This volume is a welcome addition to the sparse list of publications on early modern Wales. As Sarah Ward Clavier correctly notes, there are few full-length studies of the principality in this period and much of the existing scholarly work has focused on the development of religious dissent rather than on political and religious conformity. Ward Clavier has sought to redress this imbalance by situating her work within the niche world of the royalist gentry in north-east Wales. The book takes a thematic approach: part i discusses and defines the general concept of Welsh ‘historical culture’ and its influence on the north-east Welsh gentry; part ii examines the north-east Welsh gentry's religious views, stressing their loyalty to the episcopalian Church of England and examining their relationships with Catholicism and Protestant nonconformity; part iii discusses their loyalty both to individual kings and the monarchy more generally. The epilogue traces the significant levels of support in north-east Wales for Jacobitism after 1688. These sections are interspersed with case studies of individual members of the gentry.
Throughout the volume, the author seeks to assess the impact of Civil War, revolution and regime change on the Welsh ‘historical culture’ which she identifies as a core aspect of the identity of the gentry of north-east Wales. To construct her arguments she draws on material culture and extensive written sources, the most important of which is the personal correspondence of various gentry families. Naturally, as she readily acknowledges, this has biased her evidence towards the wealthier families whose archives have better survived the passage of time.
The central theme of the book depends upon the existence of a unique ‘Welsh historical culture’ which, the author argues, was a dominant influence on the character and activities of the gentry in north-east Wales. She identifies a general Welsh devotion to the ‘British history’ which emerged from sources including Nennius and Geoffrey of Monmouth. This origin myth looked back to the ancient Greek Aenius and his descendant Brutus as founding fathers of Wales and played a powerful role in the formation and perpetuation of Welsh, especially north-east Welsh, identity. Allied with an obsession with lineage and kinship, she suggests that this made Welsh gentry culture, especially that of north-east Wales, distinctively different from its English counterpart and led to an intense loyalty to the crown – in particular to the Stuarts.
The author continues this argument in her interpretation of the religious and political loyalties of her gentry. Their somewhat creative interpretation of the episcopalian Church of England as heir to the ancient Celtic Church, unsullied by the teachings of St Augustine, allowed them to maintain a steadfast devotion to it throughout the mid-century revolution. Where Interregnum attempts to reform and widen religious practice found some footing in south Wales, the north-east gentry clung to the episcopalian Church as a bulwark of social stability and Welsh heritage. Their devotion to tradition also allowed them to maintain close relationships with local and long-established Catholic recusants, in contrast to their dislike of Puritans, whom they regarded as both foreign and innovative. Not surprisingly, after the Restoration they became committed persecutors of nonconformists.
The profound loyalty of the north-east Welsh gentry to the monarchy remained essentially constant throughout the period 1640–88 and beyond, even enabling them to negotiate the difficult years of James ii's Catholicism by maintaining a devotion to the monarchy, if not to James himself. It was this loyalty, the author suggests, that resulted in considerable support amongst the gentry for the Jacobite cause of the early eighteenth century.
This is an interesting and well-researched volume, which stresses the importance of history, tradition and lineage in north-east Welsh gentry culture. The author has used an impressive array of written sources and her inclusion of physical objects – especially funerary memorials, royal ‘relics’ and even, briefly, landscapes – enriches her discussions of the subject. It is no mean feat to seek to identify that most nebulous concept – culture – at such a chronological distance and with limited sources and she has used well the difficult evidence that survives. It is unfortunate, however, that the publisher has failed to help in the move from thesis to book; there is considerable repetition of both facts and of ‘structural’ explanations, which a careful editorial hand might have eliminated. Some events, such as the ‘Three Questions survey’ of 1686, could have been more fully explained for the benefit of more general readers. Moreover the publishers have allowed the volume to be footnote-heavy, yet failed to provide sufficient space for a legible map or other helpful illustrations, given the interesting discussions of material culture. The reader will sympathise with the pressure on young academics to publish quickly; in this case, greater distance from the thesis would have enabled Ward Clavier to slim down the somewhat repetitive examination of historical culture and to situate the conclusions of a relatively niche study more firmly within the national context. The gentry's relations with Catholics and nonconformists, for example, would have benefited from a deeper comparison with more national evidence, and from a discussion of how the gentry were, in turn, viewed by both groups. The case studies might have helped this process by focusing on just one of her three themes in each study – for example, Thomas Mostyn and religious identity or Robert Davies and royalism. On the other hand, her examination of Jacobitism in north-east Wales is a real strength of the book; as an epilogue, its brevity has allowed her to think more fluidly and to raise questions and ideas which are stimulating and generously helpful to future scholars. Overall, this is a fascinating and thought-provoking book. It covers genuinely new ground, works competently and creatively with difficult sources and adds significantly to existing Welsh studies. The author is to be congratulated on producing a readable, engaging and intelligent study and it is to be hoped that she continues to open up this geographical and intellectual field in early modern studies.
