Owain Glyndŵr, The Last True Prince Of Wales

Sep 16, 2024

7 min read

Updated: 4 hours ago

Bearded man beside medieval battle art with banner reading Owain Glyndwr, The Last True Prince Of Wales

Quick answers

Who was Owain Glyndŵr?

A Welsh nobleman who declared himself Prince of Wales in 1400 and led a fifteen-year rebellion against English rule, briefly running an independent Welsh state with its own parliament and foreign allies.

What happened to his family?

His wife, a daughter and several grandchildren were captured when Harlech Castle fell in 1409 and died in the Tower of London. His son Gruffydd had already died there a few years earlier.

Was Owain Glyndŵr ever captured?

No. Despite a huge reward on his head, he was never caught or betrayed, and he simply vanished from the historical record somewhere between 1412 and 1416.

Why does 16 September matter?

It's the date in 1400 that Glyndŵr proclaimed himself Prince of Wales at Glyndyfrdwy, now marked every year in Wales as Owain Glyndŵr Day.

Today marks 626 years since Owain Glyndŵr stood among a small crowd at Glyndyfrdwy and let himself be proclaimed Prince of Wales. It's now marked every year as Owain Glyndŵr Day, and it's worth remembering why the date still matters. For a few years, Glyndŵr didn't just fight the English, he ran an actual independent Welsh state, with its own parliament, its own foreign allies, and a written plan for two universities and a national church. He was never captured. His family, on the other hand, paid for it in full.

Medieval archer aims arrow at knight on horseback near castle walls.

A soldier for the crown he'd later fight

Owain ap Gruffydd, better known as Owain Glyndŵr, was born sometime in the 1350s, though sources disagree on the exact year. His pedigree wasn't in doubt: through his father he descended from the princes of Powys, and through his mother from the princes of Deheubarth and Llywelyn the Great himself. When his father died in 1370, Owain inherited the estate and was sent to London to study, including time at the Inns of Court under the wing of Sir David Hanmer, a chief justice of the King's Bench who later became his father-in-law.

The dispute that started a war

Glyndŵr settled into a peaceful life on his estates, married to Margaret Hanmer, with six sons and several daughters. What ended the peace was a land dispute with his neighbour, Reginald Grey, Lord of Ruthin. In 1400, Grey is widely believed to have deliberately sat on a royal summons calling Glyndŵr to join Henry IV's Scottish campaign, making him look like a defaulting tenant through no real fault of his own. Glyndŵr petitioned parliament for justice and got nowhere. Against a backdrop of a deeply unpopular new king, who'd taken the throne from Richard II the year before, it was enough to tip a private grievance into national rebellion.

16 September 1400: the proclamation

At Glyndyfrdwy, a small band that included Glyndŵr's eldest son, his brothers-in-law and the Dean of St Asaph proclaimed him Prince of Wales. He was around fifty years old. Within days his men had attacked Ruthin, and Denbigh, Rhuddlan, Flint, Hawarden and Holt fell soon after. Welsh students at Oxford and Cambridge reportedly dropped their studies to join him, and Welsh labourers working across the border in England walked off the job to do the same.

Armored knight with lion rampant shield on barded horse, crossing stream.

16 September 1400: the proclamation

The nation Glyndŵr tried to build

By 1404 Glyndŵr had taken the castles at Aberystwyth and Harlech, making the latter his court and family home. That same year he summoned a parliament at Machynlleth, with four elected representatives sent from every commote in Wales, and was formally crowned Prince of Wales in front of envoys from France, Castile and Scotland. This wasn't just theatre. Glyndŵr set out a genuine national programme: two universities, one for the north and one for the south, an independent Welsh church answering to nobody in Canterbury, and the restoration of the old native laws of Hywel Dda. For a few years, Wales had something close to statehood.

Splitting the kingdom three ways

In February 1405, at the home of the archdeacon of Bangor, Glyndŵr signed the Tripartite Indenture with his new son-in-law Mortimer and with Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, whose son Hotspur had already died fighting Henry IV at Shrewsbury two years earlier. The three agreed to carve up England and Wales between them if they won. Glyndŵr's share alone stretched deep into England, taking in Cheshire, Shropshire and Herefordshire as far as a spot called Six Ashes on the Shropshire and Staffordshire border, a hamlet that still bears that name today. Later that year a French expeditionary force landed at Milford Haven and marched into England alongside the Welsh, getting as far as Woodbury Hill near Worcester before the two sides simply faced off and withdrew without a decisive battle.

