Gwladus verch Gruffydd - Issue of the mother of Gwladys ferch Gruffudd

Private User, thanks for a wonderful history lesson of some of my ancestors. Gruffydd ap Rhys is my 23rd grandfather and I'm enjoying information you share. It is on a line of my family that my father said "had their own words." When I first started this journey, I learned after just a few months why that might be the truth in rural areas of America specifically. I think much has been talked about Irish and Scottish dialects as pockets in various regions, but no one ever mentions Welsh. Yet, it is the most different. I think it deserves a study for sure there are pockets in places or were.

On another note, let's hope we all have the courage to be a daughter of Gwenllian.

Indeed!

Cawley doesn't seem to have found sources (yet?) for her mother either:

GRUFFYDD ap Rhys, son of RHYS ap Tewdr King of Deheubarth & his wife Gwladus --- ([1090]-murdered 1137). The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Gruffudd son of Rhys son of Tewdwr, king of South Wales, came from Ireland to Dyved…returned to his patrimony" in 1112 adding that he "passed about two years, sometimes with Gerald steward of Pembroke Castle, his brother-in-law who had married his sister Nest…"[497]. The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Rhys son of Tewdwr began to reign" in 1077[498]. Gerald of Wales´s Descriptio Kambriæ names “descendientes...a Theodoro...Resus filius Theodori, Griphinus filius Resi, et Resus filius Griphini qui hodie praest” as successive rulers in South Wales[499]. Florence of Worcester records that "Griffinus filius Res" plundered castles in Wales in 1116 in protest at Henry I King of England not allowing him to inherit part of his father's territories[500]. He succeeded in 1135 as King of Deheubarth. The Continuator of Florence of Worcester records that "rex Waliee Griffinus filius Res" was murdered in [1137][501]. The Annales Cambriæ record the death in 1137 of "Grifinus Resi filius"[502]. The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Gruffudd son of Rhys" died in 1136[503].

m (after 1116) GWENLLIAN of Gwynedd, daughter of GRUFFYDD ap Cynan King of Gwynedd & his wife Angharad of Deheubarth (-1136). The 13th century History of Gruffydd ap Cynan names "Gwenlliant and Margaret and Rhannillt and Susanna and Annest" as the daughters of Gruffydd ap Cynan by his wife[504]. [The Gwentian Chronicle names "Gwenllian daughter of Grufudd son of Cynan" as the mother of "Rhys" son of "Grufudd son of Rhys"[505].] Her parentage and marriage are confirmed by the Chronicle of the Princes of Wales which names "Rhys son of Gruffudd" and "his uncle Owain Gwynedd" in 1155[506].

King Gruffydd & his wife had two children:

1. MAREDUDD ([1130/31]-1157). He succeeded his half-brother in 1153 as joint King of Deheubarth, jointly with his brother. The Annales Cambriæ record that "Maredut filius Grifini" was killed in 1156[507]. The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Maredudd son of Gruffudd son of Rhys, the king of Ceredigion and the Vale of Tywi and Dyved" died aged 25 in 1154[508]. m ---. The name of Maredudd´s wife is not known. Maredudd & his wife had one child:

a) daughter . The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records the birth in 1172 of "Meurug son of the lord Rhys son of Gruffudd, of the daughter of Maredudd son of Gruffudd, his niece, the daughter of his brother"[509]. She was mistress ([1171/72]) of her uncle, RHYS ap Gruffydd, son of GRUFFYD ap Rhys King of Deheubarth & his wife Gwenllian of Gwynedd ([1132]-28 Apr 1197, bur St David's).

2. RHYS ([1132]-1197). [The Gwentian Chronicle names "Gwenllian daughter of Grufudd son of Cynan" as the mother of "Rhys" son of "Grufudd son of Rhys"[510].] He succeeded his half-brother in 1153 as King of Deheubarth, jointly with his brother.

- see below.

