Cunedda Wledig (fl. 430 AD)

Cunedda and his band of Romanised Picts travelled south to 

Wales and drove out the Irish who had settled there several

generations earlier. He may have been employed as a 

mercenary by the Romano-British authorities or simply seized 

an opportunity to carve out a kingdom.

Cunedda Wledig was a powerful warrior prince from Manau-Gododdin who migrated to Wales in the early fifth century and founded a dynasty from which Welsh nobility would claim ancestry for centuries afterward.

According to tradition, Cunedda was descended from a line of Votadini chieftains whose Latinised names suggest they ruled in some sort of official Roman capacity north of Hadrian’s Wall. By Cunedda’s time, the Manau-Gododdin was a sub-kingdom of Goutodin and it is likely that Cunedda was some sort of leader or sub-king. Not much is known of his life in the north. Cunedda must have been a charismatic warrior as he was able to rally the beleaguered Romano-British to fight off constant Irish and Pictish raids. Perhaps because of his actions, Cunedda managed to secure a politically advantageous marriage to Gwawl, a daughter of Coel Hen, and is claimed to have had nine sons and at least two daughters.

At some point in the early fifth century, maybe around 430, Cunedda and his warband migrated southwest to Wales. His wife, Gwawl, appears to have gone with him, as did his younger sons. His eldest son, Typaun, remained behind in Manau-Gododdin and presumably inherited whatever role it was that Cunedda relinquished when he left. According to legend, Cunedda was offered land in return for ousting Irish raiders (named as the Ui Liathain from Munster) who had invaded and settled along the Welsh coastline during the last century. Nennius, writing centuries later, wrote that Cunedda and his warband arrived in Wales “and with great slaughter they drove out from these regions the Scotti who never returned again to inhabit them”.

Alternatively, it has been suggested that Cunedda may have sailed down the Irish Sea of his own volition and invaded North Wales, establishing himself a kingdom during the chaos that resulted from a plague that swept southern Britain in 446 and the subsequent Saxon laeti revolt. Northern Wales had been governed by Custennin, a son of Magnus Maximus, but presumably Custennin had either died by this point or unable to put up much resistance. 

With only the westernmost parts of Wales remaining in Irish hands, Cunedda settled down in Gwynedd and founded both a kingdom and a dynasty. His sons went on to found royal dynasties of their own in kingdoms which would later be named after them; Ceredigion, Meirionnydd, Ysfeilion, Rhufoniog, Dunoding, Afflogion and Edeyrnion.