09 — Veneration and Legacy
What became of David of Wales (Dewi Sant, c. 500–589) after his death: the great cathedral and shrine raised on the site of his monastery at Glyn Rhosyn, the relics venerated there and the modern science that has dated them, the papal confirmation of his cult, and his eventual rise into the patron saint of a nation. These two files carry the collection’s source-critical discipline to its end — weighing the radiocarbon study of the relics and the Callixtus II “canonization” tradition from both sides, flagging the folk-etymology behind the leek and the daffodil, and closing with a sober final assessment of the man behind the cult.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (pre-Schism; Celtic; patron of Wales)
David’s afterlife in the Church and in Wales is, in many ways, better documented than his life — and the gap between the two is itself the subject of this section. The cathedral at St Davids, the smallest city in Britain, stands where his monastery stood; its shrine and reliquary were the focus of one of the great pilgrim cults of the medieval West, confirmed by the papacy under Pope Callixtus II in a form proper to the early twelfth century; and from that cult grew, by way of an eleventh-century Latin Life, a medieval Welsh Life, and a nineteenth-century national revival, the figure of Dewi Sant, patron of Wales, kept each 1 March with leeks and daffodils. This section sets out the monument and the relics with their disappointing radiocarbon date, traces the national legacy with care for what is genuine and what is later invention, and renders the collection’s final, measured verdict on a real ascetic father whose historical person is largely lost behind his cult.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| St Davids Cathedral and the Relics | The cathedral on the site of the monastery at Glyn Rhosyn; St Davids as the smallest city in Britain; the Viking raids that destroyed the early site (Annales Cambriae); the Norman rebuilding under Bishop Peter de Leia from 1181; the medieval shrine, the reliquary, and the bones — with the modern radiocarbon study showing them too late for the sixth-century saint, handled soberly from both sides; and the papal recognition of the cult under Pope Callixtus II c. 1120, with precision about what “canonization” meant in this period and the source-critical weight of the Gerald-of-Wales tradition. |
| Legacy and Assessment | Dewi Sant as national patron of Wales; St David’s Day (Dydd Gŵyl Dewi, 1 March) and its customs; the national emblems — the leek (the older badge) and the daffodil (a later, cenhinen / cenhinen Bedr punning association), with their folk-etymological origins flagged; David in Welsh identity, the eisteddfod-era and modern revival, and nineteenth- and twentieth-century national myth-making; and a sober final assessment of David as a genuine early monastic founder of real influence whose historical figure is largely inaccessible behind an eleventh-century tendentious Life, yet whose cult and ascetic ideal remain significant — tying together the collection’s source-critical thread. |
See Also
- Pilgrimage to St Davids — the medieval pilgrimage and the papal favour the shrine enjoyed
- The Monastery at Mynyw — David’s foundation on whose site the cathedral stands
- The Cult Records — the documentary basis of the cult and the losses from the Viking raids
- The Vita Davidis — Rhygyfarch’s eleventh-century Life, the source behind the legacy
- What Can Be Known — the historical core the final assessment rests on
- The Orthodox Reception — David as a venerated pre-Schism saint of the West
- Saint Columba of Iona — a parallel insular cult and shrine
- Saint Patrick of Ireland — the patron-saint cult of a neighbouring nation
- The Church Calendar — the commemoration on 1 March
- The Pre-Schism Church — the one catholic Church within which the cult stood
- Methodology — the citation and verification standard governing these files
References
- Evans, J. Wyn, and Jonathan M. Wooding, eds. St David of Wales: Cult, Church and Nation. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2007. (The cathedral, the see, the cult, the relics, the archaeology, and the national legacy.)
- James, Heather. “The Cult of St David in the Middle Ages.” In St David of Wales: Cult, Church and Nation, ed. Evans and Wooding (2007), and subsequent studies on the archaeology of St Davids and the relic analysis. (The shrine, the relics, and the radiocarbon dating.)
- Gerald of Wales (Giraldus Cambrensis). Giraldi Cambrensis Opera. Ed. J. S. Brewer et al. Rolls Series. London, 1861–1891; and The Journey Through Wales, trans. Lewis Thorpe. London: Penguin, 1978. (The shrine, the pilgrimage, and the Callixtus II tradition.)
- Annales Cambriae. Ed. and trans. John Williams ab Ithel. Rolls Series. London, 1860. (The Viking raids on St Davids.)
- Charles-Edwards, T. M. Wales and the Britons, 350–1064. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. (The historical David and the early Welsh church.)