Encyclopaedia

DAFYDD AP GWILYM (fl.1315/20–1350/70) Poet

Although the greatest of medieval Welsh poets in the eyes of most critics, and certainly the most versatile, no contemporary historical records of Dafydd ap Gwilym appear to have survived. The few historical references in his poetry suggest that he was active around the middle of the 14th century. He belonged to a well-born family from Cemais, although the poet himself may have been born at Brogynin (Trefeurig), then in the parish of Llanbadarn Fawr. His was an oral art, although it may be that an autograph copy of one of his poems survives in the Hendregadredd Manuscript. His poetry has been preserved in manuscripts dating from the 14th to the 18th century, and over 500 poems are attributed to him. Thomas Parry included some 150 poems in his magisterial edition of Dafydd’s work (1952), but the question of the authorship of many poems attributed to him remain a matter for debate.

Dafydd was the foremost of the first generation of poets to compose in the cywydd metre, but his work also includes examples of almost every genre of poetry known from medieval Wales. He composed awdlau and englynion in the manner of the Poets of the Princes, and cywyddau on a range of themes, including nature, religion and, above all, love (especially addresses to the unobtainable Dyddgu and the intermittently attainable Morfudd). His poems to his patron Ifor ap Llywelyn (fl.1340-60) - known as Ifor Hael (Ifor the Generous) - of Basaleg (see Graig), near Newport, broke new ground by combining the techniques of praise poetry with those of love poetry.

Many similarities exist between Dafydd’s works and medieval poetry from England and mainland Europe, but identifying the Welshman’s sources proves problematic. Contrary to the usual practice of poets such as the troubadours of southern France, Dafydd uses the first person to relate his frequently comic tales of misfortunes in love. Despite the lively personality at work in the poems, they should not be read as autobiography. Dafydd’s fruitful and playful imagination is manifest in his use of the convention of the llatai, or love messenger, which is usually an animal, a bird or even the wind.

Dafydd’s originality was obvious to his contemporaries, as the poet Gruffudd Gryg (fl.1357-70) notes in a famous bardic contention with Dafydd. Deploring Dafydd’s emotional exaggerations, Gruffudd declares that King Arthur himself would have been long dead had his heart suffered the spear wounds that Dafydd claims afflict him. In a famous rebuff, Dafydd defends the use of his imagination by saying that gwawd (traditional praise poetry) is no more noble than his ‘geuwawd o gywydd’ (cywydd of false praise, namely his love poetry).

The work of Dafydd ap Gwilym, which brought Welsh poetry into the European mainstream, retains its vigour and vibrancy to this day. Such has been his popularity down the centuries that two places - Talyllychau and Strata Florida (Ystad Fflur) - contend for the honour of being his burial place.