King Gruffydd had four illegitimate children by unknown mistresses:

3. ANARAWD (-1143). He succeeded his father in 1137 as King of Deheubarth. The Annales Cambriæ record that "Anaraut filius Grifini" was killed in 1143 "a familiaribus Cadwaladri"[511]. m (1142) ---, daughter of CADWALADR ap Gruffydd & his [first wife ---]. [The Gwentian Chronicle records that "Anarawd son of Gruffudd son of Rhys…was married to the daughter of Cadwaladr [son of Grufudd son of Cynan] against the inclination of Cawaladr" in 1142, after which "Cadwaladr stabbed Anarawd in the ribs so that he died"[512].]

4. CADELL (-1175, bur Strata Florida). He succeeded his brother in 1143 as King of Deheubarth. He abdicated in 1153. The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Cadell son of Gruffudd died of a severe disease and was buried in Strata Florida, after taking the religious habit" in 1175[513].

5. GWLADUS . Her parentage and both marriages are confirmed by the Chronicle of the Princes of Wales which records that "the lord Rhys son of Gruffudd" met King Henry II at Gloucester 25 Jul 1175, taking with him "…Morgan son of Caradog son of Iestin by his sister Gwladus, of Glamorgan… and Seisyll son of Dyvnwal of Gwent Uchcoed, the man who was then married to Gwladus sister of the lord Rhys"[514]. m firstly CARADOG ap Iestyn of Morganwg . m secondly SEISYLL ap Dyfnwal of Gwent Uchcoed (-killed Abergavenny 1175). The Chronicle of the Princes of Wales records that "Seisyll son of Dyvnwal was slain, through the treachery of the lord of Brecheiniog, in the castle of Abergavenny, and with him Gruffudd his son and many of the chieftains of Gwent" in 1175[515].

6. NEST . Her parentage and marriage are confirmed by the Chronicle of the Princes of Wales which records that "the lord Rhys son of Gruffudd" met King Henry II at Gloucester 25 Jul 1175, taking with him "…Gruffudd son of Ivor, son of Meurug, of Senghenydd, his nephew by his sister Nest…"[516]. m IFOR ap Meurug of Senghenydd.

http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/WALES.htm

Cawley’s note takes you to the first MS I mention, one of the versions of the Chronicle of Princes.

Yes. That's why I added it.

Sorry - being helpful :-)

Thanks!

I was thinking further about the problems with various versions of the word meaning "sister" in early manuscripts, and I remembered the story that William AEthling had died, in the White Ship Disaster, trying to save his half sister Matilda. (Probably not, but it's a great story.)

So I went looking for the transcriptions of the MS versions of it -- this morning I can only find translations, not transcriptions of the Latin, darn it.

BUT it's clear even in the translations that she is called his "sister."

William of Malmesbury, working withmostly with Ordericus Vitalis, calls her William's illegitimate sister at one point, but then at another simply calls her his sister:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/50778/50778-h/50778-h.htm (scroll down to 1116)

But Ordericus Vitalis calls her only his sister: https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalhi04ordeuoft/page/40

It's an ambiguous word.

Update -- Having gone through the histories, and the MS evidence, I've ironed out things to the best of our knowledge at this time.

Gruffydd ap Rhys had children before he married Gwenllian ferch Gruffudd, but we do not know who their mother was.

He also had children after his marriage to Gwenllian, who were not hers.

Gwenllian had named children; others of the later children might have been hers, but we don't know.

Lloyd's Welsh History (which, oddly, is the source for Gwenllian's section in the Dictionary of Welsh Biography, which gives Gwladys as Gwenllian's daughter) specifically says that Gwladys is not Gwenllian's child -- https://archive.org/details/historyofwalesfr02lloyuoft/page/766

Not an easy tangle to tease out.

We have, at this writing, three partners for Gruffudd ap Rhys -- an early one, who might have been a wife or might not; he was in Ireland at this time, and the mother of the children he had is not named -- Gwenllian, whose sons are named in the manuscripts -- and then an Unknown partner, who of course might be more than one woman, who is the mother of some of the children he had after he had come back to Wales.

