The Journey Through Wales and the Description of Wales (Penguin Classics)

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Live, North Wales (30 April 2011). "Arriva Trains Wales' Gerald of Wales premier service". North Wales Live. Following Richard’s sudden death in March 2020 the project plans have been revised to ensure that the project will continue in Richard’s memory. Professor Thomas Charles-Edwards, Emeritus fellow and former Professor of Celtic at Jesus College here in Oxford, will take over as Principal Investigator with Professor Paul Russell, Professor of Celtic in Cambridge University's Anglo-Saxon, Norse & Celtic department as Co-Investigator. Dr Jacob Currie is joining the Faculty to undertake the primary manuscript research, as well as the editing and translating of the texts. Chapter XI of Distinction III ( Topographia Hibernica, Of the incomparable skill of the Irish in playing upon musical instruments): The only thing to which I find that this people apply a commendable industry is playing upon musical instruments; in which they are incomparably more skilful than any other nation I have ever seen. For their modulation on these instruments, unlike that of the Britons to which I am accustomed, is not slow and harsh, but lively and rapid, while the harmony is both sweet and gay. It is astonishing that in so complex and rapid a movement of the fingers, the musical proportions can be preserved........ it must be remarked, however, that both Scotland and Wales strive to rival Ireland in the art of music...... [8] Indeed, his works betray a kind of horrified fascination with all things sexual which perhaps stemmed in part from his own priestly celibacy.

There is a statue, by Henry Poole of Gerald in City Hall, Cardiff, and he was included in the vote on 100 Welsh Heroes for his Descriptio Cambriae and Itinerarium Cambriae. His reputation in Ireland, due to his negative portrayal of the Irish, is much less friendly.Gerald of Wales (1146–1223) was a man with a busy career in church and court, whose prolific writings provide a vivid window on entangled Anglo-French, Anglo-Welsh, and Anglo-Irish interactions. Yet his works are currently mainly only accessible in the nineteenth-century Rolls Series without translations, which are of variable reliability, or in poor modern translations. This project will produce nine volumes of authoritative new editions with translation and commentary. These will be of huge value to historians, Celticists, and students of medieval Latin literature, and change how we think about Gerald and the world of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, as it will bring the person and his works into clearer focus and emphasise the importance of medieval Latin as a cross-disciplinary field.

Although Gerald is often hailed as something of a Welsh hero, “his feeling of ambivalence towards the native Welsh can be seen throughout his career and writings,” says Bailey. The Historical Works of Giraldus Cambrensis, containing The Topography of Ireland, and the History of the Conquest of Ireland, translated by Thomas Forester, and The Itinerary through Wales, and the Description of Wales, translated by Sir Richard Colt Hoare, 1905 Gerald of Wales, or Giraldus Cambrensis, was born at Manorbier in Pembrokshire in around 1146. His real name was Gerald de Barri, and he was of mixed Welsh and Norman ancestry. His father, William de Barry, was a leading Welsh nobleman. His uncle was Bishop of St. David's and he received a religious education. He became chaplain to King Henry II of England in 1184. He accompanied Prince John on his expedition to Ireland in 1184, which led to his first book, Topographia Hibernica (1188). In 1188 he accompanied the Archbishop of Canterbury, Baldwin of Exeter, on a tour of Wales recruiting for the Third Crusade, which led to him writing the Itinerarium Cambriae (1191) and the Descriptio Cambriae (1194). He died in about 1223.Edited by A. Joseph McMullen, Assistant Professor in Celtic Studies at Centenary University, and Georgia Henley,a Postdoctoral Fellow in TextTechnologies and Digital Humanities at Stanford University, this volume would be of particular interest to students and scholars of Medieval Latin and British history. Patriotic Welshman or arrogant agent of English imperialism – which more accurately sums up the true character of Gerald of Wales? One of the primary reasons we remember Gerald of Wales is for his journey through Wales with Archbishop Baldwin in 1188 AD, during the reign of King Henry II of England. On one hand, in his numerous writings, he spoke of the Welsh as evil, sinful, incestuous, and dishonest (and definitely didn’t have good things to say about the continuance of a Welsh law, separate from English law), but at the same time, he supported their continued quest for freedom from England. Over the centuries, the Welsh have had very few supporters in that regard. head of a grove of alders. Recalling to mind those poetical passages: Dolus an virtus quis in hoste requirat? and In 1189, meanwhile, he accompanied the Archbishop of Canterbury on a tour of Wales, exhorting Welsh and Normans alike to go on Crusade.

It is generally agreed today that his most distinguished works are those dealing with Wales and Ireland, with his two books on his beloved Wales the most important: Itinerarium Cambriae and Descriptio Cambriae which tell us much about Welsh history and geography and reflect on the cultural relationship between the Welsh and the English. Gerald, despite his desire for an independent Welsh Church and admiration for parts of Welsh life, was very loyal to Norman Marcher rule, regarding the Normans as more civilised than the Welsh, a feeling reflected in his writings. Professor Davies tells us that Gerald, whom he calls "an admirable story-teller", is the only source for some of the most famous of the Welsh folk tales including the declaration of the old man of Pencader to Henry II which concludes Descriptio Cambriae: Gerald became a royal clerk and chaplain to King Henry II of England in 1184, first acting as mediator between the crown and Prince Rhys ap Gruffydd. He was chosen to accompany one of the king's sons, John, in 1185 on John's first expedition to Ireland. This was the catalyst for his literary career; his work Topographia Hibernica (first circulated in manuscript in 1188, and revised at least four times) is an account of his journey to Ireland; Gerald always referred to it as his Topography, though "history" is the more accurate term. [2]That commitment was demonstrated by the fact that he was subsequently offered the bishoprics of Bangor and Llandaf, but turned them down because of his belief in the St David’s cause. Entitled Gerald of Wales: New Perspectives on a Medieval Writer and Critic, this broader view of his corpus brings to light new evidence for the rhetorical strategies that he employed, his political positioning, and his use of source material, in attesting to the breadth and depth of his work. His concern was that this would give the Welsh a standard around which to rally in defiance of English power. Gerald's writings in good quality Latin, based on a thorough knowledge of Classical authors, reflect experiences gained on his travels as well as his great knowledge of the standard authorities and he was highly respected as a scholar in his time and afterwards. The noted scholar Edward Augustus Freeman said he was "the father of comparative philology," and in the preface to the last volume of Gerald's works in the Rolls Series, h Gerald of Wales (c. 1146 – c. 1223), also known as Gerallt Gymro in Welsh or Giraldus Cambrensis in Latin, archdeacon of Brecon, was a medieval clergyman and chronicler of his times. Born around 1146 at Manorbier Castle in Pembrokeshire, Wales, he was of mixed Norman and Welsh blood, his name being Gerald de Barri. Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference