They Haven't Gone Away You Know.

This blog is supposed to be about Radnorian history, spiced up with a bit of old time motor sport. Trouble is I always have to guard against an urge to rant about some political issue or other. The other day I thought about posting something about Glanville Williams, one of the more influential Welshmen of the last century. Trouble is I could find no Radnorshire connection and he surely wasn't a Brooklands devotee. Of course as the President of the Abortion Law Reform Association and the legal brain behind the 1967 Act, I guess you could accuse him of the non-appearance of around 2000 potential Radnorians, but it's not much of a link I have to admit.

Glanville Williams was also a leading member of the Eugenics Society, a body that concerned itself with such issues as opposing racially mixed marriages, sterilising unemployed people and other "unhealthy seed". Although all that "good seed" baloney smacks of the 1930s, the Eugenics Society never went away, it merely changed its name. This popular broadcaster even ended up as President, I except you know him. Anyway I decided that this was not a suitable topic for a Radnorian blog and deleted the post. However ........

This morning the BBC News site is making much of the fact that the BNP are pals with American racist David Duke. Hardly surprising of course but maybe this is, the foreword to David Duke's book My Awakening by American geneticist Professor Glayde Whitney. That's the same Glayde Whitney who our present day eugenicists invited over to the UK to lecture, David Aaronovitch wrote about it in the Guardian.

So there you have it, the obviously racist BNP, the less-obvious haters of the SWP posing as "anti-fascists" outside the BBC and those highly respectable scientists seeking to rehabilitate eugenics. Wonder which are the greatest danger? Wonder also how long it will be before someone suggests sterilising the less talented "seed" in order to save the planet from global warming?

Treason

Has the world come to this, Stirling bigging up a red car!

Fascist Advance Turned Back in Radnor

The latest BNP membership list is a bit of a mess but from what I can make out they've picked up one new member in Llandrindod, while losing their two previous Radnorian sign ups.

The pleasant Wyeside town of Llanfair-ym-Muallt also gained, if that's the right word, a member, although my guess is that this one thought BNP stood for Builth National Party.

Go Figure

Top picture is the A483 at Howey, 7 busy junctions, 2 residential caravan sites, 4 housing estates, a narrow pavement used daily by dozens of folk, a couple of accident blackspots and a village.

Below is the A44 at Llanfihangel Nant Melan, a pub and a couple of farms and that's about it.

Now guess which one has a 40 MPH speed limit and which has the 50 MPH limit.

Yes, that's right .......

Here Today

Just a reminder that my Innes Ireland website will disappear into cyberspace later this month. Yahoo are taking down all their free sites and I don't feel like paying to keep it going. I guess in some ways the internet is like the manuscript age before the printing press and the permanency of books. Some things will last, some will be copied and survive in part, but most will just disappear.

Simmering Discontent or Hyperbole?

As one of those Radnorians who still think of Llandrindod as something of a Johnny-come-lately on the local scene, I can't say that I am at all well-informed about the storms that occasionally boil over in that particular tea-cup. Wilfing around the internet I was surprised to discover that back in the summer the Spa town was simmering with discontent. As things turned out this "groundswell" amounted to no more than a couple of dozen votes, as Mr Gary Price romped home to an easy victory.

Anyway it now seems that Mr Price has joined the "ultra-right" Montgomeryshire Independent group on Powys County Council. Wow! I knew that Nick Griffin lived in the Welshpool area but I hadn't realised that some Montgomeryshire version of the Iron Guard had been elected to the County Council.

Of course it could be that this is just hyperbole and that the Montgomeryshire Independent Group are merely a bunch of well-meaning souls who happen to disagree with the Liberal Democrats.

Secure in Valour's Station?

No part of Wales welcomed continued membership of the European Community more than Radnorshire in the 1975 Referendum. With Powys voting 74% YES, a figure doubtless depressed by NO votes in the old Breconshire coalfield, the more rural parts of the county would surely have outstripped the most pro areas of England in enthusiasm for Europe.

