A History of Wales

by John Davies

Overview

Stretching from the Ice Ages to the present day, this masterful account traces the political, social and cultural history of the land that has come to be called Wales.

Spanning prehistoric hill forts and Roman ruins to the Reformation, the Industrial Revolution and the series of strikes by Welsh miners in the late twentieth century, this is the definitive history of an enduring people: a unique and compelling exploration of the origins of the Welsh nation, its development and its role in the modern world. This new edition brings this remarkable history into the new era of the Welsh Assembly.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780141926339
Publisher:	Penguin UK
Publication date:	01/25/2007
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	784
Sales rank:	537,743
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

John Davies is a native of the Rhondda. He was educated in schools in Treorci, Bwlchllan and Tregaron and at University College, Cardiff, and Trinity College, Cambridge. He taught at the University Colleges of Swansea and Aberystwyth and was for eighteen years the Warden of Neuadd Pantycelyn, Aberystwyth. His other publications include Cardiff and the Marquesses of Bute, Hanes Cymru, Broadcasting and the BBC in Wales, The Making of Wales, The Celts and Cardiff: a Pocket Guide. He is the consultant editor of The Encyclopaedia of Wales. His wife comes from Blaenau Gwent and they have two daughters and two sons.

Editorial Reviews

Davies, a teacher in Cardiff, has not only taken cognizance of, and fluidly applied, the new tools history avails itself of--such as economics and archaeology--he first wrote his history in Welsh. His tremendous exertion was something new that the readers of Wales recognized, and they made it a best-seller there. Davies unearths the evidence of prehistoric hill forts and Roman ruins; he delineates the feudal wars, the 1536 union with England and the ensuing Reformation; and he explains the transformations of the Industrial Revolution. Accurate in all details, using meaningful modern maps, balanced where doubts exist, this impressive history could be criticized as a labor of patriotic love, if not for the visibly high professional standard to which Davies adheres. Nothing even remotely as accomplished has been written about Wales since 1950. And, for a few future decades, don't expect a vessel this sturdy to pass by.

Gilbert Taylor