ABSTRACT
This is the first volume to examine how the history of Wales was written in a period that saw the emergence of professional historiography, largely focused on the nation, across Europe and in the United States. It thus sets Wales in the context of recent work on national history writing in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and, more particularly, offers a Welsh perspective on the ways in which history was written in small, mainly stateless, nations. The comparative dimension is fundamental to the volume's aim, highlighting what was distinctive about Welsh historical writing and showing how the Welsh experience mirrors and illuminates broader historiographical developments. The book begins with an introduction that uses the concept of historical culture as a way of exploring the different strands of historiography covered in the collection, providing orientation to the chapters that follow. These are divided into four sections: 'Contexts and Backgrounds', 'Amateurs and Popularizers', 'Creating Academic Disciplines', and 'Comparative Perspectives'. All these themes are then drawn together in the conclusion to examine how far Welsh historians exemplify widespread trends in the writing of national history, and thereby point-up common themes that emerge from the volume and clarify its broader significance for students of historiography.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part 1|64 pages
Contexts and Backgrounds
part 2|76 pages
Amateurs and Popularizers
chapter Chapter 4|16 pages
Failed Founding Fathers and Abandoned Sources: Edward Williams, Thomas Stephens and the Young J.E. Lloyd
chapter Chapter 5|14 pages
‘An account obtained from authentic documents’: Jane Williams (Ysgafell) as a Historian
chapter Chapter 6|14 pages
A Nation of Nonconformists: Thomas Rees (1815–85) and Nonconformist History
chapter Chapter 8|14 pages
‘A refreshingly new and challenging voice’: O.M. Edwards's Interpretation of the Welsh Past
part 3|96 pages
Creating Academic Disciplines
chapter Chapter 9|22 pages
From Antiquarians to Archaeologists in Nineteenth-Century Wales: The Question of Prehistory
chapter Chapter 11|18 pages
The Institutionalization of History in the University Colleges of Wales, 1880–1939: Aberystwyth and Bangor
chapter Chapter 13|14 pages
Town and Nation: Writing Urban Histories in Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Wales
part 4|76 pages
Comparative Perspectives