Your correspondent was one of that small minority of Radnorians to vote NO in 1975, so it was with a degree of sadness that I noted the YES vote in Ireland over the weekend, the good voters of Donegal excepted. The main reason voters gave for giving up their country's hard-won independence seemed to be money. Unlike the Scottish Parliament in 1707, the Irish voters were admitting to have been bought for European rather than English gold.

Now I realise that the chances of a referendum in the UK are fairly remote, but if by some mishap it should happen, how should Radnorian vote? As a supporter of Welsh Independence it seems somewhat eccentric to vote to give away that independence before it has even been won. At the same time a victory for the NO side would be a massive fillip to the old myopic English Nationalism that defines itself by what it doesn't like, the Welsh and Scots in particular, rather than what it does.

A Walk in the Park

Can't think what came over me posting modern stuff like Jemma Griffiths, apologies. Now here's some Sixties pop genius from Coventry schoolgirls The Orchids. Oh and if you want to complete your collection of Adamsdown Soul, here's Tawney Reed and My Heart Cries, the B-side of her second and final single.

Daydreaming Over a Map

So many books touching on the Welsh language reproduce the maps of W T R Pryce, which use returns from Anglican churches to map the state of the language across Wales at a particular date. The illustration shows Radnorshire circa 1850, with monoglot Welsh and English areas divided by a bilingual zone, the darker shading.

Now I think that these maps, especially those for earlier years, are misleading as far as Radnorshire is concerned. It seems to me that Anglican churches in Radnorshire dropped Welsh services as quickly as possible, as soon as the last generation of monoglot Welsh speakers had died, if not long before. For example Nantmel is shown as part of the English monoglot zone in the mid-Eighteenth century map, at least a hundred years before that was infact the case.

Where the 1850's map gets somewhat ridiculous is in linking up Cwmteuddwr and Abergwesyn - where by the way there was precious little English fifty years later - into a bilingual area based on the language of Anglican church services. The only language heard over most of this peopleless "zone" would have been the song of the skylark and the occasional bleating sheep.

Bilingualism and Radnorshire Farmers in 1901

Some evidence of how the Welsh language persisted in North West Radnorshire, long after the academics had it buried, is provided by the numbers of bilingual farmers found in the 1901 census.

The figures shown on the map are for the parishes of Cwmteuddwr, St Harmon, Abbeycwmhir and Nantmel; and range from 88% in Dyffryn Elan to 5% in Coedglasson. Of course the figures include farmers who have moved into the county from elsewhere (although most are locally born) and disguises the fact that children were being brought up as English speaking monoglots

What's in a Name

I'm not sure how much of a connection there is between Colin Chapman's outfit and the new Team Lotus which will be returning to the F1 grid in 2010. Perhaps as much as that between Stan Chapman's pub on the Tottenham Lane and it's current incarnation as the Funky Brownz Shisha Lounge. Of course what is important is the name and history which the new team will no doubt seek to capitalize on, no matter how tenuous the link.

An old Lotus mechanic once informed me that it was the likes of Innes Ireland, Cliff Allison and Graham Hill who took the development risks from which later drivers like Clark benefited. Those were the days when Chapman's cars usually fell apart during the race, and the mechanics could be found still welding a chassis on the grid.

Anyway, I wonder if anyone will remember that it was Innes who scored Lotus's first ever F1 victory and who also gave the team their first World Championship win? Of course even in the Eighties all that counted for little. Lotus sponsor Camel held a big post-race party to which all the F1 journalists were invited, with the sole exception of the correspondent of the American magazine Road and Track, who was somehow overlooked ..... one Innes Ireland.

Lost in Translation

Welsh has been added to Google Translate. Now there are some fairly dire Welsh language translations out there already, but just wait until our public bodies latch on to this.

Book Review

I'm almost resigned to the fact that any new book about Radnorshire is going to quote that old chestnut about Richard Fowler of Abbeycwmhir and his five hundred a year. Conradi's At the Bright Hem of God, Radnorshire Pastoral doesn't fail in this respect, although, justifiably, he is quoting his friend Iris Murdoch. He also makes a good point by saying that the doggerel reflects the preponderance in the county of small independent farmers rather than big landlords.

