General Notes

Cadwaladr (d 1172), the son of Gruffudd, the son of Cynan, was the son and the brother of the two most famous north Welsh princes of their time. During his father's lifetime he accompanied his elder brother, Owain, on many predatory excursions against rival princes. In 1121 they ravaged Meirionydd, and apparently conquered it. In 1135 and 1136 they led three successful expeditions to Ceredigion, and managed to get possession of at least the northern portion of that district. In 1137 Owain succeeded, on Gruffudd ap Cynan's death, to the sovereignty of Gwyneed or North Wales. Cadwaladr appears to have found his portion in his former conquests of Meirionydd and northern Ceredigion. The intruder from Gwynedd soon became involved in feudes both with his south Welsh neighbours and with his family. In 1143 his men slew Anarawd, son of Gruffudd of South Wales, to whom Owain Gwynedd had promised his daughter in marriage. Repudiated by his brother, who sent his son Howel to ravage his share of Ceredigion and to attack his castle of Aberystwith, Cadwaladr fled to Ireland, whence he returned next year with a fleet of Irish Danes, to wreak vengeance on Owain. The fleet had already landed at the mouth of the Menai Straits when the intervention of the 'goodmen' of Gwynedd reconciled the brothers. Disgusted at what they probably regarded as treachery, the Irish pirates seized and blinded Cadwaladr, and only released him on the payment of a heavy ransom of 2,000 bondmen (some of the chroniclers say cattle). Their attempt to plunder the country was successfully resisted by Owain. In 1146, however, fresh hostilities broke out between Cadwaladr and his brother's sons Howel and Cynan. they invaded Meirionydd and captured his castle of Cynvael, despite the valiant resistance of his steward, Morvran, abbot of Whitland. This disaster lost Cadwaladr Meirionydd, and so hard was he pressed that, despite his building a castls at Llanrhystyd in Ceredigion (1148), he was compelled to surrender his possessions in that district to his son, apparently in hope of a compromise; but Howel next year captured his cousin and conquered this territory, while the brothers of the murdered Anarawd profited by the dissensions of the princes of Gwynedd to conquer Ceredigion as far north as the Aeron, and soon extended their conquests into Howel's recent acquisitions. Meanwhile Cadwaladr was expelled by Owain from his last refuge in Mona. Cadwaladr now seems to have taken refuge witht he English, with whom, if we may believe a late authority, his marriage with a lady of the house of Clare had already connected him. The death of Stephen put an end to the long period of Welsh freedom under which Cadwaladr had grown up. In 1157 Henry II's first expedition to Wales, though by no means a brilliant success, was able to effect Cadwaladr's restoration to his old dominions. Despite his blindness, Cadwaladr had not lost his energy. In 1158 he joined the marcher lords and his nephews in an expedition against Rhys ap Gruffudd of South Wales. In 1165 Cadwaladr took part in the general resistance to Henry II's third expediton in Wales. In 1169 the death of Owain Gwynedd probably weakened his position. In March 1172 Cadwaladr himself died, and was buried in the same tomb as Owain, before the high altar of Bangor Cathedral.

The Welsh chroniclers are very full of Cadwaladr's exploits, and celebrate him as jointly with his brother upholding the unity of the British kingdom. Giraldus specially commends Cadwaladr's liberality. [Dictionary of National Biography III:642-643]


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Cadwaladr (d 1172), prince, was teh third son of Gruffudd ap Cynan (d 1137) and his wife Angharad. He is first heard of in 1136, when, on the death of Richard FitzGilbert, lord of Ceredigion, his elder brother, Owain Gwynedd, and he invaded the province and took the five northern castles, including Aberystwyth. At the end of the year they returned with a large force of mail-clad knights and foot soldiers and swept over the south of the region, defeating the foreign settlers in a battle at Grug Mawr, not far from Cardigan. Cardigan town was sacked, but the castle, which could not be reinforced by sea, was not taken. In 1137 the two brothers completed their conquest by the capture of castles in the east and south of Ceredigion; a bold push across the Teify also gave them Carmarthen. This was the limit of their success; in 1138 they failed, even with the aid of a Danish flotilla, to break down the persistence of the garrison of Cardigan, and Cadwaladr was content to reap the fruits of victory and to occupy northern Cardigan as his share of the spoil. A little later he appears in a somewhat surprising light as an ally of earl Randolph II of Chester in the attack upon LIncoln of 2 Feb 1141, which resulted in the sack of the town and the capture of king Stephen. But this was no blind adventure; it must be connected with Cadwaladr's marriage to Alice de Clare, daughter of FitzGilbert - an alliance clearly intended to strenghten his hold upon Ceredigion and one which made him earl Randolph's nephew. A serious crime in 1143 led to a rupture with his brother. He allowed his retinue treacherously to murder the South Welsh leader, Anarawd ap Gruffydd, and thus incurred the just wrath of Owain, who bade his son Hywel expel him from Ceredigion. Cadwaladr found refuge in Ireland and there secured the help of the Danes of Dublin, who in 1144 brought a fleet to Abermenai to reinstate him. But here there was a change of front; Cadwaladr escaped from the custody of his allies ('blinded' is a mistranslation of the 'Brut' by Ab Ithel) and was reconciled to his brother, who drove off the invaders.

Trouble still beset him. In 1147 his nephews, Hywel and Cynan, entered Meirionnydd, the one from the south and the other from the north, and attacked his castle of Cynfail, held loyally for him by Morfran, head of the neighbouring 'clas' of Towyn. They were successful and in another two years Cadwaladr gave up his share of Ceredigion, with his new castle of Llanrhystud, to his son Cadfan. Finally, there was in 1152 a fresh quarrel with Owain, which led to his expulsion from Anglesey and a five years exile in England. His English connections now stood him in good stead. It is known that he attested, as 'Welsh,' or 'North Welsh King,' charters executed by earl Randolph in favour of the abbeys of Chester and of Shrewsbury and later, when Henry II came to the throne, he was provided with honourable maintenance at Ness in Shropshire.

Exile ended in 1157, when Henry invaded Gwynedd and secured as a condition of peace he return of Cadwaladr to his former standing. Henceforth, he ceased to pursue persional ends and is found acting with his fellow princes of the North. He was one of the coalition of northerners and English earls who in 1159 attempted in vain to subdue Rhys ap Gruffydd. He stood at the side of his brother in the great assembly of Welsh chiefs at Corwen in 1165 and aided him in the capture in 1167 of the castles of Rhuddlan and Prestatyn.

Cadwaladr survived Owain and d 29 Feb 1172. He was buried in Bangor cathedral and Gerald of Wales saw in 1188 the double tomb of the two brothers in the wall of the presbytery, near the high altar. He mentions Cadwaladr as a prince of lavish generosity; the only evidence of this is his gift of the church of Nevin to Haughmond abbey by a charter witnessed by his wife and earl Randolph. [Dictionary of Welsh Biography pp62-63]