Welsh Journals

must be welcomed. These volumes are a worthy tribute to a distinguished scholar who has made a major contribution to Welsh historical studies and, in doing so, to the study of medieval military architecture. For him this has been more than a life's work; as his British Academy lecture so clearly shows, it has been a labour of love. These studies bear witness to fine scholarship; they also bear witness to the strength of purpose and administrative ability of one of the greastest English kings, however much some may regret the consequences of his activities in Wales. And they pay tribute to the genius of that Savoyard master mason, one of a line of master craftsmen, whom Edward employed to execute his plans and whose work still stands to remind us of his skill. Bangor A. D. Carr Ieuan GWYNEDD JONES, Communities: Essays in the Social History of Victorian Wales. Gwasg Gomer 1987, 370 pp. £ 14.95. In 1981 Gwasg Gomer displayed considerable initiative and enterprise in publishing a volume of eight essays by Professor Ieuan Gwynedd Jones under the title Explorations and Explanations: Essays in the Social History of Victorian Wales (reviewed ante, volume 30 (1981-2), pp. 171-3). Now the press has served the cause of Welsh history yet again by publishing, as a companion volume, a further collection of thirteen essays by the same author. All of these essays have already appeared in print between 1964 and 1984 either as articles in academic journals or as pamphlets following their delivery as lectures. Whereas, however, the most recent essay in Explorations and Explanations dates from 1972, all but one of the writings in the present volume span the years 1971 to 1984. They constitute, therefore, the mature reflections of an experienced historian based on many years of rigorous sifting of the source materials available to him and a sustained and critical analysis of the evidence they reveal. The author has devoted almost the whole of his academic career to an intensive study of the social, political and religious history of mid-nineteenth century Wales. The first five essays describe and analyse the building or re-building of parish churches in various parts of Wales. One, relating to Flintshire, was originally published in this journal, volume 29 (1979-80), pp. 89-112. Combining the training and skills of the historian with an obvious taste for sociological investigation, Professor Jones makes a number of perceptive and revealing comments on the industrial and rural communities served by these churches and displays a rare empathy for the characteristics of mid-nineteenth century Welsh society, both agrarian and industrial. Taken together, these papers provide a sorely needed Welsh dimension to more general studies of the nineteenth-century revival and reforming spirit in the Anglican church of which church re-building and re- furbishing represented a tangible and enduring aspect. As the author takes pains to point out, the chronology and pattern of the building reflected and, at the