Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru Sir Fflint a'r Cyffiniau, Awst 4 - 11, 2007
By Megan Lloyd
The Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru or Welsh National Eisteddfod is now underway in a maes or field near Flint, North Wales. While other eisteddfodau occur throughout Wales, the Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru is Wales’ largest and most important arts competition. Here, this week every August, poets, musicians, dramatists, artists, actors and dancers come to compete all in yr iaith Gymraeg, the Welsh language. To recognize this long-standing arts festival, here are a few words about its history.
Eistedd, in Welsh means to sit. Thus the highest honor given to any artist in Wales is for him or her to sit or be chaired. The climax to the Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru is the chairing of the bard ceremony where the poet who has won the competition for the best poem in strict meters is chaired. The second best award is the crown, given to the winner of the free verse competition.
Poets in Wales have always been highly regarded. Today’s contemporary chaired bard, and all those who compete in the competition for the chair, follow some of the strict poetic meters established in the earliest Welsh poetry we have record of, coming from the bards Taliesin and Aneirin writing in the sixth century. The chairing aspect of today’s eisteddfod may go back to the place of prominence the head poet or Pencerdd was given at the Welsh Court. Hywel Dda or ‘Hywel the Good’(d. 950) created Wales’ first uniform legal system which established twenty-four offices at court, for advisors, counselors, the clergy, with two given to poets. The highest honor was given to the Pencerdd or head singer who took his place beside the prince himself. The Pencerdd was in the immediate entourage of the king or Prince.* The head poet was not only given this prominent place at court, he was given land and the ability to license other poets.** An elite profession, belonging to the bardic order, poets learned their craft and became licensed once they mastered traditional meters and vocabulary. The court included a number of these other poets called the Bardd Teulu, or “family poets” – both a family of poets and poets for the family or lord or household. Also attached to the courts of Wales in the medieval period were the Cerddorion or apprentices. These men were the more popular singers who were learning their craft and waiting for a license from the Pencerdd. The Pencerdd and Bardd Teulu all had a job to pass along their craft. To become a member of the Bardd Teulu, a poet had to complete a rigorous poetical test. Once you were a member of the Bardd Teulu or became the Pencerdd, you had it made – a secure position and the necessities of life. The power of Welsh poetry can be seen by looking at this rule: If you were of lower class, you were not permitted to teach your son to be a scholar, a blacksmith or a poet. If you became any of these without detection, you would become a free man.***
Welsh bards held eisteddfodau to test and license apprentice poets, to review rules governing the craft of poet and musician, and to protect and promote the professional status of these artists. The earliest eisteddfod may be traced back to 1176 Cardigan where Lord Rhys invited poets and musicians from all over the country and awarded the best poet and musician a chair at his table. Medieval records show that eisteddfodau were held in 1450, 1523, and 1567 to license poets and musicians and to examine the rules of poetry and music. One specific aim of the 1567 Caerwys Eisteddfod was to control wandering minstrelsy. The gentry petitioned the crown for an eisteddfod in 1594, but nothing came of it.
The Caerwys Eisteddfod of 1567 was the last “official” eisteddfod until those of the “modern era” established during the nineteenth century and filled with druidic trappings, for example, the Gorsedd who, aided by maidens adorned in flowing garments, perform the chairing and crowning ceremonies. While today’s eisteddfod does not evaluate the rules governing behavior of Welsh artists nor does it test upcoming artists so they may one day become licensed, it still preserves the purity of form established in the oldest Welsh verse, and it sustains the rich heritage of the Welsh language through the arts themselves.
** Jenkins, Hywel Dda: The Law, 38-39.
*** Jenkins, Hywel Dda: The Law, 40.
Megan S. Lloyd, PhD, is Associate Professor at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, PA. She is the author of upcoming "Speak It in Welsh": Wales and the Welsh Language in Shakespeare, published by Lexington Books.
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