Conradi makes no bones about the fact that this is an outsiders book, the natives providing a romantic backdrop for those who retreat to the county in search of "inwardness". The book deals almost exclusively with writers and Conradi's Radnorshire is drawn rather large - George Herbert, Henry Vaughan and Thomas Traherne are the subjects of one chapter for example. Indeed Marcher Pastoral might have been a more accurate subtitle for the book.

We should be grateful to Conradi for bringing Ffransis Payne to the attention of a wider audience and the book does not ignore some of the great Welsh language poetry composed for patrons living in the county. I do wish the translation of Elen Gethin as Elen the Terrible could somehow be abolished, it means olive or swarthy skinned. Does anyone really think that bards like Lewis Glyn Cothi and Llawdden would have called Elen terrible to her and her family's face? One thing the book does make apparent is the paucity of Radnorshire born writers, even Hilda Vaughan was born in Builth.

Did I learn anything new about Radnorshire? Yes, quite a lot, perhaps if I had paid more attention to the Mid-Wales Journal I would have known of R S Thomas's Presteigne connections for example. All in all there are enough "ideas" in the book to keep your blogger in topics for quite a while. Conradi shares Kilvert's ability to paint a picture in a few words and at just £9.99 this Seren publication should certainly find a place on any Radnorian's bookshelf.

Who Knew?

I must admit that I couldn't stand Simon Dee in the days when he was the BBC's "golden boy." On reflection and comparing him with the likes of Graham Norton and Russell Brand, well, actually he was just as bad.

Anyway perhaps my opinion of Simon might have been different if I had known he was a namesake of that proud Radnorian, the Elizabethan polymath Simon Dee ...... at least that's what this Independent book review calls someone the rest of us know as plain John. OK we've all made similar mistakes, but it did make me smile.

Anyway expect a favourable review of the Conradi book before too long. I haven't read it but any author who claims that Radnorshire "has been the central repository of the true spirit of Welshness since the 12th century" gets my vote!

What's the Welsh for Wilfing?

OK, I guessed that Welsh language blogs dealing with Radnorshire topics would be thin on the ground but there are a couple. Y Dysgwr Araf seemingly lives in Llandrindod and you certainly have to agree with his comments in this post. No translation necessary surely!

The author of O'r Parsel Canol lives in Aberystwyth but her posts seem to indicate a Radnorshire connection. There's mention of an old primary schoolmistress of mine on the blog who I seem to remember teaching us about the likes of eighteenth century Republican Jac Glan y Gors - pretty heady stuff for Radnorshire in 1960. I like this blogger's use of colour, as in this photo of some tiles at Old Radnor church. It makes me want to dust off my cameras and start snapping.

Mynyddoedd y Cambrian?

The only time i buy a copy of the Western Mail nowadays is on a Saturday for the TV and radio magazine, after all there are only so many letters from the likes of Gwilym Levell that you would want to inflict on yourself in one lifetime. Two columnists in the magazine who I usually read are Tryst Williams, who I find annoyingly sanctimonious, and Lefi Gruffudd, whose mildly anti-establishment viewpoint makes a refreshing change from the usual politically-correct consensus in Wales.

This week Lefi criticises the mountain bike community for inflicting names on the countryside like "Windy Alley" and "Italian Job", completely ignoring the Welsh names for such places. You get something similar in the world of rallying with monstrosities such as "Sweet Lamb". So far so good, but then Lefi spoils it all somewhat by asking for the establishment of a national park to cover the Cambrian mountains. Why anyone would want to hand over control of any part of Wales to an unelected body is beyond me. I well remember an article in one of the English magazines back in the Sixties, New Society perhaps, which advocated putting up a fence around the area, expelling the locals and populating the hills with bear, wolves, beaver and reindeer. I'm sure such ideas are still knocking around in the back of the minds of the environmentalists, with the addition of a few wind-farms of course.

Anyway Lefi spoils his article somewhat by referring to the area as mynyddoedd y Cambrian - surely the district has a perfectly good Welsh name already ...... Elenydd.

Happy Holiday Folks

The Engineer pulled the throttle, Conductor rang the bell,
The Brakeman hollered "ALL ABOARD" and the banks all went to hell.

