Wales

"The people of Snowdon assert that even if their prince should give seisin of them to the king, they themselves would refuse to do homage to any foreigner, of whose language, customs and laws they were thoroughly ignorant."

"Nec alia, ut arbitror, gens quam haec Kambrica, aliave lingua, in die districti examinis coram Judice supremo, quicquid de ampliori contingat, pro hoc terrarum angulo respondebit."

"[Y]ours is an ancient language, and the language is connected with an ancient history, and it is connected with an ancient music and with an ancient literature... [Y]our laudable and patriotic efforts will come to be more and more understood and regarded by the English people at large, and that prosperity and honour will attend the meetings by which you endeavour to preserve and to commemorate the ancient history, the ancient deeds, and the ancient literature of your country, the Principality of Wales."

"I affirm that Welsh nationality is as great a reality as English nationality. It may not be as big a reality in that it does not extend over so large a country, but with the traditions and history of Wales, with the language of Wales (hear, hear), with the religion of Wales (cheers), with the feelings of Wales, I maintain that the Welsh nationality is as true as the nationality of Scotland, to which by blood I exclusively belong."

"The Welsh made a very good and a very hard fight against the English in self-defence, and what was the consequence? That the English were obliged to surround your territory with great castles; and the effect of this has been that, as far as I can reckon, more by far than one-half of the great remains of the castles in the whole island south of the Tweed are castles that surround Wales. That shows that Wales was inhabited by men, and by men who valued and were disposed to struggle for their liberties."

"On the other edge of Europe, in the countryside of Wales, another formidable weapon against men and horses was being perfected. The English kings began to appreciate the possibilities of the Welsh longbow in their twelfth-century wars in Wales when Welsh archers with six-foot bows, taller than they were, fired arrows that could go through layers of chain mail, wooden saddles and flesh. In 1346, during the Hundred Years War between the French and the English, Edward III brought his Welsh archers to France. At Crécy a much weaker English force turned to fight the pursuing French. The French had three times as many mounted soldiers, considered the finest cavalry in Europe, 6,000 Genoese crossbowmen and 20,000 foot soldiers against 5,000. The English, however, had 11,000 archers armed with longbows. The Genoese fired first but did not inflict much damage on the English army. As the Genoese scrambled to reload, French knights, impatient for glory, started to trample them from behind, while the English archers launched a devastating fire. As one witness said, ‘Every arrow told on horse or man, piercing head, or arm, or leg among the riders and sending the horses mad.’ The French knights charged again and again, while the Welsh archers steadily reloaded and fired. By nightfall the ground was covered with dead and dying horses and men. The French lost over 1,500 knights and 10,000 who were ‘not of gentle blood’. The English losses were two knights, forty ‘others’ and some ‘few dozen’ Welsh. The unchallenged dominance of knights on the battlefield started to die there too."

"The land of my fathers. My fathers can have it."

"Years and years and years ago, when I was a boy, when there were wolves in Wales, and birds the colour of red-flannel petticoats whisked past the harp-shaped hills, when we sang and wallowed all night and day in caves that smelt like Sunday afternoons in damp front farmhouse parlours, and we chased, with the jawbones of deacons, the English and the bears, before the motor car, before the wheel, before the duchess-faced horse, when we rode the daft and happy hills bareback, it snowed and it snowed."

"There are still parts of Wales where the only concession to gaiety is a striped shroud."

"All right, I was Welsh. Does it matter? I spoke a tongue that was passed on To me in the place I happened to be, A place huddled between grey walls Of cloud for at least half the year. My word for heaven was not yours. The word for hell had a sharp edge Put on it by the hand of the wind Honing, honing with a shrill sound Day and night. Nothing that Glyn Dwr Knew was armour against the rain's Missiles. What was descent from him?"

"Even God had a Welsh name: He spoke to him in the old language; He was to have a peculiar care For the Welsh people. History showed us He was too big to be nailed to the wall Of a stone chapel, yet still we crammed him Between the boards of a black book."

"You are Welsh, they said; Speak to us so; keep your fields free Of the smell of petrol, the loud roar Of hot tractors; we must have peace And quietness."

"A wnelir liw nos a welir liw dydd."

"Adar o'r unlliw, ehedant i'r unlle."

"Adfyd a ddwg wybodaeth, a gwybodaeth ddoethineb."

"Carreg a dreigla, ni fwsoga."

"Cyfaill cywir mewn ing y'i gwelir."

"Cynt y cyferfydd dau ddyn na dau fynydd."

"Dyfal donc y dyr y garreg."

"Dysgu i gi bach gachu."

"Fel y bo'r dyn y bydd ei lwdn."

"Fel y fam fel y ferch."

"Gwna dda dros ddrwg, uffern ni'th ddwg."

"I mewn drwy un glust ac allan drwy'r llall."

"Llon llygod lle ni bo cath."

"Mwyaf y brys, mwyaf y rhwystr."

"Mae brenin a tyrchoed a iddew bwyd"

"Ni all neb wasanaethu dau arglwydd."

"Nid aur yw popeth melyn."

"Nid oes neb mor droednoeth â phlant y crydd."

"Rhaid cropian cyn cerdded."

"Y sawl na weithied na fwytaed."

"Revolted Mortimer! He never did fall off, my sovereign liege, But by the chance of war; to prove that true Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds, Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank, In single opposition, hand to hand, He did confound the best part of an hour In changing hardiment with great Glendower: Three times they breathed and three times did they drink, Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood; Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks, Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds, And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank, Bloodstained with these valiant combatants. Never did base and rotten policy Colour her working with such deadly wounds; Nor could the noble Mortimer Receive so many, and all willingly: Then let not him be slander'd with revolt."

"There is a gentle nymph not far from hence, That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn stream. Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure; Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine, That had the sceptre from his father Brute. She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit Of her enragèd step-dame Guendolen, Commended her fair innocence to the flood, That stayed her flight with his cross-flowing course. The water-nymphs, that in the bottom played, Held up their pearlèd wrists and took her in, Bearing her straight to aged Nereus’ hall; Who, piteous of her woes, reared her lank head, And gave her to his daughters to imbathe In nectared lavers, strewed with asphodel: And through the porch and inlet of each sense Dropped in ambrosial oils, till she revived, And underwent a quick immortal change, Made goddess of the river."

"The Danube to the Severn gave The darken’d heart that beat no more; They laid him by the pleasant shore, And in the hearing of the wave.There twice a day the Severn fills; The salt sea-water passes by, And hushes half the babbling Wye, And makes a silence in the hills.The Wye is hush’d nor moved along, And hush’d my deepest grief of all, When fill’d with tears that cannot fall, I brim with sorrow drowning song.The tide flows down, the wave again Is vocal in its wooded walls; My deeper anguish also falls, And I can speak a little then."

"From Clee to heaven the beacon burns, The shires have seen it plain, From north and south the sign returns And beacons burn again. * * * * * It dawns in Asia, tombstones show And Shropshire names are read; And the Nile spills his overflow Beside the Severn's dead."

"High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam Islanded in Severn stream; The bridges from the steepled crest Cross the water east and west."

"The men that live in West England They see the Severn strong, A-rolling on rough water brown Light aspen leaves along. They have the secret of the Rocks, And the oldest kind of song."

"Though it appear a little out of fashion, There is much care and valour in this Welshman."

"Lady Percy: Lie still, ye thief, and hear the lady sing in Welsh. Hotspur: I had rather hear Lady, my brach, howl in Irish."