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There seems also to have been an invasion and conquest of Wales, from the north, by the Welsh; who, joining forces with the Welsh Ordovices whom they found already in the unconquered un-Roman part, established in the course of time the kingdom and House of Cunedda, which reigned till the Edwardian Conquest.
I am not quite sure that Arthur ever really lived, except in the mind of many ages. He is the spirit of Roman rule, the true Dux Britanniae, and he has all the greatness and ability of all the race of Cunedda. I have been shown mountains under which he sleeps, with his knights around him, waiting for the time when his country is to be delivered.
It was thought that there should be one king over the whole people, but it was very rarely that every part of Wales obeyed one king. The country was divided into smaller kingdoms. In many ways Gwynedd was the most powerful. Its steep side was thus towards England, and its cornlands and pastures on the further side. It was also the home of the family of Cunedda, from Maelgwn to the last Llywelyn.
Because the two centuries of apparent settlement and sleep were the period of a silent revolution, more important, if our aim is to explain the living present rather than the dead past, than all the exciting plots and battles of the House of Cunedda from the rise of Maelgwn to the fall of the last Llywelyn.
The sons of Liethali obtained the country of the dimetae, where is a city called Menavia, and the province Guiher and Cetgueli, which they held till they were expelled from every part of Britain, by Cunedda and his sons. V.R. Damhoctor, Clamhoctor, and Elamhoctor. V.R. Liethan, Bethan, Vethan. St. David's. Guiher, probably the Welsh district Gower. Cetgueli is Caer Kidwelly, in Carmarthenshire.
Perhaps the nearest parallel in the history of Wales to the Norman Conquest of England is the conquest of Wales by Cunedda, the founder of the Cymric kingdom, in the dark and troublous times which followed the withdrawal of the Roman troops from Britain.
Griffith lost the day, and again became a sea-rover. He sailed to Dyved, and there he met Rees, the King of Deheubarth, who also was of the line of Cunedda, and had been driven from his land by the Normans. The two chiefs joined, and they crushed Trahaiarn at Mynydd Carn. Then they turned against the Normans. Rees soon fell in battle, and left two children, Nest and Griffith.
At the same time Harold, Earl of Wessex, was making himself king of England. A war broke out between Griffith and Harold; and, during it, in 1063, the great Welsh king "the head and the shield of the Britons" was slain by traitors. So far I have told you about a few, only the greatest, kings of the House of Cunedda. I know that you are wondering where Arthur comes in.
The great king, Mailcun,* reigned among the Britons, i.e. in the district of Guenedota, because his great-great-grandfather, Cunedda, with his twelve sons, had come before from the left-hand part, i.e. from the country which is called Manau Gustodin, one hundred and forty-six years before Mailcun reigned, and expelled the Scots with much slaughter from those countries, and they never returned again to inhabit them.
It is through the dark-haired Gladys, who married Ralph Mortimer, that the kings of England can trace their descent from the House of Cunedda. Llywelyn's last great task was to make relations between England and Wales relations of peace and amity.
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