The letter that still survives in Paris

On 31 March 1406, at St Peter ad Vincula church in Pennal, Glyndŵr dictated a letter to Charles VI of France, sealed in red wax and sent under his own Latin title, Owinus Dei gratia Princeps Wallie. In it he offered to recognise the Avignon Pope Benedict XIII in exchange for French support, and set out the same national vision from Machynlleth in writing: an independent Welsh archdiocese at St Davids and two national universities. The original still survives today in the Archives Nationales in Paris. It's the only surviving document that sets out, in writing, what an independent medieval Welsh state was actually supposed to look like.

The collapse

The tide had already begun turning. In 1406 a heavy defeat at the Battle of Pwll Melyn cost Glyndŵr his son Gruffydd, taken prisoner. Percy was killed at the Battle of Bramham Moor in 1408, and English pressure on the remaining Welsh strongholds only grew. Aberystwyth fell later that year. Harlech held out until early 1409, when it finally fell too. Mortimer died during the siege. Glyndŵr's wife Margaret, his daughter Catrin and her children were captured and taken to the Tower of London, where all of them were dead by 1413. They were buried at St Swithin's, London Stone, and a memorial to Catrin was finally unveiled there in 2001. Gruffydd, captured years earlier at Pwll Melyn, had already died in the Tower around 1411, before the rest of his family had even arrived.

The man who was never caught

Owain himself was never captured. Despite an enormous reward on his head, no one ever betrayed him, and he kept up a scattered guerrilla resistance for a few more years after Harlech fell. His surviving son Maredudd took over what was left of the fight from 1412, eventually accepting a royal pardon in 1421, long after his father had disappeared from the record for good. The last certain trace of Glyndŵr dates to around 1412, with rumours placing his final years quietly on the Herefordshire estate of one of his sons-in-law. Welsh legend folded him into the same tradition as Arthur, Cadwaladr and Cynan, as Y Mab Darogan, the son of prophecy who will rise again when Wales needs him most.

The influence that outlasted the rebellion

The rebellion failed, but Glyndŵr's standing has only grown since. A 1999 Sunday Times list of the most influential people of the past millennium ranked him seventh, ahead of Galileo, Newton and Lincoln. The Welsh historian John Davies once put it plainly: "Revolutionaries all over the world have always looked to Owain Glyndŵr" as a model guerrilla leader. His quartered banner of Powys and Deheubarth is still flown at rugby matches and national events today, the year 2000 saw the 600th anniversary of the rebellion celebrated across Wales, and campaigners in the Senedd have more recently pushed for better protection of the sites tied to his life, including his old home at Sycharth.

It's a story that fits neatly alongside Wales's older mythic tradition of the hero who never really dies.

The Mabinogion, the country's oldest surviving body of legend, is full of exactly that kind of figure, and it's part of why the promise of Glyndŵr's return slotted so easily into Welsh belief. It sits comfortably next to other pieces of Welsh cultural survival against long odds, from the Mari Lwyd tradition to the language and music kept alive by communities like the Kale of Wales.

Red and yellow checkered flag with four rampant lions heraldry design.

Frequently asked questions

Is Owain Glyndŵr related to today's Prince of Wales title?

No. The modern title is granted by the British monarch to their heir. Glyndŵr held it as a rival, Welsh-born claim centuries earlier, which is why he's remembered as the last native Welshman to carry it, rather than as part of that same royal line.

What happened to Glyndŵr's home at Sycharth?

Prince Henry, the future Henry V, burned it to the ground in May 1403. Only the earthworks survive today, under the guardianship of Cadw, and Welsh campaigners have petitioned the Senedd for better protection and access to the site.

Is there a statue of Owain Glyndŵr?

Yes. A life-size bronze statue of him on horseback stands in the town square at Corwen, near where he grew up. It was unveiled in 2007, the work of sculptor Colin Spofforth, set on an eight-tonne block of Welsh granite.

Why do sources give different dates for his birth and death?

Because so much of his life went undocumented at both ends. Historians rely on scattered court and property records for his early years and on rumour, pardons and legend for his last ones, which is why almost every date attached to him carries a "circa".

Is there a memorial to his daughter Catrin?

Yes, in London. A sculpture near St Swithin's Church, where she's buried alongside her children, was unveiled on Owain Glyndŵr Day, 16 September 2001.