An Important Scientific Survey of Non-Brits....

[Headsnap]

You could have answered the question yourself if you'd bothered to read the thread

 

[isabeau]

You could have answered the question yourself if you'd bothered to read the thread

who, me? or drew?

 

[lk70]

If King Arthur were here, he'd bang both your heads together to stop the nonsense....


....and she skips away into the forest with her friend the kender.

 

[Headsnap]

New evidence has been unearthed by professors of the Arthurian lore at Oxford to suggest that King Arthur was, and I quote here from a reliable, academic source, a "stupid Welsh taff who probably had BO and didn't shave and wore the same undies for 5 weeks at a time because he was a pikey Welshman, and didn't ever get a bath and was smelly". That's Oxford talking, baby. Oxford.

Stick that in your Camelot and smoke it 😛

 

[Knox The Hatter]

"Who's that?"
"Why, that's the King."
"How do you know he's King?"
"Cuz he hasn't got shit all over him."

 

[alchemy]

Before we start, this isn't so much a survey as a single question, but it's an important question that will help me a great deal in a scientific study I am conducting. I can't reveal the purpose of the study just yet, but all will become clear in due course. What I'm looking for are spontaneous, unresearched answers from non-British people, and preferably non-Europeans, to the following question:



Do you know what Wales is?



Thank you for your time and help in this important matter. I look forward to reading your responses.

Sure!
Wales: A small, unfasionable, insignificant region of the British Isles whose inhabitants are so amazingly primative, they believe that mucking about on public roads and smashing themselves on the heads with bricks not only constitutes a proper days work, but is also a lot of fun. (also see: the only people that various inhabitants from Yorkshire have managed to outwit).

(actually, I've never been to either place so I hope I didn't just offend someone )

 

[Redmage]

Do you know what Wales is?

Sure. It's a region in Western Britain, north of Cornwall. It's notable as one of the few regions in modern Britain with a native non-English language (Welsh), and has a very distinctive regional accent as a result. This came about because Wales was one of the three regions on the Isle of Britain that were never conquered by the Romans (the others being Scotland and Cornwall). It was not conquered by the Saxons either, though it was eventually absorbed by the heirs of the Normans. That stubbornness allowed the Welsh to hang on to much more of their indigenous culture than the areas that were conquered and reconquered in successive waves up through the 12th century.

It is the traditional holding of the Heir to the British throne, as well.

And in case you're wondering, no, I didn't check Wikipedia. I just typed out the few details that came to mind right away.

 

[Mastertank1]

Mastertank:
That's quite good actually, although the place is a county not a country, it looks more like a deformed cow than anything from Middle Earth, and the Pictish/ Celtic culture of Wales can be found throughout most of south-western England, particularly Cornwall. Also, the Welsh invented the longbow but the English taught them to use it.

Hmmm. All the Cornishmen I've ever known (several, in fact) consider their people to be ethnically and culturally unique, and in particular insisted that they were in no way similar to either the Welsh or the English, although they will allow that the folk of Devonshire are fairly close cousins of the Cornish.
One of them, a fella by the name of Stan Hugill, was the most memorable character I ever met in person. He was the last man still alive (up until 1997, when he unfortunately passed away at the age of 99) who actually once earned his living as a chanteyman or shantyman, meaning a worksong cadence singer, on a cargo carrying sailing clipper ship.
At the June 1997 Sea Music Festival at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut, he was still boozing, singing and chasing young women (and catching a few!) till all hours. Four months later, he was gone. I really miss the old guy.

 

[Mastertank1]

Akchurly...

is dross a Welsh term? i'm not familiar with that word..

Dross is a mining term, sweetie. It's the worthless crud left over after all the desired item (Gold, Silver, Copper, Tin, Zinc, Lead, whatever) has been seperated from the ore. It's mainly used in reference to refining gold. It could have a Welsh origin; a LOT of Welshmen were miners.

