England and Wales united in 1536, Scotland joined in 1707. The union of England and Wales took place during the reign of Henry VIII (the eighth), who was from the Welsh Tudor Dynasty. The British royal title "Prince of Wales" is a recognition of the medieval Welsh kingdoms becoming part of Britain, but the holder of the title does not have to be Welsh.
"South Wales" is just a geographical designation, and not an official name. But it's name is reflected in the Australian state of New South Wales.
I am English by birth, but I was born within walking distance of Wales and have some Welsh ancestry.
Here is Cardiff Castle. There are actually several castles around Cardiff. In fact, it is said to have more castles than any city in the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Castle#/media/File:The_West_Gate,_Cardiff,_by_Paul_Sandby.jpg
I am English by birth, but I was born within walking distance of Wales and have some Welsh ancestry.
Here is Cardiff Castle. There are actually several castles around Cardiff. In fact, it is said to have more castles than any city in the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Castle#/media/File:The_West_Gate,_Cardiff,_by_Paul_Sandby.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Castle#/media/File:Cardiff_Castle_South_Gate.jpg
The scenes begin inside a printing shop.
There are multiple scenes following. To see the scenes, after the first one, you must first click the up arrow before you can move on to the next scene by clicking the right or forward arrow. After clicking the up arrow you can then hide the previews of successive scenes, if you so wish.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4799042,-3.175713,3a,75y,330h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-fr04T8ZqkCc%2FVG4OhMDrfFI%2FAAAAAAAAA9o%2F99dvfe2OFO0mX-wIwq9NAJAiK_DtpICQQCJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2F-fr04T8ZqkCc%2FVG4OhMDrfFI%2FAAAAAAAAA9o%2F99dvfe2OFO0mX-wIwq9NAJAiK_DtpICQQCJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya84.61333-ro-0-fo100%2F!7i5632!8i2816
Another thing that Cardiff is known for is the Cardiff Bay Barrage. There is a very wide tidal range at Cardiff, that is the difference between high tide and low tide. This meant that extensive "mud flats" were exposed for most of the day, which were unsightly.
The idea arose of building a dam across Cardiff Bay, with sluices to control the flow of water so that there would be, in effect, a permanent high tide. This opened the possibility of waterfront development, because the edge of the water would always be in the same place.
The project was highly controversial. Opinions of the proposed Cardiff Bay Barrage ranged from brilliant to too expensive to ridiculous to both ridiculous and too expensive. Then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made clear her opposition to the project. But south Wales is left field when it comes to politics, and the opposition of the staunchly conservative prime minister seemed to be all the more reason to move forward with the project.
It turned into a massive civil engineering project that is today considered as a brilliant success, and was a great bonus for the city.
This is a set of sluices and control building for the Cardiff Bay Barrage. The gates allow the water that flows into Cardiff Bay to continue on to the sea, but keeps the level of water in the bay always at the former high tide level. This makes it different from the dikes in the Netherlands, in that it holds water in rather than keeping it out.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Bay_Barrage#/media/File:Sluices_at_the_Cardiff_Bay_Barrage.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Bay_Barrage#/media/File:Cardiff_Bay_Barrage_Control_Centre.jpg
Here are some scenes around the Cardiff Barrage, the dam that separates Cardiff Bay from the sea, so that the bay is no longer tidal.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4500767,-3.1650533,3a,75y,107h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-7BTRnr3m0XQ%2FVh_pZ6s3L7I%2FAAAAAAAAB_0%2FmE7yZ4Bp71EQyREb4L1jkCKWDdQWPLo6ACJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2F-7BTRnr3m0XQ%2FVh_pZ6s3L7I%2FAAAAAAAAB_0%2FmE7yZ4Bp71EQyREb4L1jkCKWDdQWPLo6ACJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya312.9225-ro0-fo100%2F!7i10240!8i5120
Welsh voters rejected the idea of having a national assembly that was separate from England. But there is a strong emphasis on the Welsh language. Welsh was the majority language in Cardiff until Victorian times.
In the past, the British Government made an effort to get everyone to speak English. There used to be a Celtic language called Cornish, in Cornwall, that is now extinct. But the effort to suppress Welsh was less successful. Today the BBC actively supports broadcasting in the Welsh language.
