Welsh Journals

the mendicant ideal and that of the older monastic orders. It is unfortunate that in the chapter on the end of the Middle Ages no place could be found for Richard Whytford, the Bridgettine of Syon and friend of More and Erasmus, recently the subject of sympathetic studies by Professor David Knowles and Professor Glanmor Williams. A future edition might also include a short bibliography appended to each chapter. These, however, are minor criticisms which do not detract from the merit of Mr. Williams's book. The outcome of a scheme launched by the Flintshire County Teachers Association, it is designed primarily for use in schools, but it will surely commend itself to all teachers and students of medieval Welsh history. The editor, publishers, and all concerned in the production of this attractive volume deserve our congratulations and thanks. One of Mr. Williams's chapters is, quite properly, devoted to the revolt of Owain Glyn Dwr and its aftermath. This is also the subject of a short essay by Mr. Gwilym Arthur Jones, awarded the prize of the University of Wales Press at the National Eisteddfod of 1961. Written for children of 11-13 years of age, it is very much a work of piety, lapsing at times into uncritical hagiography, from which Glyn Dwr emerges as 'a just ruler, a cultured gentleman and a warm-hearted patriot'. Henry IV is condemned for his desecration of Strata Florida, but nowhere are we told that the abbey of Cwm-hir suffered the same fate at the hands of Glyn Dwr's followers. Some inaccuracies appear. It is misleading to speak of 'the Church of Avignon' during the Great Schism. And Glyn Dwr did not want to set up 'an independent church of Wales'; what he wished to establish was a separate ecclesiastical province, independent of Canter- bury, and consisting of not only the four Welsh dioceses but also the bishoprics of Coventry and Lichfield, Worcester, Hereford, Bath and Wells, and Exeter. Finally, on p. 45, Hywel Dda, who died c. 950, appears in the twelfth century. w. GREENWAY. Swansea. THE GARDEN OF WALES. Edited by Stewart Williams. Barry, 1961. Pp. 129. 18s. SAINTS AND SAILING Smps. Edited by Stewart Williams. Barry, 1962. Pp. 132. 18s. Readers of the first two volumes in this series will have learnt what to expect in the last two. According to established pattern, each volume contains a dozen or so essays, each running to some 4,000 to 5,000 words, on various aspects of the history of the Vale of Glamorgan. The essays are all profusely and expertly illustrated with well-reproduced photo- graphs. The subjects covered by them are catholic in their range of topic and period. Many of the authors included in these volumes have contributed before, and a few appear in all four.