 

[isabeau]

Dross is a mining term, sweetie. It's the worthless crud left over after all the desired item (Gold, Silver, Copper, Tin, Zinc, Lead, whatever) has been seperated from the ore. It's mainly used in reference to refining gold. It could have a Welsh origin; a LOT of Welshmen were miners.

thank you Mastertank...hm i should have come across that term in the novel, "How Green Was My Valley"...plenty of Welsh terms in that book...

 

[Mastertank1]

Several points;

New evidence has been unearthed by professors of the Arthurian lore at Oxford to suggest that King Arthur was, and I quote here from a reliable, academic source, a "stupid Welsh taff who probably had BO and didn't shave and wore the same undies for 5 weeks at a time because he was a pikey Welshman, and didn't ever get a bath and was smelly". That's Oxford talking, baby. Oxford.

Stick that in your Camelot and smoke it 😛

1-In those days, a "stupid taff who probably had BO and didn't shave and wore the same undies for 5 weeks at a time because he was a pikey (insert any ethnic group then in England) , and didn't ever get a bath and was smelly". was a fair description of about 98% of all the men in the British Isles! 🙄

2-A Camelot is a lot where they sell used camels. No, not the cigarettes.

3-A question; is it true that 'Welsh Rarebit' was originally a description of one of King Edward II of England's mistresses?

Just wondering.

 

[Headsnap]

Sure. It's a region in Western Britain, north of Cornwall. It's notable as one of the few regions in modern Britain with a native non-English language (Welsh), and has a very distinctive regional accent as a result. This came about because Wales was one of the three regions on the Isle of Britain that were never conquered by the Romans (the others being Scotland and Cornwall). It was not conquered by the Saxons either, though it was eventually absorbed by the heirs of the Normans. That stubbornness allowed the Welsh to hang on to much more of their indigenous culture than the areas that were conquered and reconquered in successive waves up through the 12th century.

Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own regional languages (Scotland actually has two; Scots, which is often mislabelled as a bastardisation of English but which is actually a language in itself, and gaelic, which all the teuchters from the Highlands and Islands speak). I also don't neccesarily think it was stubbornness that allowed the Welsh to hold onto their land. Word has it that the Romans turned up and asked a Welsh shepherd for directions to their capital, but he started speaking only Welsh as soon as they arrived and thus they were lost. The Welsh were never stubborn, they were just cantankerous 😀

"Who's that?"
"Why, that's the King."
"How do you know he's King?"
"Cuz he hasn't got shit all over him."

Classic.

Sure!
Wales: A small, unfasionable, insignificant region of the British Isles whose inhabitants are so amazingly primative, they believe that mucking about on public roads and smashing themselves on the heads with bricks not only constitutes a proper days work, but is also a lot of fun. (also see: the only people that various inhabitants from Yorkshire have managed to outwit).

So you've been to Wrexham on a Saturday night then?

 

[Headsnap]

Hmmm. All the Cornishmen I've ever known (several, in fact) consider their people to be ethnically and culturally unique, and in particular insisted that they were in no way similar to either the Welsh or the English, although they will allow that the folk of Devonshire are fairly close cousins of the Cornish.

Yeah, THEY consider it unique, but if you ask people from most regions of the country whether their culture is unique they'll say yes. There were a fair few folk I knew who considered Merseyside a Celtic region and a unique culture which was separate from the rest of England, not realising that it was only celtic because the Scots, Welsh and Irish seem to like moving there for some reason, and far more who wouldn't even consider themselves English for various reasons. There's also the people of Tyneside and the north-east who have a fairly solid claim to be culturally unique, and Yorkshire likewise.

As far as being ethnically unique, that seems to stem from the fact that they think they're the last descendants of the original tribes of Britons like the Iceni and stuff. If they've got blonde hair, blue eyes and fair skin then they're talking rubbish, they're Jutes and Saxons just like the rest of us 😀

 

[Redmage]

Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own regional languages

Yep. You'll notice that I wrote "one of the few regions in modern Britain with a native non-English language." I think three counts as few, no?

You might also get some arguments from the Irish about whether or not they're part of "modern Britain." In fact I'm reasonably sure you have done, over the years.

