Occasion of Welsh language cultural festival ‘dramatic and emotional'
Wrexham
last week.
The lights dim as the weeklong event reaches its dramatic climax, the chairing of the bard who has won the 'awdl' long-form poetry contest. The chosen poet's identity is about to be unveiled in an ancient, mystical ceremony. It is a unique experience.
About 150 men and women in coloured robes, druids who belong to the Gorsedd Cymru society of poets and artists, watch from the stage. Outside is a stone circle where they held another ceremony, but the chairing – or cadeirio – is indoors.
Trumpeters herald the decision. As is tradition, the Horn of Plenty is presented to the archdruid by a young, local married woman. Children perform a flower dance to harp music. But soon, silence returns. A searchlight scans the darkened pavilion.
READ MORE
The light rests on a man three rows behind The Irish Times. He is the chosen bard. As gasps and applause break out in the crowd, the man rises to his feet, his face creased with emotion, eyes filled with tears. Sitting next to him, his family also cry. Emotion ripples outwards and soon people everywhere appear overcome.
Tudur Hallam wrote a poem about being ill, not knowing if he would live long enough to deliver it at the prestigious competition. Photograph: Eisteddfod Genedlaethol
The man is Tudur Hallam, emeritus professor of Welsh at Swansea University. He was diagnosed with liver and bone cancer during last year's Eisteddfod. In January, he learned his treatment had failed. Hallam wrote a poem about his illness, not knowing if he'd live long enough to deliver it at the prestigious competition. Now, he has won.
In the citation, competition judge Peredur Lynch says Hallam 'sang a song from the deepest depths of his being, composing an awdl he never wished to write'.
Druids unsheathe a sword above Hallam's head onstage, before clapping it back into the hilt as the crowd chants that they come in peace.
The traditional ceremony is entirely in Welsh. As a kind woman whispers an explanation of all that has just taken place, the tears begin to make sense. It is a juddering, humbling moment.
'I used to dream of it – the lights panning, the tension,' says Guto Harri, a Welsh-speaking former
BBC
journalist who worked as Boris Johnson's director of communications in Downing Street. 'It's so dramatic and emotional, and so Welsh.'
The Eisteddfod, or Sitting, held in its current form since 1880, traces its roots back to 1176. These days it is a sprawling jamboree of revelry with dancing, music and poetry in Welsh on stages and tents spread across fields. There are also hundreds of stalls selling drink, food, souvenirs and books, as well as political discussion.
This year's event attracted 150,000 people to Is-y-co-ed, a tiny village just outside Wrexham. To get a sense of the scale and nature of the event, imagine that Aosdána, the Irish artists body, is taken over by Gaeltacht druids bearing staffs and in robes, who then conquer Electric Picnic and merge it with the National Ploughing Championships.
Druids in the lead-up to the chairing of the bard ceremony. Photograph: Mark Paul
The National Eisteddfod is the premier cultural and social event of the year for speakers of the Welsh language, which has undergone a remarkable revival over the last few decades, although data indicate progress may have recently stalled.
After a decline throughout much of the 20th century, the language hit a nadir at the start of the 1980s before a turnaround precipitated by the setting up by the Tories of S4C, the Welsh television channel. The language later grew beyond its old heartlands of west and north Wales, gaining traction even in cities such as Cardiff, where it had been weak.
Official census numbers for 2021, however, show only about 538,300 people over the age of three – 18 per cent of the population – said they could speak Welsh, a decline of 25,000 on the 2011 census.
The National Eisteddfod begins today in Wrecsam and runs until 9 August. One of Europe's biggest cultural festivals, it celebrates Welsh arts, language and heritage through music, literature, drama and more. 🏴
🔗
— This is Cymru Wales (@walesdotcom)
The Welsh government's annual population survey (APS) last year estimated 843,500, but the figures were presented with a reliability health warning by statisticians. Even then, the 27 per cent proportion was the APS's lowest in eight years, backing up the trend blip suggested by the census.
The Labour-led Welsh government, which in 2017 announced a target of one million native speakers by 2050 using census data, responded to the disappointment of the 2021 numbers by appointing a commission.
Last year one of its reports said use of Welsh was down in some traditional heartlands such as counties Gwynedd and Cerdigion and was especially 'losing ground among groups with less privileged backgrounds in many Welsh-speaking communities'.
Critics blame English-speaking second-home owners in rural areas for squeezing out local native Welsh speakers who cannot afford homes in their own communities.
The Welsh government responded this year with new laws to set targets and boost the use of Welsh in schools. Former first minister and current finance secretary Mark Drakeford has political responsibility for growing the language.
In Gwynedd, which includes Bangor and Caernarfon, local politicians in April also published draft rules that would effectively phase out English-medium teaching in secondary schools.
Welsh Conservatives
said they were 'linguistic zealots'.
Drakeford, meanwhile, has resisted pressure from activists to make Welsh-medium teaching obligatory for all. 'It is the choice of the parents and child,' he says.
Harri says that, whatever the recent challenges, the language is still in better shape now than when he was a child. He credits internal migration from rural areas for strengthening Welsh in cities such as Cardiff, and better education for halting decline in the southern Welsh valleys.
'The government has a noble ambition [for 2050] but it is not focusing on it as methodically as possible,' he says. 'But there is a limit to what government can do. What disappoints me is fellow Welsh speakers who do not pass it on to their children.'
Back at Eisteddfod, enthusiasm for the language is a given, but assessments of the 2050 one million speakers strategy are mixed.
Geraint Thomas is dressed in medieval chain mail and battle gear outside a book stall that specialises in Welsh independence material. During lockdown, he devised a Welsh language board game named based on – and named after – Owain Glyndŵr, a Welsh prince who led a famous 1400 revolt against the English. Glyndŵr was never caught.
Board game designer Geraint Thomas in medieval battle garb at last week's Eisteddfod near Wrexham. Photograph: Mark Paul
Thomas is in battle clobber because he's trying to promote the game to the Eisteddfod crowd. How does he think the 2050 million-speaker strategy is coming along?
'It could be better. They reckon 530,000 or whatever can speak some Welsh, but how many are actually speaking it every day at home to their kids?' he asks.
Whatever about at home, the sound of Welsh is everywhere across the traditional festival field, or Maes (pronounced mice) in Is-y-co-ed.
Two women pass by in the sunshine wearing specially commissioned festival T-shirts. 'Maes Maes baby' reads one. 'Maes up your life' another.
Meanwhile, the Gorsedd's member cohort of druids – the total number is secret – expands during the Wrexham Eisteddfod with about 40 new honorees, including some of the most famous names in Wales.
They include
Game of Thrones actor Mark Lewis Jones
who, as a member of the arts community, wears a green ceremonial robe, and Maxine Hughes, who, as a journalist, wears blue. She is the official Welsh translator for Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney who bought Wrexham football club for a Disney documentary series.
Only past and present winners of the top poetry and prose prizes at Eisteddfod, however, get to wear the most prestigious robes, which are white. Whatever Hallam and his family may be set to lose, they will always have the memory of this.
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Meanwhile, the Gorsedd's member cohort of druids – the total number is secret – expands during the Wrexham Eisteddfod with about 40 new honorees, including some of the most famous names in Wales. They include Game of Thrones actor Mark Lewis Jones who, as a member of the arts community, wears a green ceremonial robe, and Maxine Hughes, who, as a journalist, wears blue. She is the official Welsh translator for Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney who bought Wrexham football club for a Disney documentary series. Only past and present winners of the top poetry and prose prizes at Eisteddfod, however, get to wear the most prestigious robes, which are white. Whatever Hallam and his family may be set to lose, they will always have the memory of this.
