and related by marriage to Owain Gwynedd, a monarch no less distinguished as a patron of genius than by the valour and sagacity with which he protected the liberties of his country against the ambitious projects of Henry II. On his mother’s side the poet was connected with the Magnates of the southern division of the principality; his mother, Ardudvul, being the sister of Llywelyn ab Gwilym Vychan, of Emlyn, a person of considerable importance in that part of the country, and styled in some accounts ‘the lord of Cardigan.’
Yet, whatever may have been Davyth ap Gwilym’s pretensions to an illustrious descent, there is reason to believe that his birth was illegitimate, or, at least, that the union of his parents, if it had been previously sanctioned by legal rites, had not received the countenance of their friends. At no distant period, however, a reconciliation must have been effected, as the embryo bard was taken in his infancy under the protection of his uncle, Llywelyn ab Gwilym, who is related to have been a man of some parts. He accordingly became his nephew’s tutor, and seems to have discovered in him the early indications of that particular talent, for which he was afterwards so conspicuous, and in the cultivation of which Llywelyn afforded his young pupil all the encouragement and assistance in his power.
About the age of fifteen Davyth ap Gwilym returned to his paternal home, where, however, he resided but a short time, owing, as it would appear, to the unpleasant bickerings that took place between him and his parents, in consequence of his satirical
