Here Be Dragons
Part 1
A little while ago, two members of the Terroir North Wales team had cause to travel regularly from the Vale of Clwyd in the north of Wales to near Llandeilo in the south. Those familiar with the geography of Wales will instantly recognise that this was going to be a slow and circuitous journey whichever route the Terroir team chose. The eastern route generally passes through lower lying and more undulating country whilst the western passes largely through more mountainous terrain.
We had to invent something to pass the time. Perhaps a simple game of I Spy might have worked, but M for mountain, F for field, S for sheep, DSW for dry stone wall and TJ for Traffic Jam (and yes, we do occasionally have those in Wales), would get very repetitious. Coloured cars was a bit too infantile and railway bridges disappointing; guaranteed never to exceed low single figures.
So what do you think we settled on? Well, dragons of course. Considering that most people consider dragons to be a figment of imagination, their images are omnipresent throughout Wales. No, not great scary fire breathing reptiles, lurking behind boulders or under river bridges, but red, Welsh dragon images in all their forms.
Image right: straight on for Wales and non scary dragons, left to England for scary Daleks and a variety of transport options.
And goodness, how very many forms there were: pictures and caricatures on buses, taxis, shopfronts, delivery vans, road signs and so on.
So many in fact that the game later evolved into categories – acceptable/valid images such as found on, say, Dragon Taxis, Dragon Auto Parts or patriotically flown Welsh flags (see top of this post), and unacceptable/inane dragon images, found on something having no real Welsh connection or relevance, eg some shopfronts, some buses and quite a lot of lorries. Of course this latter classification in itself caused debate, with points being awarded or lost depending on whether the opponent agreed or disagreed with the dragon spotter. Needless to say it created a fun activity to lessen the tedium of such a long and regular round trip.
Up to you to decide which category the following imges fall into.
The above are pretty easy to judge on the ‘valid or ‘inane’ decision, but why does the CCGC/CCW dragon (above centre) face the ‘wrong’ way?
Who decides which language should come first?
Welsh transport - old and new-ish.
Welsh groceries.
This led us to a discussion along the lines of ‘what would you get if a Welsh person asked a group of English people what they think typifies Wales, in one or two words (we are assuming that the English people have never, or rarely, visited the Principality)?
What would our blog readers suggest? We guessed that some of the more likely responses (in no particular order of course) would include mountains, coal mines, daffodils, leeks, rugby, unpronounceable place names (ok that’s three words) and, yes, dragons. So let’s have a look at these a bit more closely.
Mountains – yes plenty of those but contrary to popular belief, Wales has substantial areas of low lying land, especially in the east and parts of the south and south west. For example most of Pembrokeshire is very low lying and so is Anglesey of course.
Coal Mines – probably one of the most common myths is that Wales has or had wall to wall coal mines, interspersed with happy miners singing their socks off in every valley. Of course the mining areas were largely confined to the valleys of south and south east Wales and to a lesser extent in the north east around Wrexham and Deeside.
Image above: the Rhondda Valley’s Glamorgan Colliery c 1920 © Terroir
In between those two areas there were positively no coal mines (though incidentally tiny coal mines did once exist, for a very brief period, in Pembrokeshire and on Anglesey).
Little trace remains today; the mines are all closed and the tips removed or regraded. The rows of terraced houses and the odd preserved headgear are all that reminds us of this industry.
Above: images of South Wales mining taken at the Blaenavon Big Pit National Coal Museum. ‘National’ means ‘Wales’ in this context. Note the red dragon flying proudly from the preserved pit head gear (above left). Images © Terroir
Daffodils – here with Welsh Border Collie - are found everywhere but are not specifically Welsh, of course. The wild daffodils in the Lake District which so enthused Wordsworth are not to be found in Wales in such abundance, although they do occur in small numbers in many places.
The daffodil seems to be a relatively late addition to Welsh symbolism and the precise reason for its adoption remains unclear. Maybe its Welsh name Cenhinen bedr (Peter’s leek) may have some bearing in so far as it has, to some extent, superseded the leek as an emblem of Wales. And, of course, it is somewhat easier to wear as a buttonhole, and considerably less pungent than the leek. Also the fact that by St David’s Day (1st March) there should be plenty of daffodils in flower, makes it easier to gather for the many events that take place on that day.
Leeks – legend claims that Cadwaladr, a seventh century king of Gwynedd, ordered his men to fasten a leek onto their armour to help to identify them in battle. The tradition of the leek as a symbol of Welsh-ness has persisted, albeit in modern times in less combative activities. But, it remains rather odoriferous and is now very much subservient to the daffodil.
Rugby – is very much a south Wales sport and garners relatively little participation or interest north thereof. So hardly an all embracing emblem of Wales.
Place Names – with a little bit of effort and a basic understanding of the Welsh alphabet (which has only a few differences from the English one) it is usually quite easy to correctly pronounce place names and, in almost all cases they are pronounced phonetically making it even simpler.
Longest village name in UK (and probably Europe). Usually referred to as LlanfairPG for obvious reasons.
Place names tend to be strongly descriptive, based on history and/or topography, thus making it easier to understand their meaning.
Note from the only all-English member of Team Terroir: from the English perspective, I wish to challlenge the above. Depending on how you define a ‘letter’, the Welsh alphabet has 29 options of which, arguably, only 19 are in common with the English alphabet. As an English speaker not resident in Wales or the borders, and schooled in Latin, French and German, I can assure you that it is hard work to learn Welsh phonetics, alphabet and place names, however logical that pronounciation may be! Also, If you have never learnt any Welsh, having place names which are descriptive is no help whatsoever! Assistance is not always constructive: if I was to pronounce Llanfair PG as suggested by the transliteration given on the sign above I would be banned from crossing the border for ever more. Oh and the pronounciation differs between north and south…
Terroir North Wales continues: a Welsh person in England could be forgiven [really?] for struggling with English place names, as they often are not phonetic, or are pronounced differently to how they read, or include silent letters. [Do the Welsh forgive the English for mis-pronounciation of Welsh place names?] By way of example, how about Happisburgh in Norfolk (pronounced Hazeburgh), Cholmondeley (Chumley), Horsted Keynes (Horsted Kanes) but Milton Keynes is – well – Milton Keynes, Kirkby is Kirby and Norwich is Norich. I rest my case! [But not even the English can pronounce these. Well, most of us can manage Norich].
Dragons – and finally we reach that most Welsh of all Welsh symbols immortalised for ever on the Welsh flag as a spectacular and rather fearsome looking bright red creature (in Welsh – y Ddraig Goch), rampant on a white and green background. Never mind boring stripes and coloured bands found on most country’s flags - this is a serious and instantly recognisable national banner and one of only three in the world to incorporate a dragon (and in case you ask - the others are Bhutan and Malta). It is found everywhere as a symbol of Welsh patriotism and will be seen fluttering from public buildings, private houses and gardens – in fact anywhere it can be displayed – with an exponential increase in use when a major Welsh event is taking place in the locality (such as an Eisteddfod).
We’ll look more closely at the Welsh Dragon in the next post, but we leave you now with a Welsh and English take on the Dragon myth.
All images © T Thompson unless otherwise stated.