Talk:Cadwallon ap Cadfan

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[edit] Identification

Leaving aside Woolf's paper (which I have not seen), the identification of this person with a supposed king of Gwynned is clearly shaky.

• Bede's first mention of "Caedualla rex Brettonum" (ii. 20) gives no antecedents for him. Later (iii. 1), he is "rex Brettonum Ceadualla".
• AU s.a. 632 has "Bellum Cathloen regis Britonum & Anfrith" and s.a. 633 has "Bellum Iudris regis Britonum".
• AT s.a. has "Cath Etuin maic Ailli reghis Saxonum, qui totam Britanniam regnavit, in quo victus est Catguallaun rege Britonum et Panta Saxano" and s.a. 635 "Cath la Cathlon & Anfraith qui decollatus est, in quo Osualt mac Etalfraith victor erat et Catlon, rex Britonum, cecidit".
• AI s.a. 633 has the bald "Guin Catluain".
• CS and AM do not report anything.
• ASC (E) s.a. 633 has "Her wearð Eadwine cining ofslagan. fram Cadwallan 7 Pendan on Heðfelda on ii idus Octobris 7 he rixade .vii. gear. 7 eac man sloh his sunu Osfrið mid him. 7 þa syððan foran Ceadwala 7 Penda 7 fordydan eall Norðhymbra land."
• AC: no untranslated version available, but the Internet Medieval Sourcebook version gives "The beseiging of king Cadwallon in the island of Glannauc", "On the Kalends of January the battle of Meigen; and there Edwin was killed with his two sons; but Cadwallon was the victor" and "The battle of Cantscaul in which Cadwallon fell".

It's notable that we have "Edwin Ælling" and "Oswald Æthelfrithing" but no patronym for Cadwallon, and no title except rex Brettonum. Yes, there are endless genealogies, later histories, with biblically inspired tales, and the rest, but there's nothing contemporary or derived from an annalistic source which relates Cadwallon to Gwynned or makes him a son of Cadfan. Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, Woolf has pretty much destroyed the identification with Gwynedd. That was my reaction, but I also know of at least two historians who agree with him (I don't know the professional opinions of anyone else). The Gwynedd genealogies make no sense with him in it; but when you take him out, they make chronological sense. - Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 15:53, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

How should this be reflected in the article? I am worried about editing it to give too much weight to a recent paper, but also worried about giving no consideration within the body of the article to this theory, because the consequence of that could be that we are reporting an outdated understanding as uncontested fact. Reworking the article along these lines might necessitate changing the title as well. Everyking 09:11, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Barbara Yorke's The Conversion of Britain (2006) says (p. 63):

Penda had initially come to pre-eminence through an alliance in which a British king Caedwalla was the dominant partner. Caedwalla has often been seen as a king of Gwynedd, but is perhaps more likely to have been a king from one of the northern British kingdoms that had suffered from Æthelfrith's ambitions. [157]

Note 157 points us to Woolf's "Caedualla". In her Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England (1990) he is "Cadwallon of Gwynedd". Angus McLellan (Talk) 10:33, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, that helps confirm that scholarly opinion has moved away from the Gwynedd theory. Everyking 11:02, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

I found an interesting link (see section B, question 9) from a 2004 exam paper in early Welsh poetry at Aberystwyth. Angus McLellan (Talk) 14:06, 4 November 2006 (UTC)