All enquiries to Professor Peter Edbury Edbury@cardiff.ac.uk

All talks are free and Zoom/Teams allow us to have speakers from around the world

Cardiff Branch Programme 2026-27 

16 December 2026, 7pm

Venue: online via Teams contact websterp@cardiff.ac.uk  for link

International Merthyr Tydfil: Iron, Royalty and the Mabinogion

Dr Marion Loeffler, Cardiff University

This talk will introduce you to the Merthyr Tydfil of the first half of the nineteenth century, when the Cyfarthfa and Dowlais ironworks were world-leading in developing new iron smelting technologies for and producing the rails for much of north and eastern Europe. This attracted international visitors, among them industrial ‘spies’ from Sweden and France, famous Prussian industrialists and European royalty, among them those more interested in the thrill of this Gothic land- and soundscape and the cultural work of iron mistress Lady Charlotte Guest.

 

17 March 2027, 7pm

Venue: Online, contact Peter Edbury Edbury@cardiff.ac.uk to book

‘The Rhine runs through Raglan’: wealth, patronage and conspicuous consumption under William Hervert, earl of Pembroke

Professor Barry Lewis, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies

William Herbert of Raglan rose to unprecedented political power in the 1460s during the first reign of Edward IV. He and his affinity, including not only his Herbert relatives but the Vaughans and Devereux of the Hereford border, acquired lordships, offices, commissions and property to such an extent that, by 1469, Herbert's reach extended all the way from Gwent to Anglesey. Such power brought wealth, exemplified in Herbert's trading interests in the Bristol Channel. Herbert and his wife, Anne Devereux, presided over a court at Raglan whose magnificence reflected their ambitions. In this paper I examine this court primarily through the eyes of the many Welsh poets who visited it, examining their descriptions of cultural patronage and conspicuous consumption, in order to evaluate the political, social and cultural messages conveyed.

Barry Lewis is a professor in the School of Celtic Studies of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies in Ireland. He is a specialist in medieval Welsh literature with a particular interest in later medieval poetry. He was one of the editors of the works of Guto'r Glyn for the online edition and translation, www.gutorglyn.net