To begin at the beginning
My post on Prince Dafydd ap Gruffudd was very popular. This surprised me a bit, since I've posted dozens of times on Dafydd and his times, without sparking much interest. But suddenly Prince D has taken off, it seems.
Fine by me. I wrote a short handbook on Dafydd and his controversial career, so let's have another look at him. To begin at the beginning...
Dafydd was born the third son of Llywelyn's first-born son, Gruffudd, and Senana, daughter of Caradog ap Thomas ap Rhodri ab Owain Gwynedd. His two elder brothers were Owain Goch and Llywelyn, the youngest Rhodri. There is no record of his precise date of birth, but his uncle Prince Dafydd released Gruffudd from prison in 1234, and locked him up again in 1239. Therefore Dafydd and Rhodri were probably born during the intervening period.
The brothers first appear in a record of 12 August 1241, when their mother bound herself to pay Henry III 600 marks for the release of her husband and eldest son, Owain, from Dafydd's prison. As part of the agreement, she agreed to hand over Dafydd and Rhodri as sureties. They were not long in custody. Via the terms of the treaty of Gwern Eigron, 29 August, they were handed over to the king. Their father Gruffudd, however, would spend the rest of his life in the Tower. This unfortunate, sorely tried figure, a victim of dynastic politics, died in almost farcical circumstances. In 1244 he attempted to escape by lowering himself from a window via a rope made of knotted bedsheets. The makeshift rope broke and sent him plummeting to the ground, where he broke his neck.
Prince Dafydd ap Llywelyn outlived his brother by a mere two years. In 1245 Henry III launched an invasion of North Wales to secure and refortify the royal castle of Deganwy, perched on a high spur overlooking the river Conwy. This was the king's supreme effort in Wales: he was determined to get results, no matter the cost. The war that followed was exceptionally brutal, as Dafydd's warriors fought desperately to repel the invasion. The English chronicler Matthew Paris provided a grim account of the war:
'He [King Henry] was now well convinced of the irreparable ruin of his enemies the Welsh; for, on his arrival, the Irish had ravaged the whole of Anglesey, which is, as it were, the protectress and place of refuge for all the Welsh; and at his departure, he cruelly put to the sword and reduced to ashes everybody and everything that remained there; so much so, that the whole country seemed reduced to one vast and uncultivated desert solitude. He also caused the salt pits at Wytz to be filled up and destroyed; and in order that the Welsh might not obtain provisions from the neighbouring provinces, as they used to do, even in time of war, either by purchase, or by robbery, through friendship, relationship or kindred, he caused the inhabitants of that country and those in subjection to him, to be impoverished, and especially deprived of food, so much so, that in Cheshire and other neighbouring provinces, famine prevailed to such a degree, that the inhabitants had scarcely sufficient means left to prolong a wretched existence...”
Henry deliberately starved his English subjects on the March, all for the sake of inflicting defeat on the Welsh. His own soldiers suffered badly on the campaign, due to Welsh guerilla tactics and the failure of the king's commissariat to supply adequate clothing and winter gear.
