'Dacw Nghariad', that is). Also, the absence of midroll ads is much appreciated !
What a tune, though! A great way to learn my tongue! :D
@@TheWelshViking :)
Thanks for this! I am a fairly ignorant American and even I managed to figure out when I worked with people in the U. K. that they seemed to treat Wales like a joke / full of dirty people. It was always a puzzlement to me, especially since the Welsh landscape seems so beautiful in pictures. Looking forward to learning more!
It depends where you go and who you meet. Ignorant people can be found everywhere sadly ... I was lucky to learn about Wales without all that nonsense. I suppose I was taught that they were all really good singers, though, which I guess might be a bit of a stereotype. I think things are improving. And Jimmy is helping one video at a time!
Saying that Tom Jones boss singer
That PR campaign by Edward I is still going strong.
Filled the gap nicely, I got decent English, Scottish, Scandinavian and Irish, vloggers, now I finally got a decent Welsh one, thanks.
There's a really good book trilogy called ''The Warlord Chronicles'' Basically 5th century Wales with King Arthur . ''The Winter king'', ''Enemy of God'', ''Excalibur''. I pretty much heard nothing about welsh before that series and it just blew my mind . I found it beautiful ! It has lots of welsh culture in it.
I lived in an area called gelligaer in a 5 mile area we have roman and pre roman settlements, neolithic standing stones and wonderful stories of ancient brithonic ruling families. Wonderful stories One of my favorite books is fairy tales of the Rhymney valley. We had a wonderful history teacher at school and the area almost creaks under the weight of it
Thank you for sharing your knowledge of Medieval Wales, an area which is grossly overlooked in history teaching in the UK. Didderol iawn!
Don’t forget the great masterpieces like the Four Branches of the Mabinogi. Epic, mysterious and gives you a real way of looking at medieval Wales. Those books looked really great. I guess I have added two more books to my unlimited list of wanted books.
Diolch a da iawn!!!!!!!!
Cymru am byth!!!!!!
South Walian here studying to be a historian. This video summarises why I got in to studying history. Just wanted to thank you for putting videos up and telling people of our culture! Where I grew up we never heard any history past the valleys and the mines, so people such as yourself are a blessing. Diolch yn fawr, fy ddyn!
Excellent! The historian in me loves your take on a country my ancestors came from and the deserved pride you show. Love your language too, even if I don’t understand it.
Never too late to learn, m’lady!
The Welsh Viking Might be. Hard enough to remember NA English 😂
Friends who can source their information with academic research are the best kind of friends!
This was really educational. Thank you. I actually never thought about Welsh history much, so this has opened a whole new world for me. Instant subscription
Awesome video! It's so important to debunk potentially harmful myths and stereotypes in history. Especially when the archaeology DOES NOT support them!
Jimmy is finds-driven and will not accept no bogus history! NO SIR.
Thanks for the vid--there is a corpus of Welsh verse out there proving how sophisticated the culture was! The Rhydderch Hael cycle, the Eagle of Pengwern, Taliesin, the triads--so much lost but so much still preserved. Yeah, the US does not have a prejudice against Wales (that I have ever seen), just ignorance (sigh). Thank you for the book titles!
Gosh, this is so incredibly interesting! Thank you for sharing.
This is really fantastic! thank you for putting this info out there! (also very glad you have ads!!)
I love that you mention the trade routes, they are really important for context! I have been looking at trade route influences as well, in the Irish context, and once you see it you simply cannot ignore the significant impact on the culture.
Congrats on monetization too!
Bravo sir! Thank you for sharing about the Welsh culture! Also, I am thoroughly enjoying hearing the language.
Well, thank you back! I’ll keep up the Welsh side of things, both culturally and linguistically :)
I was briefly in the SCA around the year 2000, and I choose a Welsh persona. No one in my group even had resources regarding the Welsh one way or another. I feel like this video was more informative than anything I was able to research then
I'm SCA with a Welsh persona, I also had a really hard time finding good resources so I'm soaking this adorable man up!
Well presented and edifying Jim, thank you.
Da iawn byti, spot on, thanks for the refreshing video. Its definitely something that genuinely annoys me when people say the medieval / pre medieval welsh were backwards, poor tribal savages.
Simply not true I've been researching the "age of the saints" for a few years and how many of the ancient kings later became saints for example St. Brychan, St. Gwynllyw, St. Tewdrig.
Also the 6th century church and hamlet of Llanwonno which is not far from where I live.
