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HISTORY

OF

WALES,

DESCRIPTIVE OF

THE GOVERNMENT, WARS, MANNERS, RELIGION, LAWS,
DRUIDS, BARDS, PEDIGREES, AND LANGUAGE

OF THE

ANCIENT BRITONS and MODERN WELSH,

AND OF THE

Remaining Antiquities

OF THE

PRINCIPALITY.

BY JOHN JONES, LL.D.

AND BARRISTER AT LAW.

LONDON:

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY J. WILLIAMS,

SHIP PLACE, STRAND;

NEAR TEMPLE BAR.

1824

[graphic][subsumed]

PREFACE.

THE writer of the following pages has been induced to send to press this Publication, from the frequent observations of men of letters, that the History of the Ancient Britons is a desideratum in literature.

Several authors, both natives and English, have treated on this subject; but their labours, collectively, have not produced a consistent detail of events, and a faithful description of manners and customs.

The native writers have, from Gildas down to Roberts, made it their study to trace the Britons from some Asiatic origin, and to represent them as a highly refined and scientific people. By this false assumption they have degraded the character of the Welsh people, and impressed on the minds of the sons of Cambria the disconsolate tradition, that they are uncultivated descendants from the greatest conquerors, statesmen, and philosophers, that ever flourished among mankind.

The English authors, who have written on the History of Cambria, have been incompetent, from their deficiency in the language of the country. The last historian, Mr. Warrington, laboured under this difficulty.

Mr. Warrington must be acknowledged as a person of elevated mind, and a fine writer: but he is injudicious; for in describing the skirmishes of petty chiefs he bears in his mind enlarged conceptions, better adapted to the

battles of Alexander, Tamerlane, and Charles: and he perpetually falls into unpardonable anachronisms; for instance, he quotes the laws of Howel the Good two centuries before they were enacted, and he gives the manners and customs of the Welsh, from Giraldus Cambrensis, many years before that Author was born.

There are, however, several Englishmen who deserve Cambrian gratitude, for detached contributions towards the History of Wales: and the Author feels pleasure, that the Literature and Antiquities of his country have exercised the pens of Mr. Cox, Mr. Sharon Turner, Sir Richard Colt Hoare, bart., and Dr. Meyrick.

The present History has been compiled from the works of all preceding writers on the subject, with an avowed freedom of selecting whatever appeared most consistent with the well received testimonies of contemporary nations. The introducing of monuments, as historical documents, is a novelty in the History of Wales; but it is presumed will meet with the sanction of learned men, and give a permanent value to inscribed stones, which have, for ages, been considered as unintelligible and useless

The application of these documents requires great circumspection, because several ancient monuments having been removed from their original places have lost their significations by a change of locality. There is a stone in the wall of Dinevor Park, with the letters IMP CASSIANO: it was carried to this place by some Vandal from Trecastle Hill, where it was found in

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