It may be that Lloyd is delineating two of Gwenllian's sons -- but not all of them -- from two of Gruffudd's sons who weren't hers, and ignoring the daughters, whom we are supposed to read as hers, though the bracket doesn't stretch that far, but it's an odd way of reading that genealogical chart, and not the usual. If he meant to include Gwladys, he could have stretched the brackets, since the brackets are labeled "by Gwenllian."

Not only does he not mention Gwladys as a daughter of Gwenllian, he points the reader, in his note, specifically to a manuscript, to see information on Gwenllian's children. And the manuscript does not mention Gwladys.

Thomas Jones Pierce cites Lloyd, and Lloyd alone, so that argument is circular.

I gather that your main argument is that Gwladys could not be a daughter of Gruffudd after his marriage to Gwenllian, because he was married and would not have been having other children?

That was not, apparently, an important consideration among the medieval Welsh. We have an enormous amount of evidence that Welsh men (and some women, though not to as great a degree) had children by women not their wives while they were married. This might be an important consideration for other times and other cultures, but not that one.

Some examples:

Gruffudd's son Rhys: Rhys ap Gruffudd, Prince of South Wales

Llewelyn the Great -- Llewelyn "The Great" ap Iorwerth, King of Gwynedd, Prince of Wales

Madog ap Maredudd, Brenin Powys

Owain Glyndwr ap Gruffudd, Prince of Wales

What we need here would be primary evidence as to Gwladys's mother -- if there is a manuscript that states that Gwenllian is her mother, that would be excellent.

But without it, the issue remains a matter of speculation. And since the manuscript evidence, as it stands at the moment, does not list her as one of Gwenllian's children, that's where we are so far.

If Professor Pierce found evidence as to Gwenllian being Gwladys's mother, he didn't cite it in the entry for the National Welsh Biography.

But if it's there, then it's findable.

At this point, we need primary evidence.

Private User said "I'm confident that something Professor Pierce..."

This is not evidence based genealogy, this is speculation. I encourage you to speculate and theorise and keep searching and discussing your findings but because Geni is a shared tree profile connections should only be made when there is actual evidence to support them.

Private User With all due respect, I have been on Geni for just a few years. Thankfully, I have found some relatives who have been on here, created profiles and provided a rudimentary structure for some of us to follow. Thankfully also, they will collaborate with many of us who wander in this amazing site by chance.

I just finished a real phone conversation with a relative that I would not have known without Geni a few months ago. We are third cousins. That is pretty close to me. I did not know she was just a few miles away until a few months ago. Her parents came from Finland like my grandparents did.

I get the issue of "evidence based genealogy" and that we are all trying to find it. I cannot tell you how much I have learned and been humbled on this site tonight. We all are here for the purpose of finding the truth as we can find it. There is no hilarious display that I see. It is all about finding the truth. The real truth.

Sometimes we have to back off of what we have been told as it was a myth. I am not a descendent of Pocahontas. No matter what Uncle Elbert said. But I might be a descendent of some other Native American who was a real freedom fighter of some war or other. It is the truth we are after and that is why I am on Geni.

Genealogy is an art and science. You have to think and find real opportunities for unearthing something profound. We are here to find out who we are. No more. That is enough. That is everything.

Susanne Floyd that is just wonderfully written and so true.

Keri Denise Jackson, You have been my guiding light to make a path. I found a grave mistake today and am humbled. Sometimes, we just have to find a place to find a space. This it is it. This is where truth should meet the road. I am thankful I am here.

No, Private User, I do not believe that I am descended from Pocahontas, but I do know that I am descended from the profiles in question on this thread. I would not be responding otherwise.

Bear in mind that FLOYD is very Welsh.

Kelly,

I have made no comments about professor Pierce, the assumption I am referring to is made by yourself.

