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The Reformation and the Renaissance
After the outstanding period ofDafydd ap Gwilym and his followers in thecywydd, there arose for a short time a school of literary formalists. The chief of these wasDafydd ab Edmwnd, whose poetic heirs were Tudur Aled (died 1526) and Gutun Owain (flourished c. 1460–1500).
TheReformation broke the hold of the Roman Catholic religion on Welsh life without establishing at the same time a similar hold of its own. The Tudor policy of encouraging the spread of English at the expense of Welsh and of inducing the Welsharistocracy to emigrate to England almost destroyed the old Welshculture, completely bound up as it was with the language. Yet finepoetry was written by the satirists Siôn Tudur and Edmwnd Prys. Other masters of thecywydd were William Llŷn and Siôn Phylip.
The rise of modern prose
When printing began in Wales in the 16th century, traditional prose was abandoned by the Renaissance humanists. The new prose they fashioned was based on bardic language and classical authors, enriched by new formations and borrowings. The first Welsh printed book,Yn y lhyvyr hwnn (1547; “In This Book”), consisted ofextracts from the Scriptures and the prayer book: from this time modern Welsh prose began to assume definite form.
The Reformation
The most important figure of the Reformation wasWilliam Salesbury, whotranslated most of the New Testament of 1567. Despite some eccentricities, it was a fine piece of translation. In the same year was published the Welsh Prayer Book, also translated mainly by Salesbury in collaboration withRichard Davies, bishop ofSt. David’s. The Welsh Bible translated byWilliam Morgan, bishop ofSt. Asaph, aided by Edmwnd Prys, was published in 1588. The revised version, published in 1620, is still used. It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of these three translations in the development of Welsh prose. They started a steady, if not large, stream of Welsh prose books. The first were translations from English and Latin aimed at grounding the Welsh nation in the principles of the Reformation.
TheCounter-Reformation
While the reformed religion was being established in Wales, Welsh society and theWelsh language were at their lowestebb. The Roman Catholic writers of the Counter-Reformation regarded the new religion as an English import and struggled to preserve old Roman Catholic culture. As a result there appearedDosparth Byrr (“A Short Rationale”), the earliest printed Welsh primer, the work ofGruffydd Robert (c. 1522–c. 1610), and several religious works, many of which were published on the Continent.
The WelshRenaissance
Just as Italy and other European countries during the Renaissance turned to the Latin and Greek classics, so Wales turned to its own classical tradition of bardism. In addition to Gruffydd Robert’s primer mentioned above, there appeared a set of rules for bardic poetry and principles of the Welsh languagecompiled bySiôn Dafydd Rhys and a dictionary and a grammar byJohn Davies of Mallwyd.
Welsh literature in the 17th century
So far, writers of Welsh prose had contented themselves with translation, untilMorgan Llwyd produced his religious works. A Puritan, he made an original contribution to Welsh religious thought, chiefly inLlyfr y Tri Aderyn (1653; “The Book of the Three Birds”), a disquisition on government and religious liberty, andLlythur ir Cymru Cariadus (c. 1653; “Letter to the Beloved Welsh”), which expounded a mystical gospel. Among the clergy who produced some of the many translations, mostly of religious originals, during this period were Edward Samuel; Moses Williams, a diligent searcher into manuscripts; Griffith Jones, the father of Welsh popular education; and Theophilus Evans,author ofDrych y Prif Oesoedd (1716;A View of the Primitive Ages).Ellis Wynne o Lasynys is often regarded as the greatest of Welsh prose writers. His two great works wereRheol Buchedd Sanctaidd (1701), a translation ofJeremy Taylor’sRule and Exercises of Holy Living, andGweledigaetheu y Bardd Cwsc (1703;The Visions of the Sleeping Bard), anadaptation of a translation of theSueños of the Spanish satiristQuevedo.
When Henry VII came to the throne, the old Welsh gentry began to turn toward England for preferment. Soon, poets of the older school had no audience, and only the rich gentlemen farmers kept up the old tradition. A new school, however, was rising that combined a vast store of folk song, previously despised and unrecorded, with imitation of contemporary English popular poetry and sophisticated lyrics. Landmarks of this new development wereEdmwnd Prys’s metrical version of the Psalms andRhys Prichard’sCanwyll y Cymry (1646–72; “The Welshman’s Candle”), both written in so-called free meters. Prys’s Psalter contained the first Welsh metrical hymns. Prichard’s work consisted ofmoral verses in the meters of the old folk songs (penillion telyn). Many other poets wrote in these meters, but they were generally crude until handled by the greatest poet of the period,Huw Morus, who was particularly famous for his love poems. Later cameLewis Morris, the inspirer and patron of Goronwy Owen and thus a strong link with the next extremely productive period.
The 18th century: the first revival
The mid-18th century was, after the 14th, the most fruitful period ofWelsh literature.Goronwy Owen, inspired by English Augustanism, reintroduced and improved the strict meters of thecywydd andawdl (by this time a long poem written in a number of the classicalcynghanedd meters). He also introduced a wide range of subject content, and thus founded a new classical school of Welsh poetry. The more important poets of this school were William Wynn of Llangynhafal, Edward Richard, andEvan Evans (Ieuan Fardd). Much of their activity was associated with the Welshcommunity in London and the Cymmrodorion Society and led to the establishment of local eisteddfods in Wales, which perpetuated the classical forms of Welsh poetry.
Chief among Owen’s successors wasDavid Thomas (Dafydd Ddu Eryri), who, however, like other eisteddfodic bards of this period, soon departed from classical strictness.
The classicists of the 18th century stood aloof from the Methodist Revival, but religious fervor brought a new articulateness and inspired poets in free meter, especially hymn writers like the preeminentWilliam Williams of Pant-y-celyn and the mysticalAnn Griffiths.
For a long time after 1750, Welsh prose was mainly concerned with religious subjects. TheFrench Revolution, however, gaveimpetus to political writing, and among those it influenced wasJohn Jones (Jac Glan-y-gors). It was only after a periodical press had been established that politics began to compete with religion as a subject for comment.