More about the Centre

The Centre was established by the University of Wales in 1985, with a well-stocked library| which has grown over the years into an invaluable resource for Welsh and Celtic Studies. The Centre’s first Director was Professor R. Geraint Gruffydd, and its first project was the preparation of an edition of the work of the Poets of the Princes , published in seven volumes (1991–6).

In 1993 the Centre moved to purpose-built accommodation adjacent to the National Library of Wales. In the same year Professor Geraint H. Jenkins took over as Director, and the following fifteen years saw a considerable expansion in our activities, with three research projects soon running concurrently.

Completed projects include The Poets of the Princes,|   The Poets of the Nobility,| The Social History of the Welsh Language,| The Celtic Languages and Cultural Identity,| The Visual Culture of Wales,| and Iolo Morganwg and the Romantic Tradition in Wales.|

Following the decision by the University of Wales to dissolvethe Board of Celtic Studies in 2007, the Centre has been responsible for the University’s mission to promote research in the field of Celtic Studies in Wales, and we fund collaborative research and publications, including four journals, Contemporary Wales , The Welsh History Review , Llên Cymru and Studia Celtica .

The University of Wales Dictionary|  is now one of our four major projects. The other three current projects are Ancient Britain and the Atlantic Zone,| The Poetry of Guto’r Glyn,| and Wales and the French Revolution.| We plan to develop a new project on the place-names|  of Wales in 2010, and work has already begun on an edition of the correspondence of Edward Lhwyd in collaboration with the University of Oxford. The Centre currently has a total of over thirty staff.| Following the retirement of Professor Geraint H. Jenkins in September 2008 Professor Dafydd Johnston| is now Director.

The Centre holds regular events| open to the public, including annual fora relating to our current projects, major Celtic Studies conferences, and fortnightly seminars during the winter and spring terms.

Our core funding is provided by the University of Wales and the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales, with additional project funding from UK Research Councils and charities, the British Academy, and a variety of public and private donors. We are currently in receipt of funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council for our projects on Guto’r Glyn and on Wales and the French Revolution.

Celtic Studies is a wide-ranging academic discipline encompassing the languages, literatures, history and cultures of Wales, Ireland, Scotland, Brittany, Cornwall and the Isle of Man, as well as wide areas of continental Europe and central Asia Minor in ancient times. The origins of the Celtic languages and groups called Celts continue to be matters of considerable debate, questions which are central to our current project on Ancient Britain and the Atlantic Zone.| Also highly controversial is the question of a common Celtic culture and identity. Some claim to see essentially Celtic forms of art, music, literature, religion, and even world-view, but the only certain feature uniting the Celtic peoples of today is the common origin of their languages, as first identified by Edward Lhwyd in his Archaeologia Britannica in 1707.

Nevertheless, the Celts have certainly made a major contribution to European civilization from the Bronze Age onwards. Their history has been one of marginalization and oppression by imperial powers, but their languages and cultures continue to survive, adapt and develop in the modern era. The bardic poetry of Wales and Ireland is one of the little-known treasures of medieval Europe, and yet both countries have vibrant contemporary literatures too.  Although Celtic Studies provides a wealth of unique insights into tradition and cultural heritage, it is not just a backward-looking discipline, but offers essential opportunities for the study and enrichment of modern culture and planning for the future of our languages and communities.

More information about the Celts is available in two works edited by Professor John Koch, the five-volume Encyclopedia of Celtic Culture and History (2006) and the Atlas for Celtic Studies (2007).