Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 23.djvu/312

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Gruffydd
304
Gruffydd

eyebrows. He had a fine beard, a fair skin, and strong limbs. He was able to speak several languages. His wife was Angharad, daughter of Owain, son of Edwin (Brut y Tywysogion, p. 153). Her beauties are minutely described by the biographer. By her Gruffydd had three sons: Cadwallon (who in 1124 slew his mother's three brothers, and in 1132 was slain by his cousins), Cadwaladr [q. v.], and Owain, afterwards famous as Owain Gwynedd [q. v.] He also had by her many daughters (ib.; the Life says five, and gives their names), one of whom, Gwenllian, was the wife, first of Cadwgan ab Bleddyn, and then of Gruffydd ab Rhys. Gruffydd was also the father of several illegitimate children.

[The Brut y Tywysogion (Rolls Ser.) is very full for this period, but as it deals mainly with South Wales its notices of Gruffydd are comparatively scanty; the Annales Cambriæ (Rolls Ser.) is shorter but sometimes more precise; the 'Grwentian' Brut y Tywysogion, published by the Cambrian Archæological Association, adds some details that can hardly be accepted; the English chroniclers, especially Ordericus Vitalis, Historia Ecclesiastica, vols. iii. and iv. ed. Le Prévost (Soc. de l'Histoire de France), add a little; the chief source, however, is the detailed biography 'Historia Hen Gruffud vab Kenan vab Yago,' commonly called Hanes Gruffydd ab Cynan, published in the Myvyrian Archæology of Wales, ii. 583-605, and, apparently more precisely, in the Archæologia Cambrensis, 3rd ser. Nos. xlv. and xlvi. 1866, by the Rev. Robert Williams; appended to the latter edition is a Latin translation by Bishop Robinson of Bangor (1566-1585), preserved in the library at Peniarth, and there published for the first time; the biography is worked up in elaborate literary form, with classical parallels and quotations, and, though wanting in chronology and almost too minute not to excite some suspicion, its outline corresponds fairly with that derived from the other sources; the Myvyrian Archæology of Wales, i, 189-191 (ed. 1801) for Meiler's elegy; Stephens's Literature of the Kymry, 2nd edit.; Freeman's William Rufus works up in detail Gruffydd's relations with England; Powel's History of Cambria; Walter's Das alte Wales (Bonn, 1859); J. D. Rhys, Cambro-Brytannicæ Cymræcæve Linguæ Institutiones (1592) for the Musical Laws, translated in the Transactions of the Cymmrodorion Soc. i. 283-293.]

T. F. T.

GRUFFYDD ab GWENWYNWYN (d. 1286?), lord of Cyveiliog, Upper Powys, or, as it was called from his father, Powys Gwenwynwyn, was the son of Gwenwynwyn [q. v.], the son of Owain Cyveiliog, by his wife, Margaret Corbet. The expulsion of his father from his dominions by Llewelyn, son of Iorwerth, led to Gruffydd's being brought up in England, where in 1218 his father died. He was supported by a charge on the revenues of his estates, which remained in Llewelyn's hands, by the dower of his mother's English estates, and by occasional grants from the exchequer, as for example in 1224, when he received half a mark because he was sick (Rot. Lit. Claus. i. 583). Llewelyn kept Cyveiliog in his hands until his death in 1240, though after 1233 Gruffydd and his followers seem to have frequented the king's border castles. In 1241 Gruffydd paid a fine of three hundred marks to the king and obtained the seisin of all his father's estates, doing homage for them to Henry alone, so that he held as a baron of the king, and was independent of the princes of Gwynedd (Excerpta e Rot. Finium, i. 350; Annales Cambriæ, s.a. 1241). In the same year he acted as a surety for Senena, wife of Gruffydd ab Llewelyn, in her agreement with Henry III (Matt. Paris, Hist. Major, iv. 318, ed. Luard).

In 1244 Gruffydd was one of the three Welsh magnates who alone remained faithful to the king when Davydd ab Llewelyn [see Davydd II, 1208-1246] revolted. He was besieged in his castle of Walwar, and though steadfast himself was much afraid that his followers would desert to Prince Davydd (Shirley, Royal Letters, ii. 38). In 1247, after Davydd's death, Gruffydd led a South Welsh army over the Dyvi to ravage Gwynedd (Ann. Cambriæ, s. a. 1247).

Gruffydd's fidelity to the English king involved him similarly in conflicts with Llewelyn ab Gruffydd, and brought him more privileges and grants from the crown. After Prince Edward's officers had enraged the Welsh princes by their attempt to introduce the English system of administration, Llewelyn marched against Gruffydd, and in 1256 deprived him of nearly all his lands (Brut y Tywysogion, p. 343). In 1257 he lost his territories altogether (ib. p. 345), and took refuge in England, where in 1260 he was summoned, doubtless for his English estates, to serve against Llewelyn (Fœdera, i. 399). But the English connection had done Gruffydd very little good, and he was also involved in a long and troublesome suit with his kinsman Thomas Corbet of Caus, for the possession of Gorddwr. In 1263 he revolted from the king and on bended knee did homage to Llewelyn as prince of Wales (Annales Cambriæ s. a.), receiving in return some additional grants of territory. He at once besieged Mold, in the interest of his new lord. In 1267, when the mediation of the legate Ottobon put an end to the war, Gruffydd was recognised by Henry III as a vassal of Llewelyn, but was