Wales has a rich history which I throughly enjoy researching, our ancestors certainly weren't poor.
Thanks again 👍
Thank you for sharing all this interesting information! Can't wait for the early medieval Welsh dazzling look :D
I appreciate you sticking up for us welsh folk!
Loving your videos, James! 'Way to REPRESENT Medieval Wales! ❤
I studied in Wales and England，but Wales always have a special place in my heart. You can really feel the culture when you go to wales and see a lot of beautiful castle and stunning sites. And i think bbc made a doc about the history of wales, which did a good job explain the sufficicated history of wales. It was really in the forefront of modern day law.
I’m happy with anything that helps you keep making your videos!
Love hearing a bit of the history of Wales. And very much enjoying the bits of Welsh language sprinkled in.
Dwi mor falch! Diolch yn fawr! :)
Your presentations are fascinating.
I didn't know any of this; thank you!! So glad you have the opportunity to make some cash off this.
Your vids have become one of my anticipated daily joys! Initially, it was due to the textile and period-fashion focus delivered in a delightful and knowledgeable manner. But now there is even greater interest, since Ancestry.com has indicated I have roots in Wales and Northwestern (also Germanic) Europe with a bit of Scotland, Norway, Ireland and Spain in the mix. So greetings from across the pond; and please know that your material is fascinating, and you are much appreciated!
Wales is an amazing country! I have lived in Cardiff and in Holyhead and I love it there! Bangor is a lovely town and I played with their local theatre group as well, so I spent a lot of time in that place. And just from that I have always known about the very rich cultural heritage of Wales. Holyhead is very proud of its history so it's hard to ignore when you love there! Thank you so much for all this wonderful information - more people need to know how wonderful and rich a place it is!
Once again, a concise and most illuminating video. Thanks Jimmy, you're are so good at this!
Your passion is infectious! It always stirs my heart and sends me down research rabbit holes when I see someone whose curiosity matches my own.
This is very interesting!! Im glad you are doing these educational/rant videos, I learn so much!
Thanks, Vanessa! I’ll keep doing them!
I am happy that you are monetized! I like the idea that someone that teaches me things can make money doing so!
Congrats on reaching this milestone in your channel!
Thank you! It’s very exciting :)
Happy to hear the crannog reference, I'm visiting one on Wednesday : )
"I don't see it so it never existed" as an attitude annoys me. Especailly when they just haven't looked.
Oh! Congrats on being monetised, time to bringe you work, again!
Wahey! Diolch yn fawr!
Ooh, which crannog? I love the things. Such a mad idea
@@TheWelshViking The Scottish crannog Center, on Loch Tay in Perthshire. They're actually about to move to a new location as they're running out of space for repairs after ~20 years. Do check them out, They have some fab resources : D
Great video thankyou, good to see some true welsh history🏴 well done
Totally ok with you having ads at the start! These videos add some fun and knowledge to my life, you definitely should get paid a bit for them if you can! Plenty of people getting paid a lot more for less accurate stuff (cough Vikings cough).
I enjoyed that. It's always good to learn about places and peoples that one knows very little about. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge about early Wales. I learned something new today, so that makes it an excellent day. Take care. (The ads are fine. I usually just knit through them 😁)
It was time for this culture to emerge as well. For those of us who are not English, it is difficult to grasp the history of Wales. Thank you so much for taking the time to teach us about this time in Wales
Amazing video! Keep this coming!
Diolch yn fawr! Will do!
I laughed and almost spat out my cider at the idea that it rains in Wales. I think I've always assumed that the Welsh courts were as sophisticated as those anywhere else in Europe. Why wouldn't they be? Anyway, I'm looking forward to learning more.
Right? Silly nonsense that becomes accepted history
Thank you so much for this. A large portion of my ancestors were Welsh. I love to try to learn as much as I can about the culture and history from over there. I really wish I could trace my family line but it can be quite difficult as over time records are lost or destroyed. All I can say for certain is that it calls out to me as if I feel a great need to discover the culture of my ancestors. This video is awesome.
Diolch for making and posting this video.
