Welsh Journals

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BONEDD HENRRI SAITHVED PEDIGREES setting out the Welsh ancestry of the Tudor sovereigns are found in many of the Welsh genealogical manuscripts, and some of them go into great detail regarding the female lines. Two groups may be distinguished, one emanating from North Wales, the other from the South. One might expect each to be more accurate in those parts which concern its own area. Both versions are represented by texts from our earliest genealogical manuscripts. The earliest North Welsh version known to me is that in BM. Add. MS. 14919, fo. 135r v, dated 1493. It is comparatively short. The next is that in Peniarth MS. 127 pp. 65-76, written c. 15 10 by 'Syr' Thomas ap Ieuan ap Dafydd (or Deicws). The beginning (which deals with the English ancestry) is partly lost, but the title can be inferred from references on pages 17, 25, 125 and 129 as Achoedd y brenhin Harri wythved. It is thorough and careful and goes into great detail as regards the female lines. The best known North Welsh version is that contained in Cardiff MS. 50 pp. 133-144 of the sixteenth century. It purports to be 'The Returne of a Commission sent into Wales by King Henry the Seventh to serche out the petegrees of Owen Tuder'. I am not aware of any other evidence that such a commission existed. The text was printed, very inaccurately, in William Wynne's History of Wales, 1774 edition, pp. 331-342. This was reprinted, with all its errors, in S. R. Meyrick's edition of Lewis Dwnn's Heraldic Visitations of Wales, Vol. 1 pp. xiv-xx. A slightly fuller version was given (c. 1550 by Humphrey Llwyd?) in British Museum Royal MS. 18 A lxxv. The South Wales versions are much shorter and are sufficiently typified by the earliest, that by Ieuan Brechfa in Peniarth MS. 131 (c. 1500). The text occurs twice: (A) completely on pp. 291-95 and (B), with the beginning missing, on pp. 217-19. Where they overlap they are in essential agreement. This version is comparatively little known and the South Wales parts, where they differ from the North Wales versions, are of interest and probably more correct. For these reasons it was thought worth while to edit the text, using A as the basis and giving variations from B. BONEDD HENRRI SAITHVED [a] Llyma vonedd Henrri saithved o rass Duw mab Iemwnt ap Ywain ap Meredydd ap Tudur vychan [ap Gronwy] ap Tudur ap Gronwy ap Ednyved vychan ap Kynwric ap Ierwerth ap Idnerth ap Edryd ap Inythan ap Iasseth ap Karwed ap Marchudd ap Kynann ap Elvyw ap Mor ap Mynnawc ap Yssbwys ap Mwyndyrch [ap]