To tell you why the title ‘Prince of Wales’ is an historical insult to the Welsh and shouldn’t exist anymore

[Upthebracket22]

I am Welsh. I was enraged yesterday when the new king decided to ‘bestow’ the title on Prince William, an English Prince without asking the Welsh if they wanted another English Prince of Wales.

here is some historical context from a petition going around at the moment:

The "Prince of Wales" title (Welsh: Tywysog Cymru) is a title historically used by native, Welsh princes since the 14th century. The last native Prince of Wales was Llywelyn the Last, killed by English soldiers in 1282 and his head was then paraded through the streets of London and placed on a Tower of London spike. Llywelyn's brother Dafydd was the first person of note to be hung, drawn and quartered and his head was placed next to Llywelyn's. Both their daughters were taken as infants and children and imprisoned.

But this happened centuries ago you might say. The truth is, that since the days of Llywelyn the Last and the "rebel" Prince of Wales, Owain Glyndwr, the title has been held exclusively by Englishmen as a symbol of dominance over Wales. To this day, the English "Princes of Wales" have no genuine connection to our country.

The title remains an insult to Wales and is a symbol of historical oppression. The title also implies that Wales is still a principality, undermining Wales' status as a nation and a country. In addition, the title has absolutely no constitutional role for Wales, which is now a devolved country with a national Parliament.

As Welsh actor, Michael Sheen put it;

"Make a break there. Put some things that have been the wrongs of the past right. There's an opportunity to do that at that point. Don't necessarily just because of habit and without thinking just carry on that tradition that was started as a humiliation to our country. Why not change that as we come to this moment where things will inevitably change."

I don’t think many people have any concept of Welsh history. I find it offensive and think now would have been a good moment to right a historical wrong.

Is this you seriously attempting to claim or suggest that the Prima Nocta myth isn't a part of Scottish Nationalism?

As the bit you selectively quoted refers to that. Additionally, I see you didn't touch the other examples. Probably best not to.

Now, let's have no further Ad Hominem Fallacies from you....shall we?

Answer the question: How you objectively quantify the "major distortion" you refer to?

Consider the "long winded" comment a bit of external construction feedback, don't take it personally.

Consider the comment on Slavic alphabets a reminder to fact check. Again very constructive feedback.

Sheeeesh

yes predominantly Anglo German, "predominantly" means "mostly", allowing for other elements (surely I don't need to say that again ?)

no, someone doesn't have to have ALL the elements of nationality I suggested, just SOME of them, so not a binary choice. I set it out like that because William doesn't seem to meet ANY of the criteria I suggested very well, he lived there years ago, with no apparent plans to move back - and apparently learnt the national anthem parrot-fashion (nice that he did that but not the same as learning the language). But most fundamentally he hasn't even expressed that he wants to be regarded primarily as Welsh as far as I know? and it would seem a bit unreasonable to ascribe the nationality to him therefore.

Yes there is genuinely a Welsh culture as I've discussed. It is a bit mean hearted that you want to deny Wales its cultural distinctiveness in order to lumber it with some Royals from Berkshire.

@herecomesthsun I was born in Scotland. I've lived and worked here for most of my life (apart from boarding school in England and a decade working in Germany). I consider myself English, I feel no attachment to Scottish traditions, culture, etc. It's very much the same for my kids too (boarding school in England), but now working in Scotland too.

Sports can reveal a lot. I always support England in cricket, rugby, football. The one exception being I'm a long time Rangers (and Everton) supporter. Looking forward to seeing Rangers-Liverpool, but we could not get tickets for the Anfield game :(

Yeah, I think it is a bit fluid, and that personal affiliation comes into it hugely. But I think the "Welsh leader" (Tywysog Cymru) should be someone who is clear that they identify as being Welsh, rather "British", which is not the same thing.

Quite! It is still relatively unknown by many.

PS It's 'harrying' not 'harrowing'.

13 minutes before someone bit 😂

Well boohoo. The royal family is a symbol of oppression for everyone, English people included. We’re all stuck with them. Better to get rid of them altogether than fanny around trying to convince people they need to change their stupid meaningless titles.

Big step = and much more controversial - to get rid of the monarchy, relatively simple to tweak the Tywysog thing.

Interesting word Tywysog. Cognate with Taoiseach no doubt , which also means Leader.

William might be a good Taoiseach for all I know. Charles might be a good King. If there was an election he'd likely win it

I'm sure there's people who claim descent from the last High King of Ireland. Doubt I'd vote for him / her. But it's nice to have the option.

Not every single line, that would mean over 2 million people, and there are many theads that do not have records going back that far. My ancestry is also not nobility, and the further back you go the fewer records exist for peasants/serfs so I’ve really only found the lines through my “bastard” ancestors born on wrong side of the beds of nobility back that far. My tree currently has 2300 people in it.

