"So long as Wales shall stand by
the writings of the chroniclers and by the songs of the bards shall
his noble deed be praised throughout all time." The prophecy has
not yet been verified.
Welsh chroniclers have made but scanty
references to Gerald; no bard has ever yet sung an Awdl or a
Pryddest in honour of him who fought for the "honour of Wales." His
countrymen have forgotten Gerald the Welshman. It has been left to
Sir Richard Colt Hoare, Foster, Professor Brewer, Dimmock, and
Professor Freeman to edit his works. Only two of his countrymen
have attempted to rescue one of the greatest of Welshmen from an
undeserved oblivion. In 1585, when the Renaissance of Letters had
begun to rouse the dormant powers of the Cymry, Dr. David Powel
edited in Latin a garbled version of the "Itinerary" and
"Description of Wales," and gave a short and inaccurate account of
Gerald's life. In 1889 Dr. Henry Owen published, "at his own proper
charges," the first adequate account by a Welshman of the life and
labours of Giraldus Cambrensis. When his monument is erected in the
cathedral which was built by his hated rival, the epitaph which he
composed for himself may well be inscribed upon it -
Cambria Giraldus genuit, sic Cambria mentem
Erudiit, cineres cui lapis iste tegit.
And by that time perhaps some competent scholar will have translated
some at least of Gerald's works into the language best understood by
the people of Wales.
It would be impossible to exaggerate the enormous services which
three great Welshmen of the twelfth century rendered to England and
to the world - such services as we may securely hope will be
emulated by Welshmen of the next generation, now that we have lived
to witness what Mr. Theodore Watts-Dunton has called "the great
recrudescence of Cymric energy." {5} The romantic literature of
England owes its origin to Geoffrey of Monmouth; {6} Sir Galahad,
the stainless knight, the mirror of Christian chivalry, as well as
the nobler portions of the Arthurian romance, were the creation of
Walter Map, the friend and "gossip" of Gerald; {7} and John Richard
Green has truly called Gerald himself "the father of popular
literature." {8} He began to write when he was only twenty; he
continued to write till he was past the allotted span of life. He
is the most "modern" as well as the most voluminous of all the
mediaeval writers. Of all English writers, Miss Kate Norgate {9}
has perhaps most justly estimated the real place of Gerald in
English letters. "Gerald's wide range of subjects," she says, "is
only less remarkable than the ease and freedom with which he treats
them. Whatever he touches - history, archaeology, geography,
natural science, politics, the social life and thought of the day,
the physical peculiarities of Ireland and the manners and customs of
its people, the picturesque scenery and traditions of his own native
land, the scandals of the court and the cloister, the petty struggle
for the primacy of Wales, and the great tragedy of the fall of the
Angevin Empire - is all alike dealt with in the bold, dashing,
offhand style of a modern newspaper or magazine article.
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