I also don't neccesarily think it was stubbornness that allowed the Welsh to hold onto their land. Word has it that the Romans turned up and asked a Welsh shepherd for directions to their capital, but he started speaking only Welsh as soon as they arrived and thus they were lost. The Welsh were never stubborn, they were just cantankerous

Right. The other Britons answered in good Latin, didn't they? More fools them.

Sorry, I know you're eager to run down the Welsh here, but I don't know that holding out for 1000 years against three different waves of invaders (the Romans, the Saxons, and the Danes) can be written off as merely "cantankerous." I'd reserve that word rather for someone who refuses to give brave men and women their due.

It all reminds me of a needlepoint that I saw once in the home of an Irish grandmother. It read, "The Englishman is a self-made man. This relieves the Almighty of an immense responsibility." 😉

 

[Headsnap]

Yep. You'll notice that I wrote "one of the few regions in modern Britain with a native non-English language." I think three counts as few, no?

It might do, but I honestly don't think the Welsh or Scottish, or most English for that matter, would really appreciate being labelled as a "region of Britain" when they are in fact countries. The Lake District is a region. Wales has it's own laws. Sort of. And a lot of sheep.

You might also get some arguments from the Irish about whether or not they're part of "modern Britain." In fact I'm reasonably sure you have done, over the years.

The Irish would be well placed to argue that they're not part of Britain. They haven't been since the Free State was established as far as I know. The nationalists in Northern Ireland might claim they're not British, but at the end of the day they're ruled from Westminster until they get Stormont working properly. As far as the arguments they actually made go, I don't think mortar bombs, sniper rounds and ambushes can really be classed as legitimate political fare.

Right. The other Britons answered in good Latin, didn't they? More fools them.

No, they didn't really get asked the question. Neither did the Welsh farmer. Do you know why? Because he wasn't real and I was jesting.

Sorry, I know you're eager to run down the Welsh here, but I don't know that holding out for 1000 years against three different waves of invaders (the Romans, the Saxons, and the Danes) can be written off as merely "cantankerous." I'd reserve that word rather for someone who refuses to give brave men and women their due.

Brave men and women? They "held out" against three waves of invaders because none of those three waves made much of an attempt to get into Wales as far as I'm aware. If you have any battles or sieges that you can point to to disprove that then please let me know. The first wave that made any real attempt were the English, and look what happened there. Same thing that happened to most everyone else 😀

It all reminds me of a needlepoint that I saw once in the home of an Irish grandmother. It read, "The Englishman is a self-made man. This relieves the Almighty of an immense responsibility." 😉

In that case who do we have to thank for the 800-year subjugation of the Irish? "Fighting Irish" my arse, if the Irish fought as well as they blathered the English would be long gone ^_^

 

[Mastertank1]

One of them put it this way;

Yeah, THEY consider it unique, but if you ask people from most regions of the country whether their culture is unique they'll say yes. There were a fair few folk I knew who considered Merseyside a Celtic region and a unique culture which was separate from the rest of England, not realising that it was only celtic because the Scots, Welsh and Irish seem to like moving there for some reason, and far more who wouldn't even consider themselves English for various reasons. There's also the people of Tyneside and the north-east who have a fairly solid claim to be culturally unique, and Yorkshire likewise.

As far as being ethnically unique, that seems to stem from the fact that they think they're the last descendants of the original tribes of Britons like the Iceni and stuff. If they've got blonde hair, blue eyes and fair skin then they're talking rubbish, they're Jutes and Saxons just like the rest of us 😀

Before the Anglo-Saxons were the Romans; Before them were the Britons, before them were the Celts, before them were the Picts, and before them were the Cornish. That's what the guy told me. What ethnic family that makes them a part of is outside my range of knowledge.
I have to say, none of the Cornish I knew were blonde, and none had blue eyes. They mainly had very pale complexions with a very faint olively undertone, and their hair tended to be reddish brown in a variety of shades ranging from the medium to the dark. Their eyes were also reddish brown, how reddish depending on how many pints they had downed that evening.

 

[His Divine Shadow]

Do you know what Wales is?

