Cylchgronau Cymru

Chwiliwch trwy dros 450 o deitlau a 1.2 miliwn o dudalennau

Garstin calls "the Russian miracle," of the magic. which in a single week transformed that vast empire from a continent simmering with discontent into a united nation of one purpose and one creed, singly devoted to the successful prosecution of their holy war. It is this spirit which has enabled the Russian armies to maintain their morale through four of the most trying months which any army has ever survived. And although, now that the first impulse has worn itself a little fainter and the pressure of a long and arduous campaign begins to make itself felt among the civil population, we can see signs that the old discords are not wholly healed, we can feel assured that the same spirit will carry our great ally through to victory, and leave her at the end not only victorious over the foreign aggressor, but conqueror of herself, happily launched upon a new era of progress which will enable her to realise, as she has never done before, that great store of spiritual treasure of which she has already given sluggish Europe, so wonderful and exciting a foretaste. C.T. Cardiganshire Antiquarian Society Transactions and Archaeological Record, Vol. 2. No. 1. The Cardiganshire Antiquarian Society is to be congratulated on the recently issued number of its Transactions. It is a volume of most varied interest, and the wealth of its illustrations is remarkable. The Society is fortunate in its editors and its con- tributors. Professor Tyrrell Green is an authority on Church Architecture as well as a very capable Draughtsman. His volume on Towers and Spires is a standard work on that branch of architecture. He is responsible for the great majority of the illustrations and the most valuable piece of work in the volume is his scholarly notes on the Fonts of the county, and his admirable drawings thereof, which are both accurate and artistic. A large proportion of the Fonts are Norman, and Professor Green points out the interesting fact that the ornamentation on some of these fonts is of the Celtic type, introducing the interlaced pattern seen in Strata Florida, and especially found in the pre-Norman monuments of Glamorgan and Pembrokeshire. One would wel- come an extension of Professor Green's investigations into Welsh Fonts so as to embrace other Welsh counties. It would be a peculiarly interesting study to trace the extent the so-called Celtic ornament has been used in the decoration of Fonts and the beautifying of churches in Wales, apart from its more familiar use in the decoration of sepulchral monuments. One font, at least, that in the Church of Penmon, Anglesey, is entirely decorated with the key-pattern, which, with the interlaced ropework pattern, is the chief characteristic of the Celtic ornamentation on the stones of Uantwit Major. Margam, Carew, and Golden Grove. An exceedingly suggestive note on the carved woodwork on the rood beam at Uanina Church calls attention to the extreme poverty of present day Cardigan churches in carved wood screens, a poverty the more lamentable in that at the beginning of last century at least eight Cardigan churches are said by Meyrick to possess rood screens. Though Welsh churches as a rule cannot compare with those of Somerset and Devon in the possession of these magnificent relics of the carver's craft, yet in several churches rood screens, and in some cases rood lofts. can be found in excellent preservation, especially in the churches of Patricio, and Llanfilo in Brecon- shire Uanwnog, Montgomery, Newtown and Pennant Melangell in Montgomeryshire Uanrwst and Conway in Denbighshire; Uanegryn in Mer- ioneth and all acquainted with these churches will mourn the loss of the screens of Cardigan. Cardiganshire cannot boast of many monuments of antiquity of major importance, apart from Strata Florida Abbey, the Priory in Cardigan Town, the Castles of Aberystwyth, Cilgerran, and the very scanty remains of the Roman Camp at Uanio Still, the Society is doing most valuable work in preserving the memory of less important aspects of its past history, especially by publishing drawings of so many bits of vanished and vanishing Cardigan. Another enthusiastic and learned antiquary, Mr. G. Eyre Evans, contributes a most interesting account of the founding of a Royal Mint in Abery- stwyth Castle by Thomas Bushell in the reign of Charles I. Nor is the Society unmindful of the County's worthies. Photographs of the statues of Dr. Lewis Edwards, Bala, by Sir Goscombe John, and of Henry Richard, M.P.. by Mr. Albert Toft, are accompanied by short but adequate accounts of their life work. Considerable space is devoted to reviews of books of antiquarian interest. The four volumes published of the inventory of ancient monuments in Wales and Monmouth receives somewhat scathing criticism, especially the architectural parts of the volume. The reviewer, though he leaves upon us the impres- sion that the patient and careful research of the compilers has received somewhat less than justice, has certainly justified his suggestion that an expert in church architecture should be added to the Commission on Ancient Monuments.