There are indeed thousands of profiles on Geni which lack any sources, that however is a strawman argument as those thousands of profiles are not the profiles we are looking at on this thread.

Susanne has learnt via evidenced based genealogy that she is not descendant from Pocahontas, she is not trying to regain some sort of connection but has learnt that reality is far more important than fantasy. Her post is quite clear and your misinterpretation of it is quite surprising (unless it is a deliberate attempt to distract from her point).

Anne Brannen is a professor of medieval history with a particular interest in Welsh genealogy, she is not obstructing you due to a lack of understanding of the nuances of Welsh history or how Geni works, she is the driving force behind the accuracy and reliability of Geni's historical tree in this portion. If some portion has not yet been built up to your standard that is because the tree is huge and the number of people working on it is small.

Thank you, Alex Moes. No more needs to be said. You said it all, in my humble opinion - and yes, I mean that. We wander through many roads in genealogical research, but it needs to be about truth. Finding the truth - whatever it is, no matter how painful and it is sometimes I know as a daughter of the South.

Private User — You had demanded that I examine the manuscript evidence. I did. The evidence you want isn’t in the manuscripts that have been cited by any of our secondary works. If you want different manuscripts evidence, you need to find it.

Private User Cawley's Medlands is useful because it's online and cites primary sources. It invites historical analysis and engagement with the primary sources because of this.

I'm not seeing your primary sources, and if I'm reading you correctly, your argument is that illegitimate children do not happen.

Private User — I can see (if I’m reading this right) that one of the things bothering you is that I seem to be discounting the work of the historian Thomas Pierce, and that I have no right to do so, because I am not as great a historian as he.

Absolutely, I am not as great a historian as Thomas Pierce, but that is irrelevant. Nor am I discounting him as a great scholar. He was.

Wha I am saying is that in this one instance, he cites a source that backs up most of the entry for Gwenllian verch Gruffudd, but does not back up the one point we are discussing.

To accept that point, without further question, when we know that the citation is problematic, because he was a great scholar, is not scholarship. It is the opposite of scholarship.

We can’t accept that he looked at other sources or manuscripts, because he doesn’t tell us what they were. Maybe he did and maybe he didn’t. No way of knowing.

The argument that we should accept what he says without question because he was a great scholar is what’s called an “argument from authority,” and is a logical fallacy. It has a long history, though, having been very popular in the Middle Ages.

It’s a fallacy, though. Alas.

This isn’t an argument that can be solved by weighing the academic credentials on the different sides. It’s an argument that can only be solved by evidence and sound logic.

Professor Pierce said, in his entry for Gwenllian verch Gruffudd, that Gwladys was her daughter. He cited his source. His source doesn’t anywhere in it say that. The only way one can cause the source to say that is by interpreting a genealogical chart in a way that negates what it actually says.

This line of argumentation is therefore a dead end. Several people have defended me, because they have found me helpful in the past and they trust my work, and that is very kind of them, but they have been lured into that method of argumentation because the appeal to authority fallacy is SO seductive. And then you can get into an argument about who has the greater authority behind them — Aquinas! Augustine! — and it can be very emotional and even entertaining, but it doesn’t actually address the actual argument.

Pierce is an excellent authority in most cases, but in this case, he falls short. His citation does not back up what you want it to back up.

So, Pierce doesn’t solve this. The Chronicles of the Princes don’t solve this. The genealogy in Jesus MS 20 doesn’t solve this.

At this point, the only thing that could show that Gwenllian is the mother of Gwladys would be a source that either a primary source that states the relationship, or a secondary source that cites the primary document which states the relationship.

I went and tracked down the manuscripts cited in the sources I found. If there are others, I will be delighted to see them. I’m not in this to win some kind of academic football game. I’m in it to uphold evidence and logic. I will happily agree that Gwenllian is Gwladys’ mom, if I see the evidence.

So far, there hasn’t been any.