Thank you so much for doing these sorts of videos. I'm Canadian and I've been looking into my family history a lot lately. I grew up calling my dad's parents Nain and Taid, and I knew part of my family was Welsh, but my Taid was adopted, and his records are sealed So, last year, I did a DNA test to find out my ancestry. I thought I would be roughy 25% Welsh with only my Nain being traced back to that (her family came to Canada after setting up a Welsh settlement in Argentina, then they left when they would be forced to start speaking Spanish), but to my surprise, I'm only 40%. I also found out that Nain, who is currently 96 years old, grew up fluent in Welsh. She didn't teach it to my dad or his siblings though, and within a generation we lost the language. It's my goal for 2022 to learn some Welsh, so please keep dusting it into your videos! I intend to also spend a lot of time learning about the history of Wales to inform me more about my Welsh ancestors, recent and ancient. Btw, my Welsh family is from Northern Wales, so I'm learning the Northern pronuncations for everything. Thank you again!
Hello! I'm the first comment. :) I loved visiting Wales while I lived in the UK. It captured my imagination.
This is actually helpful at just the right time! Been part of reenactment for 2 rears now, and as I'm Welsh I'm building a Welsh archer persona! Fab!
Very much enjoyed this video. Congratulations on being monetized, every little bit helps. I've read about the Welsh and now you've introduced some new reads. I have a problem with books I own probably too many. Anyway looking forward to the next video and you even entertained my new kitten as she settled down to watch as well.
Well then you and your kitten are most welcome! Glad to be further sparking the interest and shamelessly increasing the reading list
New subscriber here! I must say that I am so excited to see more of your content concerning Welsh historical topics. It's something I've done the tiniest bit of study on but isn't at all covered in American schools.
Thanks for your content and congratulations on being monetized!
Thank you, Angelique! I’ll keep doing some more of them in that case :)
I just want to let you know that you’re not the only one! I’ve had my fair share of urinating against the winds of ignorance that blows In the face of Welsh history. Your piece here was a breath of fresh air. Great stuff! I live in Caernarfon, probably the last stronghold of the Brythonic language the Saxons called Welsh. Needless to say that like the rest of Wales most of the Cymry here in Caernarfon know hardly nothing about their country’s own rich history. The winners write the history books - but you are putting that right Welsh Viking. Diolch! :-)
You are one of me favorite channels now stay well my friend. My re-enactments are 1750’s long hunter in TN and KY. Welsh made it here too.
Congratulations friend! I didn't realize you had reached monetization! How exciting. Keep up the great stuff. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge with us.
Thanks! And congrats on your Community tab!
You have so much cool information to share. Thanks so much! #74AndStillCurious!
Squeeeeee! Finally someone else working on early medieval Welsh kit that isn't defined by inferiority
Glad i stumbled into subscribing :) Looking forward to seeing more about it, or... finding it, if you've by now already done more on early medieval welsh.
Also relatedly, reenactorisms are so fun! doing my own research into primary sources after i shifted away from one group's ideas, led to so many weird realisations and moments of hang on why does literally nobody have those on their kit...? like dress hooks and wrist clasps.
Thanks for the video. From Sweden here, did not know much about Wales.
Congratulations on monetization!
Thank you for teaching. You make your ideas accessible. You give leads to sources. Thank you.
I am healing from a stroke. Accessible is important for folks like me.
I wish you wellness. I wish you every success in your studies.
Bless you for these videos.
That’s wonderful to hear, Karen, thank you so much for that lovely comment.
May your road to healing be short, smooth, and full of being waited on hand and foot by those around you.
Now that I’m catching up somewhat and going through your older videos I realize what amazing progress you made adding your music and cute thumbnails. I get to the end of these and miss the music!
Haha! Yeah, it's fun for me to see how much I've had to try to get my head around in a year and a bit. So many elements of editing still to master!
*adds Welsh to the loooong list of impressions that I'd like to do*
Also, all my knowledge of medieval Wales come from reading the Cadfael books which make Welsh culture seem so much more civilised that the English (Saxon or Norman hehehe).
Can I vote for a subtitled history video in Welsh?
Sure thing! I’ll work towards that :)
Oh, Cadfael is absolutely wonderful!
Thanks for my Monday morning education as usual!
Haha! You’re most welcome!
I’m binge-watching you this morning whilst I do some packing to move to Ceredigion. Everything you say resonates - diolch yn fawr iawn!
I saw that cranog on Time Team! Wales is fascinating. I never really knew anything until Time Tram and reading Ken Follett’s century trilogy. I’m also a devotee of Cerridwen and so have done research on my own. Excellent video! Thanks is for sharing your expertise!
Love Wales. Looking forward to going there again.
Hello from Finland! So happy to have found your channel. Am interested in Welsh medieval history. In sca.
Good stuff. I've been interested in later medieval Wales (12th and 13th century) for a long time, but had never really considered the early period. I'm happy to watch as much of this as you want to post.