Some notables in my family tree from 12-13th century include Ada Delen died 1220 Dumbarton. Gilbert Drummyn 1297 Kincardineshire, four generations of Malcom Drummonds : 1150, 1210, 1239, and 1295. A Roderick Drummond in 1181 all in Kincardineshire. Non Graham 1220, Kirkwall, Orkney. Lnu Maldwin 1150 Loch Lommond. Euphemia Ross, 1257 Tain, and Beatrix Stewart 1184 Forfar.

That's the thing - it's been ably demonstrated that the Windsors' ancestry is not predominantly Anglo-German. Their Scottish ancestry both well established and significantly sizeable. So is their Irish ancestry. Add in a good chunk of Welsh.

You'd have been more accurate in saying they're predominantly of British-German ancestry, allowing for the varying degrees of Europe wide ancestry.

William began learning Welsh in 1999 at the behest of King Charles. It's thought he's not fluent in it which is the same as most of the 29% who can speak Welsh. Remember, a whopping 70% of people in Wales cannot speak Welsh. So, it's clearly not a part of some kind of criteria you've imagined.

Neither is living in Wales. I know someone who is Welsh and hasn't lived there for about 40 years. Again, this isn't a criteria.

Who's talking about ascribing Welsh to William? The point is he has good connections to Wales!

Hang on, I'm denying nothing of a Welsh culture. But I am impressing upon you that Wales is NOT really different from the rest of the UK. Moving from one part of the UK to another isn't a culture shock by any means. British culture is found in all parts of the UK. Wales has more commonality with the rest of the UK than it does differences.

Considering 70% of people in Wales don't speak any Welsh, are you counting books written in English by Welsh authors as Welsh culture? Or songs sung in English by Welsh singers? And so on. Those would be British culture. But you cannot possibly mean cultural things solely in Welsh since 70% of people in Wales don't have any Welsh skills. A good chunk of the 29% who have some Welsh skills aren't fluent enough for 100% Welsh cultural expressions.

Welsh is a minority language. Therefore, Wales mostly has the same culture as the rest of the UK. British.

That's the thing - it's been ably demonstrated that the Windsors' ancestry is not predominantly Anglo-German. not the main point, but no it hasn't

Yes, it has which is why I posted the line if descent from Brian Boru to Queen Elizabeth II, for example. Did a partial ljne for her Scottish line too. These are very extensive lines and not small ones.

Showed the Welsh line.

It amounts to Windsor ancestry not being predominantly Anglo, but British. 🤔

Hang on, I'm denying nothing of a Welsh culture. But I am impressing upon you that Wales is NOT really different from the rest of the UK.

Those 2 statements don't hang together.

www.itv.com/news/wales/2022-09-16/crowd-heard-booing-as-king-charles-arrives-at-cardiff-castle

I think that a tactful approach that takes into account the spectrum of opinion - the boos as well as the cheers -would be very wise.

I actually think that this would be a very inopportune time to completely dismantle the monarchy as we have so much other uncertainty and some people find the Royals reassuring, but they need to handle this carefully and to listen to the concerns of Mark Drakeford and co. Who were, you know, elected.

Well, you could get too hung up on genetics and family trees but the contribution of Prince Philip, for example, to Charles' bloodline is approximately 50%, and Brian Boru would have been a 36th great-grandfather, so the amount of genetic material passed on to the modern day Royals pretty minimal.

In addition, when you get that far back, to someone born in 941, a successful reproducer would have literally millions of descendents by now. You and I are almost certainly descended from Brian Boru too.

It gets meaningless at this point.

May I say, I have nothing against German people, and Prince Philip was a very interesting character, the D of E scheme is great etc.

But then you’re back to insisting Queen Victoria and her descendants are all German regardless of place of birth or where they were brought up or lived.

How long does a family have to live somewhere before you’ll let go of ‘German’

Charles IIIs Grandmother was 100% Scottish.

Yes , Brian Boru died in 1014. Most of us are descended from him. Sir Iain Moncrieff, the late Chief Herald , said we are all descended from Charlemagne who died in the early 800s.

But any descendant of Brian's who sits in the House of Lords will only have Irish blood in homeopathic amounts.

So ....

How many people alive in the UK today do you think could also trace their family tree and find those same people as great...........grandparents?

It's not impressive.

Sorry. It's meaningless

Considering 70% of people in Wales don't speak any Welsh, are you counting books written in English by Welsh authors as Welsh culture? Or songs sung in English by Welsh singers? And so on. Those would be British culture.

so you are in effect arguing that for example Scottish folk songs sung in English by Scottish people are British culture and not Scottish culture? Novels written by Welsh authors in English but set in Wales are not Welsh culture but British culture?

Appears to be a lot of booing almost Boris levels for the King.

twitter.com/Lowkey0nline/status/1570787551354720256