To my knowledge, probably false, Wales is on the western coast of the island of Britain (If that's what the big one is called. I forget exactly.) and is one of those "countries" that make up the UK. Once, it was its own autonomous state, until something related to the King of England brought it into the domain of England (Somebody in the Royal Family has the title "Prince of Wales" for this, I believe.). That's all I can think of, and I didn't read the thread before this so as to not spoil my response.

 

[theshire]

It's funny how when I started a thread in the P & R forum the other day in which I was pretty scathing about Islam I got called a racist and yet here we have pure non-rational HATRED for Wales and not a word of "racism" is uttered.

Just sayin'.

 

[drew70]

It's funny how when I started a thread in the P & R forum the other day in which I was pretty scathing about Islam I got called a racist and yet here we have pure non-rational HATRED for Wales and not a word of "racism" is uttered.

Just sayin'.

Yeah, I have to agree that's pretty fucked up, especially since Islam isn't a race. When I read this thread, the discriptive phrase that popped into my head was "regionalistic bigotry."

 

[isabeau]

so this is basically a rascist thread against Wales? a hate thread?

 

[Knox The Hatter]

All this needless expense of energy merely because Headsnap decided to let loose with his sense of humo(u)r. Tsk tsk.

 

[isabeau]

All this needless expense of energy merely because Headsnap decided to let loose with his sense of humo(u)r. Tsk tsk.

ahhhhh so it's a humor thread lol...well i thought so at first i think....

 

[drew70]

so this is basically a rascist thread against Wales? a hate thread?

Not racist and probably not hate. Basically a pompous "they suck" kind of mentality.

All this needless expense of energy merely because Headsnap decided to let loose with his sense of humo(u)r. Tsk tsk.

Humo(u)r he's not fond of admitting or explaining, evidently.

 

[Redmage]

I honestly don't think the Welsh or Scottish, or most English for that matter, would really appreciate being labelled as a "region of Britain" when they are in fact countries.

I can't think why. The United states is a region of North America, after all. And as proud as the Welsh are, I think few of them would claim to be a fully independent nation when, legally, they're a principality - part of the domain of Prince Charles. No?

From Wikipedia

The head of state in Wales, a constituent part of the United Kingdom, is the British monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II (since 1952). Executive power is derived by the Queen, and exercised by the Parliament of the United Kingdom at Westminster, with some powers devolved to the National Assembly for Wales in Cardiff. The United Kingdom Parliament retains responsibility for passing primary legislation in Wales. The National Assembly has regulatory authority over laws passed that are applicable to Wales, and has limited power to vary these by secondary legislation The National Assembly is not a sovereign authority, and the UK Parliament could, in theory, overrule or even abolish it at any time.​

Sounds rather like your description of Northern Ireland, at the end of the day.

The nationalists in Northern Ireland might claim they're not British, but at the end of the day they're ruled from Westminster until they get Stormont working properly. As far as the arguments they actually made go, I don't think mortar bombs, sniper rounds and ambushes can really be classed as legitimate political fare.

"War is a continuation of politics by other means." Carl von Clausewitz

No, they didn't really get asked the question. Neither did the Welsh farmer. Do you know why? Because he wasn't real and I was jesting.

Surely not. Well, to be fully honest, I was returning the jest, by way of showing the rather peculiar light that it cast on the teller.

Brave men and women? They "held out" against three waves of invaders because none of those three waves made much of an attempt to get into Wales as far as I'm aware. If you have any battles or sieges that you can point to to disprove that then please let me know.