Now that you've developed some embroidery skills, perhaps you should try that Llangorse Crannog design for the cuffs in your medieval Welsh tunic 😋
Then I will post a LOT.
Oh boy, I did one of the Llangorse lions. Took me three hours!
Enjoyed!
I play, or at least DID play(finances suck, particularly when you don’t have any lol) the harp, so as a part of that is an interest in the instrument, it’s history and the history of the cultures that prized it. In this case it’s the the Irish with your Turlough O’Carolans, and earlier still, the Welsh. Taliesin is a byeword for bard, a maker of tales and songs, a poet. Hywel the Good’s laws were a model for lawmakers in centuries long after his kingdom was gone. The Welsh were a vital culture just like all the other cultures in the British isles and I can understand your frustration, since I’ve always thought of the “Celtic” cultures as rather splendid, educated and advanced(for their era) and it surprises me that it’s not general knowledge....yes some people were poor, some were most definitely NOT, and EVERYone liked a bit ‘o bling to the degree that they could afford it.
This 👆This right here. This succinct summation of EVERYTHING about medieval Wales and her culture.
Interesting, enlightening, Thanks!
Congratulations on being monetised! You obviously put in a lot of work on your videos, so it's certainly well deserved.
As a bit of a history nerd, I love finding out about places and periods that were mostly glossed over in my history classes at school.
Thank you, it’s so lovely to have such appreciation and clear enjoyment shown for what I’m up to :)
The lost and forgotten stuff is always the most compelling. Weird that it’s not covered more.
@@TheWelshViking I'm probably a bit odd in enjoying the bits that my friends would find boring during history lessons at school, but I do love a really interesting, but often overlooked detail 😄
so fascinating!
Many thanks from a Welshman in Australia really good discussion
Just found your channel
Well done bachan 😁👍
Just discovered your videos ... fascinating, I was born in Angelsey my dads family were from Ireland x
It’s absolutely all right with me! And I feel the same way about the ads!
LOVE!! Thank you for the references - so excited! My stepfather’s family is from Wales and I feel so connected that I took a little Welsh in the one university in the US teaching Welsh at the time. We recently found a family gravestone (not medieval!) that was inscribed with a lovely long poem in the grand Welsh literary tradition. I think perhaps Tolkien modeled the hobbits after the modern “view” of the Welsh - cosy, comfort-loving and unpretentious but the stalwart heroes in the end! And they loved poems as well. I had hoped to attend Eisteddfod this year but alas, plague struck. Yay for Wales and the Welsh!
Oh, I hope you get to come and enjoy it soon! It’s a splendid celebration of modern Welsh culture. You certainly count as Welsh in my book, and I heartily encourage you to keep plugging gently away at dysgu’r hên iaith.
May I ask what the poem was? I’m a gravestone nerd, as you’ll know ;)
@@TheWelshViking I do plan on that! I read a hilarious book recently called "Some Sex and a Hill: or How to Learn Welsh in 3 Easy Pints." I thought I'd died and gone to heaven - a funny book about language learning! I'm such a geek! Very happy to hear the Eisteddfod is what it purports to be...so many "festivals" in the US are just a way to sell more gadgets. I am eager to go!
@@terriwilliams4938 That sounds like a fabulous book, and I think I’m going to hunt it down. Thank you!
Welsh Ambassador to the world 👏🏼 tell us more about your mysterious country. It is true that a lot is said and talked of the other countries in the UK but less of Wales.
I’ll admit that I knew Wales was a different entity for most of my life, but I definitely saw it as a subset culturally until about 2019. I definitely appreciate the new info here! Love that we still use the word bard, it really feels like a good solid word. Thank you for this, and roll those ads!!
Oh! Would you be willing to put in subtitles of the Welsh at the end? I’d love to see how it’s all spelled!
I’ll try to make that happen, Teela. I’m still learning how all the tech stuff works. Otherwise maybe I’ll do a highlight reel! 😆
Congrats! And thanks for considering your viewers when having ads.
Of course! They inconvenience you rather than me, and I want that inconvenience to be as minimal as poss
Best Welsh book I ever read was 'Buched Dewi'. Easier than modern Welsh, I found - being a 2nd language Welsh speaker.
WoW Now that I know where the word BARD comes from... I shall boldly proclaim it to anyone who will listen!!! Thanks for your rant. I have been going though all your videos and it is wonderful to see where your passions lie (lye?). I am always stoked to listen when folks are truly "into things". HELLS TO THE YES JIMMY! PREACH!