Society

America discovered by Welsh 300 years before columbus

Society / By

As is well known by our American cousins Prince Madog ap Owain Gwynedd heir of Owain discovered America around the year 1200 some 300 years before Columbus and founded a colony near to Alabama (although the exact location of the earlier settlements is in dispute some claiming Tennessee a more likely location). Recent radio carbon dating evidence, and the discovery of ancient Welsh style artefacts (clogs and a leak peeler) and inscriptions in the American Midwest have provided proof positive that Welsh explorers, under the leadership of Prince Madog ap Owain (sometimes put as ‘ap Meurig’ due to name confusion) set up colonies there. There is actually a dispute over when exactly Prince Madoc sailed to America. some claiming that this was much earlier around 562 AD just after the Romans got fed up with the continuous rain in Wales up-sticks and left. This claim however does not stand up to scrutiny as it is known that Prince Madog was one of 19 children of Owain Gwyneth (the first true Prince of Wales) ‘the Randy’ who was an historical figure dating from the 12 century. A Welsh poem of the 15th century tells how Prince Madog sailed away in 10 ships and discovered America and whether truth or myth, was used by Queen Elizabeth I as evidence to the British claim to America during its territorial struggles with Spain. So there you have it the first link in the long history of the Welsh in America.

coracles
Old picture of coracles used in Wales
Mandan_Bull_Boats_and_Lodges-_George_Catlin
Bull boats used by first nation people based on coracles

I could say a lot more about the discovery (but you won’t because I am already fed up ed.) but I will sign off with some fascinating facts:

  • By proportion Welsh surnames dominate in eastern states (source National Geographic).
  • There have been at least 10 American presidents with Welsh ancestry (Mitt Romney the 11th!!). Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Abraham Lincoln, John Adams, John Quincy Adams, James Garfield, Calvin Coolidge, Richard Nixon and Barack Obama.
  • Jefferson Davies the Confederate President (good Welsh name there).
  • Robert E. Lee – Confederate General
  • Benedict Arnold – Revolution general who defected from the Americans to the British side (oops!)
  • Signers of the declaration of independence: William Floyd, Button Gwinnett, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris and Robert Morris.

And last of all over 10,000 pages of memoires were written in Welsh that survive today from the American Civil War.

Just a little knowledge bomb to lay on you; the Welsh patronymic system describes family trees in terms of the male line and records the family association in the ‘ap’ or ‘ab’ prefix (ap is a contraction of the Welsh word ‘mab’, which means ‘son of’, ‘ferch’ means ‘daughter of’ incidentally) so Madog ap Owain means Madog son of Owain. Often a small epithet to the name like Llewellyn ‘the last’ (the last true Prince of Wales) is also used and so in a more contemporary context we might regard the real name of Mitt Romney (as he claims Welsh heritage via his wife) as Mitt Romney ap George the Gaff Prone in celebration of his recent gaff that the UK was not prepared for the Olympics (which is probably true actually).

For more information about the Welsh in America visit : http://www.alabamawelsh.com/ and if your interested in signing the petition to restore a monument to the great prince go here:

http://www.petitiononline.com/AWA0987/petition.html

Prince Charles treats us to more nonsense

royalty moans, Society / By

The Deathly GM Crops and The Half-Wit Prince (Book 8)

Most of the time I regard Prince Charles as an amiable affable buffoon who talks a peculiar brand of new age sentiment and claptrap and dresses in a quaint Scottish (kilt commando style) way so beloved by our American friends across the water or who swans down the racecourse in top hat waving to the assembled masses on the rails. This erstwhile Edwardian who I think at heart harks back to those times when obedient yokels tilled the fields from dawn to dusk and tipped a respectful forelock in his ‘ighness’ direction as he swept by in his carriage to the big house (god bless yer guv) and people knew their place and the beautiful class structure of the realm stood in all its glory whilst he sat at the top of the pile as king (eh not yet the Queen is still very much hanging on ed.) with his subjects arraigned about him.

Now on the subject of GM crops (and about time too!!) HH has actually managed to hit a few (very few) good points but what surprised me about this whole issue was that a national newspaper gave his non-scientific bar room opinions front page coverage. I was actually about to buy a copy of the Telegraph to peruse on the train when I saw he was the lead for the day – this forced me to buy the broadsheet version of the Socialist Tribune (the Guardian) as a substitute so dear readers you can guess this was a serious setback.

