Welsh people
[20] During their time in Britain, the ancient Romans encountered tribes in present-day Wales that they called the Ordovices, the Demetae, the Silures and the Deceangli.
Most people in Wales today regard themselves as modern Celts, claiming a heritage back to the Iron Age tribes.
The process whereby the indigenous population of Wales came to think of themselves as "Welsh" (a name applied to them by Anglo-Saxon settlers) is not clear.
There is plenty of evidence of the use of the term Brythoniaid (Britons); meanwhile, the earliest use of the word Kymry (referring not to the people but to the land—and possibly to northern Britain in addition to Wales) is found in a poem c. 633.
[32] However, it is unclear whether such inscriptions reveal a general or normative use of Latin as a marker of identity or its selective use by the early Christian Church.
[34] Recent research on ancient DNA has concluded that much of Britain's Neolithic population was replaced by Beaker people in the Bronze Age.
The post-Roman period saw a significant alteration in the genetic makeup of southern Britain due to the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons; however, historical evidence suggests that Wales was little affected by these migrations.
A study published in 2016 compared samples from modern Britain and Ireland with DNA found in skeletons from Iron Age, Roman and Anglo-Saxon era Yorkshire.
The study found that most of the Iron Age and Roman era Britons showed strong similarities with both each other and modern-day Welsh populations, while modern southern and eastern English groups were closer to a later Anglo-Saxon burial.
[37] A third study, published in 2020 and based on Viking era data from across Europe, suggested that the Welsh trace, on average, 58% of their ancestry to the Brittonic people, up to 22% from a Danish-like source interpreted as largely representing the Anglo-Saxons, 3% from Norwegian Vikings, and 13% from further south in Europe such as Italy, to a lesser extent, Spain and can possibly be related to French immigration during the Norman period.
[39] A study of a diverse sample of 2,039 individuals from the United Kingdom allowed the creation of a genetic map and the suggestion that there was a substantial migration of peoples from Europe prior to Roman times forming a strong ancestral component across England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, but which had little impact in Wales.
[40] Speaking of these results, Professor Peter Donnelly, of the University of Oxford, said that the Welsh carry DNA which could be the most ancient in UK and that people from Wales are genetically relatively distinct.
[48] In 2001, it is uncertain how many people in Wales considered themselves to be of Welsh ethnicity; the 2001 UK census did not offer 'Welsh' as an option; respondents had to use a box marked "Other".
Additional criticism was levelled at the timing of the census, which was taken in the middle of the 2001 United Kingdom foot-and-mouth crisis.
[53] The highest percentage of those identifying as of Welsh ethnicity was recorded in Gwynedd (at 27%), followed by Carmarthenshire (23%), Ceredigion (22%) and the Isle of Anglesey (19%).
[53] Among respondents between 16 and 74 years of age, those claiming Welsh ethnicity were predominantly in professional and managerial occupations.
Most residents of Wales (96 per cent, 2.9 million) reported at least one national identity of English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish, or British.
In August 1911, during a period of public order and industrial disputes, Jewish shops across the South Wales coalfield were damaged by mobs.
Govinda's temple and restaurant, run by the Hare Krishnas in Swansea, is a focal point for many Welsh Hindus.
[49] The decline in Welsh speakers in much of rural Wales is attributable to non-Welsh-speaking residents moving to North Wales, driving up property prices above what locals may afford, according to former Gwynedd county councillor Seimon Glyn of Plaid Cymru, whose controversial comments in 2001 focused attention on the issue.
[67] A Plaid Cymru taskforce headed by Dafydd Wigley recommended land should be allocated for affordable local housing, called for grants for locals to buy houses, and recommended that council tax on holiday homes should double.
[citation needed] Due to an increase in Welsh-language nursery education, recent census data reveals a reversal of decades of linguistic decline: there are now more Welsh speakers under five years of age than over 60.
The language is used in the bilingual Welsh Parliament (Senedd) and entered on its records, with English translation.
[73] Welsh as a first language is largely concentrated in the less urban north and west of Wales, principally Gwynedd, inland Conwy and Denbighshire, northern and south-western Powys, the Isle of Anglesey, Carmarthenshire, North Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion, and parts of western Glamorgan, although first-language and other fluent speakers can be found throughout Wales.
Parts of the culture are strongly connected to the language — notably the Eisteddfod tradition, poetry and aspects of folk music and dance.
[82] Settlers from Wales (and later Patagonian Welsh) arrived in Newfoundland in the early 19th century, and founded towns in Labrador's coast region; in 1819, the ship Albion left Cardigan for New Brunswick, carrying Welsh settlers to Canada; on board were 27 Cardiganian families, many of whom were farmers.
[83] In 1852, Thomas Benbow Phillips of Tregaron established a settlement of about 100 Welsh people in the state of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil.
[92] There is no known evidence which would objectively support the legend that the Mandan, a Native American tribe of the central United States, are Welsh emigrants who reached North America under Prince Madog in 1170.
[93] The Ukrainian city of Donetsk was founded in 1869 by a Welsh businessman, John Hughes (an engineer from Merthyr Tydfil) who constructed a steel plant and several coal mines in the region; the town was thus named Yuzovka (Юзовка) in recognition of his role in its founding ("Yuz" being a Russian or Ukrainian approximation of Hughes).
After she suffered from bronchopneumonia as a child, her parents were advised that it would aid her recovery to live in a warmer climate.
