Birth and Early Years of Ab Gwilym - Morfudd - Relic of Druidism -The Men of Glamorgan - Legend of Ab Gwilym - Ab Gwilym as a Writer - Wonderful Variety - Objects of Nature - Gruffydd Gryg.
DAFYDD AB GWILYM was born about the year 1320, at a place called Bro Gynnin in the county of Cardigan. Though born in wedlock he was not conceived legitimately. His mother being discovered by her parents to be pregnant, was turned out of doors by them, whereupon she went to her lover, who married her, though in so doing he acted contrary to the advice of his relations. After a little time, however, a general reconciliation took place. The parents of Ab Gwilym, though highly connected, do not appear to have possessed much property. The boy was educated by his mother's brother Llewelyn ab Gwilym Fychan, a chief of Cardiganshire; but his principal patron in after life was Ifor, a cousin of his father, surnamed Hael, or the bountiful, a chieftain of Glamorganshire.
This person received him within his house, made him his steward and tutor to his daughter. With this young lady Ab Gwilym speedily fell in love, and the damsel returned his passion. Ifor, however, not approving of the connection, sent his daughter to Anglesey, and eventually caused her to take the veil in a nunnery of that island.
Dafydd pursued her, but not being able to obtain an interview, he returned to his patron, who gave him a kind reception. Under Ifor's roof he cultivated poetry with great assiduity and wonderful success. Whilst very young, being taunted with the circumstances of his birth by a brother bard called Rhys Meigan, he retorted in an ode so venomously bitter that his adversary, after hearing it, fell down and expired. Shortly after this event he was made head bard of Glamorgan by universal acclamation.
After a stay of some time with Ifor, he returned to his native county and lived at Bro Gynnin. Here he fell in love with a young lady of birth called Dyddgu, who did not favour his addresses. He did not break his heart, however, on her account, but speedily bestowed it on the fair Morfudd, whom he first saw at Rhosyr in Anglesey, to which place both had gone on a religious account. The lady after some demur consented to become his wife. Her parents refusing to sanction the union, their hands were joined beneath the greenwood tree by one Madawg Benfras, a bard, and a great friend of Ab Gwilym. The joining of people's hands by bards, which was probably a relic of Druidism, had long been practised in Wales, and marriages of this kind were generally considered valid, and seldom set aside. The ecclesiastical law, however, did not recognise these poetical marriages, and the parents of Morfudd by appealing to the law soon severed the union. After confining the lady for a short time, they bestowed her hand in legal fashion upon a chieftain of the neighbourhood, very rich but rather old, and with a hump on his back, on account which he was nicknamed bow-back, or little hump-back. Morfudd, however, who passed her time in rather a dull manner with this person, which would not have been the case had she done her duty by endeavouring to make the poor man comfortable, and by visiting the sick and needy around her, was soon induced by the bard to elope with him. The lovers fled to Glamorgan, where Ifor Hael, not much to his own credit, received them with open arms, probably forgetting how he had immured his OWNdaughter in a convent, rather than bestow her on Ab Gwilym. Having a hunting-lodge in a forest on the banks of the lovely Taf, he allotted it to the fugitives as a residence. Ecclesiastical law, however, as strong in Wild Wales as in other parts of Europe, soon followed them into Glamorgan, and, very properly, separated them.
The lady was restored to her husband, and Ab Gwilym fined to a very high amount. Not being able to pay the fine, he was cast into prison; but then the men of Glamorgan arose to a man, swearing that their head bard should not remain in prison. "Then pay his fine!"said the ecclesiastical law, or rather the ecclesiastical lawyer.
"So we will!" said the men of Glamorgan, and so they did. Every man put his hand into his pocket; the amount was soon raised, the fine paid, and the bard set free.
Ab Gwilym did not forget this kindness of the men of Glamorgan, and, to requite it, wrote an address to the sun, in which he requests that luminary to visit Glamorgan, to bless it, and to keep it from harm. The piece concludes with some noble lines somewhat to this effect "If every strand oppression strong Should arm against the son of song, The weary wight would find, I ween, A welcome in Glamorgan green."Some time after his release he meditated a second elopement with Morfudd, and even induced her to consent to go off with him. Afriend, to whom he disclosed what he was thinking of doing, asking him whether he would venture a second time to take such a step, "Iwill," said the bard, "in the name of God and the men of Glamorgan." No second elopement, however, took place, the bard probably thinking, as has been well observed, that neither God nor the men of Glamorgan would help him a second time out of such an affair. He did not attain to any advanced age, but died when about sixty, some twenty years before the rising of Glendower. Some time before his death his mind fortunately took a decidedly religious turn.
He is said to have been eminently handsome in his youth, tall, slender, with yellow hair falling in ringlets down his shoulders.