Gutun Owain and the scholarly culture of north-east Wales in the later Middle Ages

Cadw is supporting the University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies for the research project ‘The first Welsh Renaissance man? Gutun Owain and the scholarly culture of north-east Wales in the later Middle Ages’.

This new and exciting project, beginning on 1 May 2025, will publish edited texts and translations of poetry by the fifteenth-century polymath Gutun Owain, and will investigate his contribution to the scholarship of his region on the eve of the Renaissance in Wales. The project will run from 1 May 2025 to 31 July 2027, will be carried out by Dr Jenny Day, Dr Gruffudd Antur and Dr Martin Crampin, with Professor Ann Parry Owen as advisor.

Gutun Owain was one of the most prominent Welsh poets of the later Middle Ages, and he was a scribe and scholar with a particular interest in the fields of history writing, genealogy and bardic grammars. He lived in Dudleston, near Oswestry, where he was part of a vibrant network of literary patrons and fellow scholars which extended across north-east Wales and included not only fellow poets and gentlemen scholars, but also Cistercian abbots of Valle Crucis and Basingwerk. 

Susan Mason, Cadw’s head of Lifelong Learning, said, 

“Cadw are delighted to support this important research into such a significant figure in the cultural and literary history of Wales. 

This project will also enhance our knowledge of the people who populated our rich artistic and historical landscape.”

See The UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) awards £234,138 to the University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies | University of Wales Trinity Saint David for more information.