Llywelyn ap Gruffudd: Prince of Wales is an outstanding work by an author with a perceptive understanding of the complexities of his subject. It is clearly, sometimes passionately, written and is destined to be the definitive work on this matter for many generations. This is the first full-length English-language study of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd (c. 1225-1282), prince of Wales. In this scholarly and lucid book J. Beverley Smith offers an in-depth assessment not only of Llywelyn, but of the age in which he lived. The author takes thirteenth-century Wales as a backdrop against which he analyses the relationship between a sense of nationhood and the practical realities of creating a structure to embrace a unified principality of Wales held under the aegis of the English Crown. This examination of the triumphs and subsequent reverses of a ruler of exceptional vision and vigour is a substantial contribution to our understanding of the nature of Welsh politics and the complexities of Anglo-Welsh relations.

Gruffudd ap Llywelyn was Wales' greatest king. Ambitious and battle-sure, he succeeded in doing what no Welsh king before him was capable of: he ruled all Wales as a united and independent state. He went further by turning the Viking threat to his realm into a powerful weapon and conquering border land that had been in English hands for centuries. Having emerged as a war leader, Gruffudd also proved to be much more: a patron of the arts and church, with the trappings of a king who was respected and feared on the European stage. His eventual murder at the hands of his own men narrowed the country's political ambitions and left Wales in chaos on the eve of the arrival of the Normans. Those who betrayed Gruffudd were the forebears of the famous princes who would dominate Wales until the Edwardian Conquest, meaning that the former king left no one to tell of his glory. As a result, 1,000 years after his birth, the would-be nation builder is all but forgotten. Here, Sean and Michael Davies reveal the king in all his glory, telling for the first time the story of one of Wales' greatest figures and exploring the full implications of Gruffudd's rule. For, without Gruffudd, the fate of King Harold and the outcome of the Battle of Hastings would have been very different...

'Cronica Walliae' is the earliest and largest extant work of antiquary and map-maker, Humphrey Llwyd. Completed in 1559, it is a translation into English of an account of the lives and acts of the kings and princes of Wales from Cadwaladr to Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, the last native Welsh prince.

The late 13th century witnessed the conquest of Wales after two hundred years of conflict between Welsh princes and the English crown. In 1282 Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, the only native Prince of Wales to be formally acknowledged by a King of England, was slain by English forces. His brother Dafydd continued the fight, but was eventually captured and executed. Further revolts followed under Rhys ap Maredudd, a former crown ally, and Madog ap Llywelyn, a kinsman of the defeated lords of Gwynedd. The Welsh wars were a massive undertaking for the crown, and required the mobilization of all resources. Edward’s willingness to direct the combined power of the English state and church against the Prince of Wales, to an unprecedented degree, resulted in a victory that had eluded all of his predecessors. This latest study of the Welsh wars of Edward I will draw upon recently translated archive material, allowing a fresh insight into military and political events. Edward’s personal relationship with Welsh leaders is also reconsidered. Traditionally, the conquest is dated to the fall of Llywelyn in December 1282, but this book will argue that Edward was not truly the master of Wales until 1294. In the years between those two dates he broke the power of the great Marcher lords and crushed two further large-scale revolts against crown authority. After 1294 he was able to exploit Welsh manpower on a massive scale. His successors followed the same policy during the Scottish wars and the Hundred Years War. Edward enjoyed considerable support among the ‘uchelwyr’ or Welsh gentry class, many of whom served him as diplomats and spies as well as military captains. This aspect of the king’s complex relationship with the Welsh will also feature.

Down the centuries, poets have provided Wales with a window onto its own distinctive world. This book gives a sense of the view seen through that special window in twelve illustrated poems, each bringing very different periods and aspects of the Welsh past into focus. Together, they give the flavour of a poetic tradition, both ancient and modern, in the Welsh language and in English, that is internationally renowned for its distinction and continuing vibrancy.

Llywelyn ap Gruffudd's life and death confronts us with a puzzling contradiction - he was the only Welsh leader to be officially recognised by the English as Prince of Wales, yet, within a year of his death, Wales lay crushed beneath the iron heel of the rapacious English. Llywelyn narrates the brutal history of his attempt to free Wales from English hegemony. It is a tale full of battles and beseiged castles; patriotism and treachery; triumphs and defeats; all leading to ultimate disaster and despair.

Based on the most recent historical research and current debates about Wales and Welshness, this volume offers the most up-to-date, authoritative and accessible account of the period from Neanderthal times to the opening of the Senedd, the new home of the National Assembly for Wales, in 2006. Within a remarkably brief and stimulating compass, Geraint H. Jenkins explores the emergence of Wales as a nation, its changing identities and values, and the transformations its people experienced and survived throughout the centuries. In the face of seemingly overwhelming odds, the Welsh never reconciled themselves to political, social and cultural subordination, and developed ingenious ways of maintaining a distinctive sense of their otherness. The book ends with the coming of political devolution and the emergence of a greater measure of cultural pluralism. Professor Jenkins's lavishly illustrated volume provides enthralling material for scholars, students, general readers, and travellers to Wales.

The author produces revealing pictures of the leading Welsh kings & princes of the day & explores their contribution to Welsh history & their impaction the wider world:

The first ever full-scale biography of the last native Prince of Wales who fought to maintain an independent Wales.

A novel set in the period of the reign of Gruffudd ap Llywelyn (1039-63), a violent, determined man who became the undisputed king of all Wales. The story follows the life of Elen who, against her will, becomes embroiled with that of this most powerful of Welsh kings at his capital in Rhuddlan.