Welsh Journals

The lecture displays not only learning but also verve and perspicacity. Its author's interest in the subject was aroused by the perusal of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Vita Merlini. His references to Welsh examples and parallels show how well he adapted himself to his environment during his short tenure of the chair of Hispanic Studies at Cardiff. A. o. H. JARMAN Cardiff THE WELSH CISTERCIANS: ASPECTS OF THEIR ECONOMIC ACTIVITY. By David H. Williams. The Griffin Press, Pontypool, 1969. Pp. 100, maps and illustrations. 31s. 6d. Mr. D. H. Williams, already known to readers of Archaeologia Cambrensis and the Monmouthshire Antiquary for his essays on individual Cistercian houses in south-east Wales, has now made a useful compilation of material relating to the Welsh province of the order as a whole. His work is arranged under various headings: the process of settlement, site changes, the impact of external events. But the book is sub-titled 'Aspects of their (i.e., the Cistercians') Economic History', and it is this branch of their many-sided activities which principally interests him. Nevertheless, there is a good deal of information which can only roughly be classified as economic: their interests are not amenable to rigid classification, and the author is quick to see that peculiarities of organization, though largely dictated by spiritual considerations, inevitably affected their economic and social contribution to life in medieval Wales. Their quest for solitude, for instance, helped to develop their pastoral interests and may well have contributed to their practice of hospitality. The scale of Cistercian activity was restricted: fourteen houses were listed as belonging to the Welsh province in 1521. Yet, it is a commonplace that they exercised an influence and enjoyed a position inside Wales and in the hearts of Welshmen out of all proportion to their numbers. They enjoyed the patronage of the native princes, and themselves were patrons of Welsh literature. They were well endowed: a map on p. 38 shows how extensive their Welsh holdings were. Much of their acreage consisted of mountain sheep runs. Two contrasting aspects of the Cistercian world are seen in the economy of Aberconway, with holdings of over 38,000 acres; one of its Snowdonian granges comprised more than 12,000 acres, though only nine tenants lived there. Inevitably, wool assumed great importance in the monastic economy: the Welsh houses were contributing to exports in the time of King John, though the trade was most prosperous in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, when Italian merchants from Lucca and Siena were familiar with the technicalities of Welsh production. Yet the monks were not only sheep-farmers: they were forward in the business of assarting, enjoying exemption from tithe