EDITORIAL PREFACE.
Amid all the bustle and clangour of modern urban life, the spirit
voices of Cardiff's past are still audible and articulate, in records
which time and the spoiler have spared to these latter days, and the
continued existence of which has been secured by the printer's art.
In the twentieth century, Edwardo Septimo feliciter regnante, the
burgess of Cardiff (who is now nearly every householder) can close
his ears to the shrieking of locomotives, the whirr and clatter of
electric cars and the whizzing of telephone-bells, and transport himself
back into the quiet Welsh county town whose citizens are sleeping
in Saint John's churchyard. Nay, he can lose himself in the paulopost-Arthurian haze which envelopes the dim heroic forms of
Robert Fitzhamon and Iestyn ab Gwrgan, and take sides with either
the Clans or the Feudal System. As the reader follows the history
of the long struggle between Celtic tribesman and Teutonic settler,
his sympathies will be irresistibly drawn to one or the other and will,
perhaps, be determined by what he knows as to his own nationality.
Cardiff, indeed, is as cosmopolitan as any meeting-place of the nations.
Specimens of the aboriginal Welsh-speaking Cardiffian may still be
met with, here and there, and there has, of course, been a large influx
into the town from this and the adjacent counties; but commonest is
the immigrant from Gloucestershire and Somersetshire, it is said—especially the latter. The English spoken at Cardiff by the average
passer-by no longer betrays any suspicion of Welsh accent, but smacks
strongly of the West Saxon spoken on the opposite Severn shore,
which bids fair to form the basis of a new dialect for this town and
district. In one walk from the Hayes bridge to the Pier Head, it is
easy to hear a dozen languages, to say nothing of dialects. All the
principal European nationalities are represented among the wellestablished merchants and tradesmen of the town and port. A Cardiffborn Polish noble carries on the business of a watchmaker; an Austrian
of aristocratic lineage keeps a small public house; and a Welshman,
who descends from the two most ancient families in Glamorgan, works
as a master mason. Never was such a confusion of races and conditions.
At Cardiff may be found the issue of marriages between persons of
widely-distant nationalities, as Italian-Welsh, Greek-Irish, (fn. 1) MalteseEnglish, Scottish-Welsh—one might ring the changes indefinitely.
Bearing in mind an axiom of physiology, one expects the future
inhabitants of Cardiff to be a gifted people. To give another
illustration of our cosmopolitanism, sermons have lately been preached
in English, Irish and Pomeranian, in Saint David's Catholic church,
the priest in charge of which is a Dutchman. The services of the
Orthodox Greeks in this town, a few years ago, were conducted by a
priest who was an Englishman, and a clerk who was a Welsh-speaking
Welshman from Russia! The top-hat and frock coat of London
civilisation are hardly a more familiar sight to Cardiffian eyes than
the wide hat, with pendant ribands, of the Breton peasant, the
brimless headgear and curled shoes of the Indian lascar, or the
Chinaman's pigtail. Add such foreign elements to the early fusion of
the manifold, unknown races which have formed the Cymric nation—and one wonders what will be the racial composition of our future
citizens.
To leave such speculations and hark back to the 14th century:
How much we should like to have on the shelves of our Free Library
those eight books (fn. 2) which belonged to Llewelyn Bren; three of which
were in Welsh, and one in French, the Roman de la Rose! The old
record gives no hint as to what became of these captured treasures of
the unfortunate Welsh patriot, or of his bright-red ridingcoat and
silver spoons. The lawless state of Cardiff in Henry the Eighth's
reign is strikingly illustrated by the tale of wanton murder and civic
incompetence which Mistress Katherine Watts unfolded to the Star
Chamber. (fn. 3) The unlawful exactions of William Herbert in 1558
aroused the effective resentment of the townsfolk, as appears by their
complaint in the same Court. In 1645, during the Civil War, Cardiff
Castle was described as "a place of singular concernment as any in
Wales" (p. 149.) It received a great deal of attention from both
Cavaliers and Roundheads, and was held now by one party, now by
the other. In 1648 mediæval South Wales may be said to have
vanished for ever, amid the smoke and blood of the battle of Saint
Fagan's; (fn. 4) and from her ashes arose, slowly but surely, the new race,
Puritan and democratic before all things. A mile west of Cardiff
Bridge, near the bridge which spans the river Ely, is a hamlet of old
thatched cottages bearing the significant name Pwll Coch (the Red
Pool). This appelation is said to bear allusion to the colour of the
water as it carried to the sea the grim refuse of that terrible carnage
which, more, perhaps, than any other event in history, changed the
face and shaped the destinies of Wales. Of the army of Welshmen
then taken prisoners by the Parliamentarian forces, 240 (being
bachelors) were shipped to Barbadoes as slaves, and three were "shot
to death at Cardiff." No one will grudge Wales the glory earned for
her by these gallant adherents of a lost cause.
The latter and larger half of the present volume is taken up with
a continuous series of extracts from the formal transactions of civic
business, especially the Minutes of Council; and it may be well to
say a word as to the method which has been used in the selection. I
have aimed at extracting everything of permanent interest or utility
to the public. In some cases this interest lies in the picture of old
local life and manners; or the utility in the legal bearing which a
given ancient document may be likely to have, some time or other,
upon current municipal questions. In other cases, the interest of the
extracted document may consist in its connecting our Borough with
the history of the Kingdom as a whole; or its utility in the fresh
light incidentally supplied to historical students in general, apart from
merely local research. The public may rest assured that nothing
worthy of perpetuation has been allowed to slip through the editorial
hands; nor, I think, will the careful student deem anything worthless
which has been here retained. The value of some items may not be
apparent at the first glance, but upon consideration the reader will
probably see how they fall distinctly under one or other of the two
categories named. It is often the humblest fragment of a record
which conveys most knowledge to the studious utiliser of such collections as these.
The present volume differs from its predecessors in being
ornamented with head and tail pieces, initials and capitals drawn by
myself. This has been done not without diffidence on my part, as a
mere penman, at continuing the work so skilfully performed by Mr.
Fowler, Mr. Ward, Mr. Sant and Mr. T. H. Thomas in the previous
volumes. I hope it may be held that the artistic shortcomings of the
present set of head and tail pieces are atoned for by correctness of
heraldic arrangement in the former; and, in the sketches of old
buildings, by a minuteness of detail which, though it may not satisfy
artists, will at least be appreciated by antiquaries. The large
initials to the chapters, and the ornamental capitals inserted in the
text, have been copied by me in pen and ink, from an illuminated
Book of Hours in my possession, written on vellum and executed in
Flanders for an Augustinian Canoness, about the year 1425. The
manuscript is an exceptionally fine production of the Flemish school
of limners.
The names and blason of the coats of arms will be found in a list
at the end of this volume, together with a list of the tail pieces.
JOHN HOBSON MATTHEWS,
("Mab Cernyw.")
Cardiff. 17 December 1902.
CWM-Y-FWYALCHEN, WHITCHURCH.