According to the census, about 15% of people in Wales can speak, read and, write in Welsh. Those are concentrated in the western part of Wales, furthest from England. It is not like French in Quebec. Welsh is on signs everywhere, and is on radio and television. But there are no daily newspapers in Welsh, and hearing people speak it in daily conversation is elusive.
One way to know if you are in an area where a significant number of people speak Welsh is that it will appear first on bilingual traffic signs. Around Cardiff, that is not the case so English appears first.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_language#/media/File:Wales.cardiff.slow.jpg
Welsh is a Celtic language. W and Y are used as vowels. The city of Cwmbran is pronounced as "Coom-bran". There is doubling of some letters to represent different sounds, dd, ff and, ll, which are not the same as the singular letters together.
Look at the name of Cardiff Castle here, spelled as Caerdiffe. This shows how the name of the city was originally Welsh, but has been anglicized into Cardiff.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff#/media/File:Cardiff-Castle.jpg
All along the border between England and Wales is the familiar sign of:
"Croeso i Gymru", meaning "Welcome to Wales".
The reason that the Welsh language is so different from English is that the Welsh people are considered to be the descendants of the original people of Britain, while English people and their language are the descendants of settlers from northern Europe, such as Angles, Saxons, Danes and, Vikings. This is why Welsh is a Celtic language but English is related to the other northern European languages.
This is the area around Llandaff Cathedral, starting inside the cathedral from the 12th Century. This is not in central Cardiff because remember that Cardiff was the town that grew around the castle, but was not a major city until the Nineteenth Century. There is thus no very old, centrally-located, Cardiff Cathedral. There is the cathedral in central Cardiff that was built in the Twentieth Century.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4957754,-3.21813,3a,75y,105.48h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-aNcimTa66Ww%2FU8_aoDnm-qI%2FAAAAAAAABvU%2F77i0mdFlw7skvXwwo19EmOVjtABwDvy0gCJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh4.googleusercontent.com%2F-aNcimTa66Ww%2FU8_aoDnm-qI%2FAAAAAAAABvU%2F77i0mdFlw7skvXwwo19EmOVjtABwDvy0gCJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya310.5653-ro0-fo100%2F!7i9216!8i4608
Here is an older residential area of Cardiff, to the west of the central part of the city. There are Welsh names around Philadelphia, such as Bryn Mawr and Bala Cynwyd, and any Philadelphian would feel right at home in Cardiff's row houses.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4702071,-3.1845084,3a,75y,84.09h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1scsEgvIDm33AYZb_hx4XJFQ!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DcsEgvIDm33AYZb_hx4XJFQ%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D80.55752%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656
Another major city in south Wales is Newport, to the east of Cardiff. This is a medieval city that, like Cardiff, grew up around a Norman castle. This was a more important port than Cardiff until the mid-Nineteenth Century.
Here are some scenes around Newport, including the ruins of the castle. Notice that we are starting in front of the BBC Cymru office. This is the BBC channel which broadcasts in Welsh. "Cymru" means "Welsh" in the Welsh language.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4799042,-3.175713,3a,75y,330h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-fr04T8ZqkCc%2FVG4OhMDrfFI%2FAAAAAAAAA9o%2F99dvfe2OFO0mX-wIwq9NAJAiK_DtpICQQCJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2F-fr04T8ZqkCc%2FVG4OhMDrfFI%2FAAAAAAAAA9o%2F99dvfe2OFO0mX-wIwq9NAJAiK_DtpICQQCJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya84.61333-ro-0-fo100%2F!7i5632!8i2816
Another thing that Cardiff is known for is the Cardiff Bay Barrage. There is a very wide tidal range at Cardiff, that is the difference between high tide and low tide. This meant that extensive "mud flats" were exposed for most of the day, which were unsightly.
The idea arose of building a dam across Cardiff Bay, with sluices to control the flow of water so that there would be, in effect, a permanent high tide. This opened the possibility of waterfront development, because the edge of the water would always be in the same place.
The project was highly controversial. Opinions of the proposed Cardiff Bay Barrage ranged from brilliant to too expensive to ridiculous to both ridiculous and too expensive. Then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made clear her opposition to the project. But south Wales is left field when it comes to politics, and the opposition of the staunchly conservative prime minister seemed to be all the more reason to move forward with the project.