The Maestro Speaks

Some candid quotes from Stirling Moss in this month's Motor Sport. Of course he's too much of a gentleman to be other than, well, gentlemanly:

"Fangio, to my mind, was the best F1 driver in World" ..... ok if you say so Stirl', although I'm sticking with that guy Moss.

Graham Hill "a driver who attained more success with less ability than most." ...... and really that's quite a compliment.

Phil Hill "he was good in as much as he could drive most cars fairly well" ..... mmmh I can feel some Americans reaching for their word processor.

Hawthorn "he was fast, but one has to say what he did at Le Mans was rather foolhardy." ...... C'mon Stirling don't you know that the default Britisher position is that it was all Levegh's fault, stop being fair.

and so it goes on .........

Oh and Sirling's opinion of Radnorshire based racer Innes Ireland:

"One of the most underrated drivers, he was very fast. If Colin Chapman had been able to control him the way he did Jimmy Clark, I think he would have been up there with him. I don't think Innes got as much assistance from Chapman as he could have had."

Plantation

Looking at a sample of over a thousand Radnorshire wills from the 17C we find that a majority of folk from across the county are using traditional Welsh patronyms, Rees ap David of Gladestry (1660) for example, or Gwenllian vch Hugh of Aberedw (1671).

The new fangled surnames are certainly making headway, although a subtantial number of these are infact hidden patronyms. For instance it's highly unlikely that John David Bedo Mayn of Llanyre (1640) was actually a Mr Mayn!

Surnames that denote an English ethnic origin are absent from most parishes but in Llanddewi Ystradenni, Llangynllo and Llanbadarn Fynydd they make up between 20% and 25% of the population. Familiar names from in and around these parishes include Mason, Clark, Bufton, Payne, Hamer, Harding, Wilde, Ingram, Worthen and Mantle. These families soon inter-married with the local population and Buftons, Hamers and Ingrams etc are found in the last generation of native speakers of Radnorshire Welsh. At the same time they no doubt introduced a degree of bilingualism into North Radnorshire which would have been sustained by contact with the border towns of Knighton and Presteigne. It is this bilingualism that is the key to the later anglicisation of the county and it is the upper Ithon valley and the hill country of Maelienydd that is the conduit not the Wye valley as supposed by many.

My old chemistry teacher, Ll. Hooson Owen, in his thesis on the Welsh language in Radnorshire seemingly believed that it was a planted Cromwellian soldiery that introduced this English element into the county, but the names cited above are found before the Civil War. Perhaps they were settled on lands confiscated from the monks of Abbey Cwmhir, does anyone know?

Re-Writing History

It's always been a pleasure to point out to the more bumptious Anglo-Saxon that, from the Welsh point of view, the English are themselves fairly recent immigrants to this sceptred isle. Now along comes Stephen Oppenheimer with the claim that the English have been inhabitants of Britain for much longer than previously thought. Indeed his more extreme followers even go as far as to say that parts of Ireland have also been English for 2000 years.

Oppenheimer bases his theory on the belief (dismissed by specialists) that the Belgae of Southern England were a Germanic speaking tribe and, well that's about it, except for the fact that how else to explain that England is, you know, English rather than Welsh.

Of course Oppenheimer's book is manner from heaven for those English folk whose confidence has been shaken by the loss of Empire, immigration, bolshie Scots and rule from Brussels, but is it true?

Firstly the Belgae only occupied a small area of Southern England so, even if they were Germanic speakers, it doesn't explain what happened to all the other Celtic tribes of what became England, the Iceni for example. Secondly how is it possible that so few Latin loan words ended up in Anglo-Saxon, far fewer than in Welsh. After all according to Oppenheimer the "English" lived in the most Romanised part of Britain, Southern England, yet the Romans seem to have had precious little influence on their language, culture or religion.

How then can those of us who find little of value in Oppenheimer's work explain the comparative absence of Welsh placenames and loan-words in England? Well how about the extreme weather events of the 530s and the great plague of the 540s. This all fits in with Gildas and would explain how the Anglo-Saxons were so easily able to move into an under-populated landscape.