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In 1859, the historian Lord John Acton asserted: 'two great principles divide the world, and contend for the mastery, antiquity and the middle ages'. The influence on Victorian culture of the 'Middle Ages' (broadly understood then as the centuries between the Roman Empire and the Renaissance) was both pervasive and multi-faceted. This 'medievalism' led, for instance, to the rituals and ornament of the Medieval Catholic church being reintroduced to Anglicanism. It led to the Saxon Witan being celebrated as a prototypical representative parliament. It resulted in Viking raiders being acclaimed as the forefathers of the British navy. And it encouraged innumerable nineteenth-century men to cultivate the superlative beards we now think of as typically 'Victorian'—in an attempt to emulate their Anglo-Saxon forefathers. Different facets of medieval life, and different periods before the Renaissance, were utilized in nineteenth-century Britain for divergent political and cultural agendas. Medievalism also became a dominant mode in Victorian art and architecture, with 75 per cent of churches in England built on a Gothic rather than a classical model. And it was pervasive in a wide variety of literary forms, from translated sagas to pseudo-medieval devotional verse to triple-decker novels. Medievalism even transformed nineteenth-century domesticity: while only a minority added moats and portcullises to their homes, the medieval-style textiles produced by Morris and Co. decorated many affluent drawing rooms. The Oxford Handbook of Victorian Medievalism is the first work to examine in full the fascinating phenomenon of 'medievalism' in Victorian Britain. Covering art, architecture, religion, literature, politics, music, and social reform, the Handbook also surveys earlier forms of antiquarianism that established the groundwork for Victorian movements. In addition, this collection addresses the international context, by mapping the spread of medievalism across Europe, South America, and India, amongst other places.
This is the first volume to examine how the history of Wales was written in a period that saw the emergence of professional historiography, largely focused on the nation, across Europe and in the United States. It thus sets Wales in the context of recent work on national history writing in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and, more particularly, offers a Welsh perspective on the ways in which history was written in small, mainly stateless, nations. The comparative dimension is fundamental to the volume's aim, highlighting what was distinctive about Welsh historical writing and showing how the Welsh experience mirrors and illuminates broader historiographical developments. The book begins with an introduction that uses the concept of historical culture as a way of exploring the different strands of historiography covered in the collection, providing orientation to the chapters that follow. These are divided into four sections: 'Contexts and Backgrounds', 'Amateurs and Popularizers', 'Creating Academic Disciplines', and 'Comparative Perspectives'. All these themes are then drawn together in the conclusion to examine how far Welsh historians exemplify widespread trends in the writing of national history, and thereby point-up common themes that emerge from the volume and clarify its broader significance for students of historiography.
In the first detailed study of its kind, James Gregory's book takes a historical approach to mercy by focusing on widespread and varied discussions about the quality, virtue or feeling of mercy in the British world during Victoria's reign. Gregory covers an impressive range of themes from the gendered discourses of 'emotional' appeal surrounding Queen Victoria to the exercise and withholding of royal mercy in the wake of colonial rebellion throughout the British empire. Against the backdrop of major events and their historical significance, a masterful synthesis of rich source material is analysed, including visual depictions (paintings and cartoons in periodicals and popular literature) and literary ones (in sermons, novels, plays and poetry). Gregory's sophisticated analysis of the multiple meanings, uses and operations of royal mercy duly emphasise its significance as a major theme in British cultural history during the 'long 19th century'. This will be essential reading for those interested in the history of mercy, the history of gender, British social and cultural history and the legacy of Queen Victoria's reign.
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.
A “fascinating [and] unique exploration” of the mythological founder of Britain, divine ancestor of King Arthur, and symbol of British identity (Your Family History). Believed to be a great-great-great grandson of the Greek goddess Aphrodite, Brutus of Troy led a voyage from Greece to Britain. Landing at Totnes in Devon, it is said that Brutus overthrew the giants who lived there, laid the foundations of Oxford University and London, and sired a line of kings that includes King Arthur and the ancestors of the present Royal Family. Genealogist Anthony Adolph traces the legend of Brutus of Troy from the Roman times onwards, looking at his popularity, his mentions in fiction, and his place in mythology of some of London’s landmarks. Brutus’ story played a crucial role in royal propaganda and foreign policy. His tale also inspired poets and playwrights including Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton, Pope, Wordworth, Dickens, and Blake. Brutus of Troy delves into how the myth shaped Britain’s identity and gave the nation a place in Classical mythologies and the Bible.
This is the first intellectual biography of John Edward Lloyd (1861–1947), widely regarded as the founder of the modern academic study of Welsh history. Indeed, the compliment that pleased him most was that he had ‘created Welsh history’. Published to mark the centenary of Lloyd’s most important book, A History of Wales from the Earliest Times to the Edwardian Conquest (1911), the study reassesses Lloyd’s significance by setting his work in its multiple contexts. Part One gives an account of his life, with particular emphasis on his upbringing, education and subsequent career as a historian, viewed against the background both of efforts to give expression to Welsh nationhood through educational institutions and of wider developments in the professionalization of historical scholarship. In Part Two the focus shifts from the biographical to the thematic and examines why Lloyd privileged the early and medieval Welsh past and how he depicted this in his 1911 History. These chapters investigate key themes in Lloyd’s interpretation with reference not only to previous accounts of Welsh history but also to the broader intellectual and scholarly context of his own time. Through its reappraisal of Lloyd the book provides a case study of how the past of a small, stateless nation was reconfigured, at a time of self-conscious national revival, through deploying modern canons of scholarship that served to legitimize a new narrative of national origins. It thus offers a fresh and distinctive perspective on issues of broad significance in modern European historiography and intellectual history.