history
Hanesion coll
Yn ôl adroddiad yn Golwg yr wythnos ddiwethaf, mae ymchwilydd yn honni fod haneswyr wedi llwyr anghofio am un o ddiwydiannau mawr Cymru, mwyngloddio am blwm ac arian yn y Canolbarth. Ac mae’n ymddangos bod Ioan Lord hefyd yn cyhuddo prifysgolion yng Nghymru o beidio â rhoi cyfle i fyfyrwyr astudio hanes diwydiannol y wlad […]
Poets and rebels at Llyn Llech Owain
At the ‘six ways’ junction in Gorslas, at the head of the Gwendraeth Fawr, I’ve driven past the sign to Llyn Llech Owain hundreds of times without ever taking up its invitation – to follow the minor road up the hill, past the church and chapel, to the lake and the country park that surrounds […]
The memory of Sir Thomas Picton
One of the many noxious elements making up the miasma of Brexiter thinking is exceptionalism. The idea that Britain is naturally superior to other countries, and that it is strong enough to stand alone against every foe, has deep roots – much deeper than the Battle of Britain, so often trundled out by politicians. If […]
Offa a’r Cymry
Offa, brenin Mercia, a fu farw yn y flwyddyn 796, yw’r unig frenin Eingl-sacsonaidd y mae ei enw yn rhan o fyd ieithyddol Cymru. A hynny am un rheswm yn unig, oherwydd ei gysylltiad â ‘Chlawdd Offa’. Gan ein bod ni ar fin taclo’r Clawdd ar droed, neu o leiaf y rhan ddeheuol ohono, meddyliais […]
Abaty Cymer, abaty dirgel
Faint o weithiau dych chi’n gyrru’n gyflym ar hyd yr A470 o Lanelltud tua Dolgellau, gan anwybyddu’r lôn fach i’r chwith, yn syth ar ôl croesi afon Mawddach, sy’n arwain at Abaty Cymer? Y dydd o’r blaen ymwelais â’r Abaty am y tro cyntaf. O’r maes parcio, tro bach yw e lawr i’r afon, a’r […]
Edward Thomas in Swansea
Killed by a shell, a year short of his fortieth birthday, on 9 April 1917, at the start of the Battle of Arras, after seventeen years as a prose writer and a mere two years as one of the twentieth century’s finest poets. The bare facts of Edward Thomas’s life conceal a complex character and […]
The Sicilian Expedition: a second Brexit footnote
After the 2016 Brexit referendum I suggested that the historian Thucydides, in the fifth century BC, can help us to understand how democracies have the capacity to change their decisions on major policies – and both the capacity and the duty to do so when those decisions are clearly, in retrospect, unwise or disastrous. A […]
Dilyn Iolo
Bore mwyn, di-haul o Ionawr, a dyma bedwar ohonon ni’n cychwyn ar Daith Gerdded Treftadaeth Iolo Morganwg. Taith gylchol o ryw bedair milltir a hanner yw hon, un o gyfres o deithiau cerdded wedi’u dyfeisio gan Gyngor Bro Morgannwg, gyda help Valeways, Ramblers Bro Morgannwg a’r Undeb Ewropeaidd (cofio hwnnw?). Taith berffaith ar gyfer canol […]
Allies against slavery: Ignatius Sancho and Laurence Sterne
Ignatius Sancho was one of the most prominent black Britons of the eighteenth century – and without doubt the most multi-talented. Born in Africa, according to his own account (or on board ship, according to his biographer, Joseph Jekyll), he was shipped across the Atlantic to be a slave in the Spanish colony of New […]
Sir John Perrot: two faces of a ruffian
One of the images included in Wales in 100 objects is a small oil painting by an unknown artist, now in Haverfordwest Town Museum, of the Elizabethan magnate Sir John Perrot. I chose this particular portrait, painted long after Perrot’s death, because it shows its subject as a jaunty, stylish and dashing character, whereas in […]