It turned into a massive civil engineering project that is today considered as a brilliant success, and was a great bonus for the city.
This is a set of sluices and control building for the Cardiff Bay Barrage. The gates allow the water that flows into Cardiff Bay to continue on to the sea, but keeps the level of water in the bay always at the former high tide level. This makes it different from the dikes in the Netherlands, in that it holds water in rather than keeping it out.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Bay_Barrage#/media/File:Sluices_at_the_Cardiff_Bay_Barrage.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Bay_Barrage#/media/File:Cardiff_Bay_Barrage_Control_Centre.jpg
Here are some scenes around the Cardiff Barrage, the dam that separates Cardiff Bay from the sea, so that the bay is no longer tidal.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4500767,-3.1650533,3a,75y,107h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-7BTRnr3m0XQ%2FVh_pZ6s3L7I%2FAAAAAAAAB_0%2FmE7yZ4Bp71EQyREb4L1jkCKWDdQWPLo6ACJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2F-7BTRnr3m0XQ%2FVh_pZ6s3L7I%2FAAAAAAAAB_0%2FmE7yZ4Bp71EQyREb4L1jkCKWDdQWPLo6ACJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya312.9225-ro0-fo100%2F!7i10240!8i5120
Welsh voters rejected the idea of having a national assembly that was separate from England. But there is a strong emphasis on the Welsh language. Welsh was the majority language in Cardiff until Victorian times.
In the past, the British Government made an effort to get everyone to speak English. There used to be a Celtic language called Cornish, in Cornwall, that is now extinct. But the effort to suppress Welsh was less successful. Today the BBC actively supports broadcasting in the Welsh language.
According to the census, about 15% of people in Wales can speak, read and, write in Welsh. Those are concentrated in the western part of Wales, furthest from England. It is not like French in Quebec. Welsh is on signs everywhere, and is on radio and television. But there are no daily newspapers in Welsh, and hearing people speak it in daily conversation is elusive.
One way to know if you are in an area where a significant number of people speak Welsh is that it will appear first on bilingual traffic signs. Around Cardiff, that is not the case so English appears first.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_language#/media/File:Wales.cardiff.slow.jpg
Welsh is a Celtic language. W and Y are used as vowels. The city of Cwmbran is pronounced as "Coom-bran". There is doubling of some letters to represent different sounds, dd, ff and, ll, which are not the same as the singular letters together.
Look at the name of Cardiff Castle here, spelled as Caerdiffe. This shows how the name of the city was originally Welsh, but has been anglicized into Cardiff.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff#/media/File:Cardiff-Castle.jpg
All along the border between England and Wales is the familiar sign of:
"Croeso i Gymru", meaning "Welcome to Wales".
The reason that the Welsh language is so different from English is that the Welsh people are considered to be the descendants of the original people of Britain, while English people and their language are the descendants of settlers from northern Europe, such as Angles, Saxons, Danes and, Vikings. This is why Welsh is a Celtic language but English is related to the other northern European languages.
This is the area around Llandaff Cathedral, starting inside the cathedral from the 12th Century. This is not in central Cardiff because remember that Cardiff was the town that grew around the castle, but was not a major city until the Nineteenth Century. There is thus no very old, centrally-located, Cardiff Cathedral. There is the cathedral in central Cardiff that was built in the Twentieth Century.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4957754,-3.21813,3a,75y,105.48h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s-aNcimTa66Ww%2FU8_aoDnm-qI%2FAAAAAAAABvU%2F77i0mdFlw7skvXwwo19EmOVjtABwDvy0gCJkC!2e4!3e11!6s%2F%2Flh4.googleusercontent.com%2F-aNcimTa66Ww%2FU8_aoDnm-qI%2FAAAAAAAABvU%2F77i0mdFlw7skvXwwo19EmOVjtABwDvy0gCJkC%2Fw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya310.5653-ro0-fo100%2F!7i9216!8i4608
Here is an older residential area of Cardiff, to the west of the central part of the city. There are Welsh names around Philadelphia, such as Bryn Mawr and Bala Cynwyd, and any Philadelphian would feel right at home in Cardiff's row houses.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4702071,-3.1845084,3a,75y,84.09h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1scsEgvIDm33AYZb_hx4XJFQ!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DcsEgvIDm33AYZb_hx4XJFQ%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D80.55752%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656
Another major city in south Wales is Newport, to the east of Cardiff. This is a medieval city that, like Cardiff, grew up around a Norman castle. This was a more important port than Cardiff until the mid-Nineteenth Century.