From Britannia.com

In what is now Wales, the Romans were awestruck by their first sight of the druids. The historian Tacitus described them as being "ranged in order, with their hands uplifted, invoking the gods and pouring forth horrible imprecations" ("Annales"). The fierce resistance of the tribes in Wales meant that two out of the three Roman legions in Britain were stationed on the Welsh borders. Two impressive Roman fortifications remain to be seen: Isca Silurium (Caerleon) with its fine ampitheatre, in Monmouthshire and Segontium, (Caernarfon), in Gwynedd.​

The Romans attempted to conquer Wales because the Welsh tribes controlled significant deposits of copper, tin, and gold. However they were unable to push further north than Carmarthen on the southern frontier, nor further south than Caernarfon in the northern regions. So they ringed Wales about with a line of forts and stationed two thirds of their military along the frontier to try to pacify the Welsh tribes. The closest they got was the introduction of Christianity thanks to Roman missionaries. The history of the Roman presence in (or rather, on the edges of) Wales is one of nearly continuous warfare from roughly 50CE until the Romans left Britain in 410CE. They managed to force an uneasy peace with the Welsh tribes, enough that they could at least trade with them. Later Welsh kings in the southern regions claimed descent from the last Roman general in the area, Magnus Maximus, but the Romans never pacified that region for more than a decade or so at a stretch.

The Saxons had the same interest in Wales that the Romans had had, but they had even less military power. Roman Britain fell a piece at a time to the Saxons after the Legions pulled out, but in the 8th and 9th centuries Welsh kings like Rhodri Mawr united Wales and forced a negotiated border with the neighboring English (that is, Saxon) rulers. You may have heard of Offa's Dyke, which is an earthwork nearly 150 miles long built to defend the English kingdom of Mercia from Welsh raiders. When the Danes invaded in the late 9th and early 10th Century they fought the Welsh in Anglesey and lost, even though they conquered all the rest of England between Hadrian's Wall and the Thames until Alfred the Great finally drove them out.

You are a British citizen, right? I really shouldn't be having to tell you all of this.

The first wave that made any real attempt were the English, and look what happened there. Same thing that happened to most everyone else 😀

The first people to truly conquer Wales were the Anglo-Normans in the 13th century. The Saxons had been pushovers, of course: William the Bastard did for them in 1066. But it took them another 200 years before Wales finally fell.

In that case who do we have to thank for the 800-year subjugation of the Irish? "Fighting Irish" my arse, if the Irish fought as well as they blathered the English would be long gone ^_^

800 year subjugation? Hardly. Henry II gained title to Ireland in 1172, thanks to a grant from the Pope (who happened to be British at that time). However English law didn't extend beyond Dublin and Waterford until the middle of the 16th century, roughly 450 years later. It was another 100 years after that before the Protestant Ascendancy that placed British nobles in control of Irish lands. After that, have you looked at what the British had to do there in order to keep the island even halfway stable? Considering the enormous difference in military power between the British Empire and the island of Ireland, I'd say the trouble they've had holding on to that island is a testament to the Irish tenacity as fighters. You really need to lose the superior attitude and dig into your history, if you don't mind me saying.

 

[storyteller]

800 year subjugation? Hardly. Henry II gained title to Ireland in 1172, thanks to a grant from the Pope (who happened to be British at that time)...

Henry II! My favorite English monarch. Henry had at least a two reasons for wanting Ireland and used all his political wiles to get it. He'd divided up his vast realm among his three, remaining oldest sons (Henry, Richard, and Geoffrey; oldest son Arthur died in early childhood). John, the fifth son, survived infancy and childhood, but Henry had nothing left to give. As a consequence, John was known as John Lackland, because John lacked land. Henry's support of his common laws and primogeniture prevented him from giving John his brother Henry's share when the Young King died. England went to the next son, Richard. Henry II figured he could contain the Irish, who were a potential, and occasionally active, threat, and provide John with a landed inheritance. As history notes, Richard died without issue, Geoffrey died, and Geoffrey's son and daughter died or disappeared (many think at John's hands). So, John took all, and lost all his father's Continental holdings, but he had England, Wales, and Ireland. Of course, the barons, unused to having a full-time, on-site king, didn't like the power John had and frequently abused so along came that pesky Magna Carta to reign him in. It was effective, for about 5 minutes. John wasn't too keen on keeping certain agreements. His son, Henry III, was likewise difficult when it came to adhering to the Great Charter.

Apologies Headsnap for getting off topic. Couldn't resist this one. As said, Henry Plantagenet, Henry II, is one of my favorite historical figures.