Welsh Journals

the bardic hierarchy were raised by the sixteenth-century eistedd- fodau, partly in response to falling standards, but also, it seems, to exclude outsiders. Preservation and codification of existing tradition were un- doubtedly important to Welsh bardic craftsmen. Comprehensive inventories of cerdd dant pieces began to be copied from at least the early sixteenth century, and two theoretical documents on cerdd dant also survive from this period. In neither case can we be certain when, or even whether, a written original was compiled, but both the Dosbarth Cerdd Dannau ('the classification of cerdd dant') and the Cadwedigaeth Cerdd Dannau ('the preservation of cerdd danf) claim that some of the formal rules of the art were codified by a council of harpers and crwth players which met at Glyn Achlach (Glendalough?) in Ireland in c.1100. The names of some of those present at the council found their way into the titles of pieces within the repertory, but it is not certain to what extent they reflect ancient authority and tradition, how far they are the result of cumulative oral compilation over a number of generations, or to what extent this impressive past was really a retrospective and spurious construction, generated by later craftsmen anxious to sanction a repertory that was in danger of disappearing for ever. This article does not attempt to prove or disprove the claims made for the tradition or its roots, but rather it addresses the evident tendency for classification and canonization of the repertory which seems to have emerged in the mid fifteenth century. This movement perhaps began at the Carmarthen Eisteddfod of c.1451, and is em- bodied in several sources: Robert ap Huw's own manuscript, the lists of cerdd dant pieces in Welsh manuscripts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and the requirements of the comprehensive bardic syllabus known as the Statute of Gruffudd ap Cynan, named after the Irish-born King of Gwynedd (c. 1055-1137), but probably compiled no earlier than the 1520s in the form in which we know it. The evidence of the Statute suggests the grouping of pieces into specific compositional genres, and the manner in which certain genres never exceeded a fixed number of items. An implicit hier- archy of genre emerges both from the Statute of Gruffudd ap Cynan and from a selection of poetic cywyddau praising the accomplish- ments of cerdd dant players. It becomes apparent that some of the most technically demanding pieces appear in fixed groups of four, and in many instances take their titles from specific craftsmen who were active in the second half of the fifteenth century. One may conclude that this was a critical time within the history of cerdd dant, when the tendency to codify and canonize begins to permeate the repertory, giving rise to a series of eisteddfodau, a new bardic