Hedd Wyn
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Hedd Wyn (13 January 1887–31 July 1917) was a Merionethshire farmer and poet of World War I. Born Ellis Humphrey Evans, he used the Bardic name Hedd Wyn, Welsh for "white peace".
Evans spent most of his life on a hill farm, Ysgwrn, near Trawsfynydd, Merionethshire. By the age of 28 he had won four Eisteddfod chairs for his poetry. Evans' nephew still lives at Ysgwrn today and regularly entertains guests with the story of Ellis and his chairs.
Evans was awarded the Bardic Chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod, Birkenhead, for his poem "Yr Arwr" ("The Hero"), written in the verse form known as an awdl. The award was posthumous, with the Eisteddfod Chair draped in black cloth during the award ceremony, Evans having been killed in Belgium at Pilckem Ridge shortly before. (Another war poet, Francis Ledwidge, was killed on the same day.)
He is buried at Artillery Wood Cemetery, near Boezinge (see external link below for picture).
The story became the subject of the Oscar-nominated Welsh-language film Hedd Wyn in 1992.
[edit] External links
- Hedd Wynn's tombstone
- Texts by Hedd Wyn in the Welsh Wikisource (including Yr Arwr)
- Hedd Wyn at the Internet Movie Database
- A detailed biographical sketch of Hedd Wyn
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