As always I am interested in the purpose of these things and not in the content per se for if I want to hear some claptrap I can always talk to my pocket memo for five minutes then play it back. The point it seemed to me was to position Charles as next ruler and restate the inevitability of a continuation of the stultifying class structure we have in this country with the Windsor’s at its head. Demonstrating that he has thoughtful and erudite opinions (ok that didn’t work ed.) and in an unquestioning way accept and parade his views before the public. Also the writer sprinkled the article with discourses of justification of why this was an important piece due to the role HH would play as future monarch etc etc – not questioning the reasoning behind this rationalisation at all.

Often it is refreshing for the basis behind some scientific advances to be critically reviewed as to their consequences and costs – the debate about cloning being an example where there is not much understanding so very little control. GM crops are a potential benefit to society as a whole at least in the third world where they don’t have the luxury of choosing ‘organic’ or otherwise as we do in comfortable wet UK – and drought resistant strains of wheat may indeed be a breakthrough for them – and of course there are always the agribusiness monopolies wanting to maximise their profits which should be monitored. So there is a basis for debate which is underway but these more thoughtful insights do not get airtime or the grounds of critical debate are undercut by poorly informed half understood issues expounded for purposes of publicity and positioning of a future king.

Royston

Snippet from the Web

Lord Robert Winston, Imperial’s famously moustachioed professor of fertility studies seems to have got himself in a trouble over his comments relating to critics of GM technology.
In a speech at Whittington Hospital (somewhere in North London, apparently) a while back, the celebrity ICSM Prof spoke out against those who criticise any kind of genetic manipulation, saying that many protests were “ill-advised”. He was particularly forthright on Prince Charles, whom he called one of “the most genetically modified people around”.

Return the Bardsey Crown

5 Comments / Wales / By

The Bardsey Crown to Return to the land of Merlin

The Bardsey Crown to Return to the land of Merlin

No doubt everyone is watching with great interest the attempts by the Bardsey inhabitants (all ten of them) to have the Bardsey island Crown returned to its rightful place in Wales.
The Island is a god forsaken lump of rock off the Llyn Penninsula in the North of Wales once inhabited by Monks in a colony established there in the 6th Century by one Saint Cadfan. – and as an interesting side note is the imputed last resting place of Merlin – further emphasizing that the whole Arthurian legend is based on the Welsh Princes fighting off those pesky Anglo Saxons.

For many years, the Island had formed part of the estates of the Newborough Family of Glynllifon near Caernarfon who cheered up the locals by crowning the oldest male on the island as King – to be called Brenin Enlli (King of Bardsey). The coronation celebrations being the only known official example in the UK where the Queen of Bardsey was also heir presumptive to the Crown and the entire congregation were either cousins, brothers and sisters. The actual Crown is kept at the Maritime Museum in Liverpool who acquired it when the maritime collection of the Newboroughies was flogged off around the 1980’s for four pence halfpenny and a route map out of Wales – and there in lies the conundrum – those nasty English Liverpudlians are hanging on to it and not inclined to repatriate this artefact of past Welsh glory to its homeland.

The symbolism of the crown goes well beyond the tatty tin and brass it is made of and now assumes the role of an icon and memorial to those former Welsh Princes who went down gloriously in defeat at the hands of the invading Angles; from those at the dawn of time, to Lywelyn ap Iorwerth, Dafydd ap Lywelyn, Lywelyn ap Gruffudd (the Last) to Owain Glyndwr – this latter prince was the last real Welsh prince when the principality was lost by conquest at or around 1415.

Since the time of the Welsh Princes we have been fobbed off with a motley collection of loser princes and elder sons of Kings of England from Edward Blackadder of Caernarfon to the latest incarnation Prince Charles ap Windsor the Halfwit. This Prince whose only known attempts at Welsh are ‘ble ydy ‘r doiled’, and ‘ca ‘m oddi hon dduw adawedig chyflea’ – which roughly translated means ‘where are the toilets’ and ‘get me out of this god forsaken place’ which shows his commitment to the job.

I support any initiative that repatriates ethnic aboriginal art and artefacts to their rightful place – and the Bardsey Crown is right up there with the Elgin Marbles and the African Art pillaged from their rightful owners over the centuries. A suitable place for its final resting place must surely on the mantle piece in the gallery shop at the Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw at Llanbedrog near Pwllheli where for a suitable fee visitors will be able to eat their welsh rarebit whilst reliving the days of yore by wearing the crown.

As a point of interest for our American cousins it may not be well known that Prince Madog ab Owain heir of Owain discovered America around the year 1200 and founded a colony near to Alabama. For more information about the welsh in Alabama visit : http://www.alabamawelsh.com/ and if your interested in signing the petition to restore a monument to the great prince go here:
http://www.petitiononline.com/AWA0987/petition.html

Above is a nice Picture of one of the ‘Brenin Enlli’ His Royal Highness John Williams taken around 1920.

Cheers

Royston