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In 2016, an analysis of the geography of Welsh surnames commissioned by the Welsh Government found that 718,000 people (nearly 35% of the Welsh population) have a family name of Welsh origin, compared with 5.3% in the rest of the United Kingdom, 4.7% in New Zealand, 4.1% in Australia, and 3.8% in the United States, with an estimated 16.3 ...
The earliest known item of human remains discovered in modern-day Wales is a Neanderthal jawbone, found at the Bontnewydd Palaeolithic site in the valley of the River Elwy in North Wales; it dates from about 230,000 years before present (BP) in the Lower Palaeolithic period, [1] and from then, there have been skeletal remains found of the Paleolithic Age man in multiple regions of Wales ...
Wales as a nation was defined in opposition to later English settlement and incursions into the island of Great Britain. In the early middle ages, the people of Wales continued to think of themselves as Britons, the people of the whole island, but over the course of time one group of these Britons became isolated by the geography of the western peninsula, bounded by the sea and English neighbours.
The English words "Wales" and "Welsh" derive from the same Old English root (singular Wealh, plural Wēalas), a descendant of Proto-Germanic *Walhaz, which was itself derived from the name of the Gaulish people known to the Romans as Volcae and which came to refer indiscriminately to inhabitants of the Western Roman Empire. [1]
Under his son, Henry VIII of England, the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542 were passed, integrating Wales with England in legal terms, abolishing the Welsh legal system, and banning the Welsh language from any official role or status, but it did for the first time define the Wales–England border and allowed members representing constituencies ...
The Old Irish and Welsh words for 'slave', cacht and caeth respectively, are cognate with Latin captus 'captive' suggesting that the slave trade was an early means of contact between Latin and Celtic societies. [142] In the Middle Ages, slavery was especially prevalent in the Celtic countries. [144]
Cambria is a name for Wales, being the Latinised form of the Welsh name for the country, Cymru. [1] The term was not in use during the Roman period (when Wales had not come into existence as a distinct entity) or the early medieval period.
In 2024, a petition called for the prohibition of the name "Wales" and for the Welsh name Cymru to be the only name. The petition had gained 5,400 signatures by 4 January 2024, [28] [14] and over 10,000 by 15 January, meeting the threshold for a Senedd debate.