Here are some scenes around Newport, including the ruins of the castle. Notice that we are starting in front of the BBC Cymru office. This is the BBC channel which broadcasts in Welsh. "Cymru" means "Welsh" in the Welsh language.
The central business street of a city in Britain if often named "High Street", the equivalent of "Main Street" in North America.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.5888876,-2.9971458,3a,75y,254.25h,85.8t,1.39r/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1saDaa5NKGQL-IOOYpaSusnQ!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo3.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DaDaa5NKGQL-IOOYpaSusnQ%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D61.19553%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656
To the west of Cardiff is another city on the coast of south Wales, Swansea. Unlike Cardiff and Newport, Swansea specialized in metals, rather than coal. Workers in Swansea were so skilled in separating metals from their ores that ore was often brought from other countries to be refined in Swansea. The city's nickname used to be "Copperopolis".
What Swansea does have in common with Cardiff and Newport is that it also grew up around a Norman castle. Isn't it ironic that the three major cities of south Wales are built around castles that were originally put there to defend against the native Welsh people? Welsh cities center around castles, just as English cities center around cathedrals.
Here are some scenes around the center of Swansea.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.6211677,-3.9407826,3a,75y,40.95h,87.78t,-0.63r/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sra4WgisLGY9TbDgrcYoaXg!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3Dra4WgisLGY9TbDgrcYoaXg%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D142.5%26pitch%3D-7%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656
Here is a look around a residential area of Swansea, with the very Welsh name of Brynhyfryd. You can be sure that you have crossed the border and left England when you see a name like that.
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.6427027,-3.9480799,3a,75y,281.29h,93.96t,357.71r/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1ssGn1qbMgzo65xGngCRjEfA!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo2.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DsGn1qbMgzo65xGngCRjEfA%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D6.954975%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656
Carmarthen is a town in southwest Wales that is not on the coast. It has a very long history and was important in medieval times, before the Industrial Revolution made the coal that was handled by the port cities so important.
Tenby is a seaside resort town that goes back to the days before mass transportation brought inexpensive vacations in sunny places. The first of the following scenes are at Tenby's medieval walls, much of which is still standing.
There is a tidal island, meaning it is only an island at high tide. If you wonder how on earth this geological arrangement came to be, and you are familiar with Wales, there is the posting "The Carmarthen Raceway", on the brief blog about glaciers www.markmeekworld.blogspot.com
The arrangement is not geological but is caused by massive slides of ice, at the end of each ice age, from the mountains of Wales toward the coast, along what I call "The Carmarthen Raceway".
If you see the palm trees, you are not imagining it. Tenby, like Cornwall in England, are the places in Britain that are most exposed to the Gulf Stream, which brings warming water. So yes, palm trees can grow in Britain.
Monmouth is within walking distance of where I was born. It is built around a castle, but the castle came later. Monnow Street, where the following scenes begin and the main street of Monmouth, has been used since ancient times. The famous stone arch, on the bridge over Monnow River, is from the Thirteenth Century.
I can remember, from early childhood, when I was first brought to look in the shops on Monnow Street. We usually went to Gloucester for shopping but one day we came here.
There is a statue of Charles Rolls, one of the founders of Rolls Royce, in Monmouth. It has always been the world's ultimate car and ultimate status symbol. But Charles Rolls was actually more interested in aircraft. His statue is holding a model plane. He ended up being the first Brit to die in an air crash. Rolls Royce today is known more for high-quality aircraft engines than for cars, and makes more aircraft engines than any company except General Electric.
Charles Rolls grew up in a mansion near Monmouth, known as The Hendre. It was a private home but looks like one of Henry the Eighth's brick palaces.
One thing that should be more widely-known is that, in medieval times, the idea of making a simple warm hat out of sheep's wool arose in Monmouth. This resulted in what was known as the "Monmouth Cap". What this led to was the ubiquitous knit caps, sometimes called a beanie, that are seen in cold climates across the world today.
Also near Monmouth is Tintern Abbey, which we saw in the posting on this blog, "The Reformation At 500", February 2017.
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