eyes. Soon after they took and imprisoned the father himself, who recovered his liberty through his blind son Hywel. In 1197 the plague raged in Wales, and this restless' chieftain perished in it, and was buried at St. David's. By his wife Gwenllïan, the daughter of Madog ab Maredudd, Lord of Bromfield, he had four sons and two daughters. He was succeeded by his elder son, Gruffudd. The first I learn of him is in an English prison, whither he had been sent by his wicked brother, Maelgwyn, and his brother-in-law, Gwenwynwyn. He was released by the English Justiciary, Fitzpeter, who assisted him also in their defeat. Gruffudd died in 1202 on St. James's Day, and was buried at Ustradflur. He was succeeded by his elder son Rhys. Rhys died in 1222, being, says Powel, "a lusty gentleman. His inheritance was divided between his brother, 'Hi motus animorum atque hæc certamina tanta, 'Pulveris exigui jactu, compressa quiescent. "Rhys was the eldest of six towardly sons, that his father, Gruffudd, had by Gwenllian, the fair daughter of Gruffudd ab Cynan, Prince of North Wales; and he, surviving them all, obtained the dominion of South Wales, which he well and worthily ruled. *-Panton Papers. *Spes Patriæ, columen pacis, lux urbis et orbis; Owain, and his uncle, Maelgwyn. A.D. Owain married Angharad, daughter of Maredudd ab Robert, Lord of Kedewain, and left two sons, Llywelyn and Maredudd: Of the elder I learn nothing, but that he left a son, Thomas. Maredudd, the younger brother of Llywelyn, was better known, and, says Powel, "this year died 1268. Maredudd ab Owain, the defender of South Wales." Thomas married the daughter and heiress of Philip, Lord of Iscoed, and by her had a daughter, Elen, who married Gruffudd Fychan, Lord of Glyndyfrdwy, and by him was mother to our great Glyndŵr. I find but five descendent families from this Tribe; Wynn of Dôl-Bachog," Owen of Cefn-Hafod, Lloyd of Plâs-uwch Clawd, Evans of Tre-Castell, and Jones of Haim. "Of the Dól-Bachog family I can trace nothing. Of Cefn-Hafod I am equally ignorant, as of the Lloyds of Plâs-uwch Clawd near Rhiwabon, and Jones of Haim. But there is a place called Haim wood, near the junction of the Severn ard Vernew. Mr. Evans of Towyn is of the Tre-Castell family. A.D. BLEDDYN AB CYNFYN. BLEDDYN AB CYNFYN ranks the third Royal Tribe. He had a title to Powys in female succession from his great grandmother, Angharad; but his crown of North Wales, was usurpation, in common at first with his brother, Rhiwallon, who fell four years after in the 1068. battle of Mechain; and the whole was then his own. From his Father, Cynfyn ab Gwerystan, he had no claims; by his mother, the daughter and heiress of Maredudd ab Owain, Prince of South Wales, he was half brother to Gruffudd ab Llywelyn ab Seisyllt, the preceding Prince of North Wales,' who was himself an usurper also; moreover on the death of Owain ab Angharad was the grandaughter and heiress of Merfyn, the third son of Roderic the Great, in whose favor his father gavelled off the Principality of Powys, which comprehended Montgomeryshire, parts of Shropshire, and parts of the present Counties of Brecknock, Denbigh, and Radnor. This warlike Prince was put to death by his own subjects, and his head sent to Harold, who commanded the armies of the Confessor Edward with success against our countrymen. Harold brought Gruffudd's widow out of Wales, and married her; she was sister to the powerful Saxon Earls, Edwyn and Morcar, the sons of Algar, and grandsons of Leofric, Earl of Mercia; which latter led an army against Swane, King of Denmark in 1003, and died in 1057, being the husband of the famous Godina, who freed Coventry from an heavy tax, and gave rise to the well-known story of Peeping Tom. Edwyn, Bleddyn accumulated the sovereignty of South Wales, again uniting the whole dominion of his maternal ancestor Roderic; and like him gavelling his lawful inheritance, he divided Powys between his sons Maredudd, and Cadwgan. It remained not long separate, but was reunited in Maredudd on the murder of his brother Cadwgan, (a superior person of that time, whom Camden calls "the renowned Briton,") by their nephew Madog, the son of Ririd, the fifth son of Bleddyn ab Cynfyn; and the extinction of his nephews the sons of Cadwgan, by Maredudd himself. The story of our country under its native Princes is a wretched calendar of crimes; of usurpations, and family assassinations; and in this dismal detail we should believe ourselves rather on the shores of the Bosphorus, (things oddly coincident") than the banks of the Dee. The Celts or Gauls were descended from Gomer, the eldest son of Japhet, who was the eldest son of Noah, and from the Provinces of the Upper Asia they migrated to the countries on the Lake Meotis, on the North side the Euxine Sea; and, as they were called Cimmerians in Asia, so they communicated their name to that famous Strait, which has been since called Cimbrian or Cimmerian Bosphorus. Here they had not M Our Law of distribution the custom of gavelkind,' had the same ill effect, applied to the succession as the freedom of the State; it balanced the power and raised the competition of the younger branches against the elder; a Theban war of Welsh brethren ending in family blood, and national destruction. Nor was the elder more continued long, when the increase of their progeny made it necessary to penetrate farther into the country, and, as it is supposed they fell down the Danube, along whose banks they encamped, as their manner of life was, for the convenience of their cattle; and so shaping their course Westward, entered Germany, from whence they advanced into France; for the Inhabitants of France, as Josephus tells us, were anciently called Gomerites, as being descended from Gomer; and from France they came at length into the Southern parts of this Island. And therefore we find that the Welsh, the ancient proprietors of Britain, called themselves Gomeri or Cymry, and their language Cymmraeg; which words bear so great analogy to the original appellation, from whence they are derived, that we may reasonably conclude the true ancient Britons, or Welsh, to be the genuine descendants of Gomer, the eldest son of Japhet. But this will be farther evinced from the affinity between the Celts or Gauls, and the ancient Britons, with respect to religion, language, laws, and customs.-Owen's History. "What aggravated this mischief," says Lord Lyttelton, "was another ancient custom which prevailed among the Chieftains, and Kings of Wales of sending out their infant sons to be nursed and bred up in different families of their principal Nobles or Gentlemen; from whence it ensued, that each of these foster fathers, attaching himself with a strong paternal affection to the child he had reared, and being incited by his own interest to desire his advancement above his brothers, endeavoured to procure it by all the means in his power. Thus, as most of their Kings cohabited with several women who generally brought them many children, several parties were |