Wales was conquered by England in the thirteenth century, but large areas were ruled by powerful English Marcher Lords, rather than directly administered from London. This fact, along with its remoteness from the center of power, and the unimportance of its agricultural, industrial and resource contributions to the developing English state, meant that Wales stayed a different country culturally. The surviving Welsh gentry patronized Welsh bardic poets, the main carriers of Welsh tradition, so that Welsh learning continued to be cultivated. There was a rich cultural life.
By the late eighteenth century, though, most of the gentry had been assimilated to English society and had lost interest in Welsh. The language might have become simply a despised peasant language, and eventually gone the way of Irish--though Wales was never as deeply colonized as Ireland was--but for two developments.
As in Ireland and the Highlands, some independent scholars and clergymen continued to take an interest in Welsh tradition, providing a loose structure of support for the cultivation of Welsh language and tradition, and thus for the continued existence of a Welsh people.
The second development was more decisive, though. Many Welsh communities, adrift in this period of social and cultural change when old structures were collapsing, and old meanings seemed inadequate, were ripe for the message of fundamentalist Christianity that was already transforming English agricultural and industrial communities. Society in most areas of Wales was thus rebuilt around small Methodist, Baptist and Independent chapels. Since the Bible was at the center of the fervent religiosity, the ability to read it in Welsh was essential for everyone. Thousands of sermons were preached every Sunday in Welsh, accustoming listeners to complex theological and moral argument. Hundreds of books of theology were published in Welsh. The downside of this was that Welsh folk literature, song and music pretty much ceased to exist.
At the same time, the development of the Glamorgan and Gwent valleys as industrial and mining centers created huge population centers. The chapels, with their sermons, literary and musical competitions, were in many ways at the center of this new society. A literate native Welsh middle class grew up, providing a market for periodicals, newspapers, poetry and prose. Welsh still received very little official recognition, but mostly, it didn't matter--Wales lived its own life outside official structures.
At the same time, Welsh society was an integral part of the flourishing British empire, and it was gradually and inevitably integrated more closely into this. In the world beyond the farm, slate quarry or coal-mining valley, Welsh was but an obstacle to progress; a primitive dialect of no possible use. Welsh cultural vitality was therefore built on an uneasy foundation. Immigrants from neighboring English counties and from Ireland poured into Glamorgan and Gwent looking for work. Such pressures, along with the Great Depression that forced many Welsh out of their close-knit industrial and mining communities, seriously weakened the language in the main population centers, the valleys. Publishing in Welsh began to contract.
By the 1950s, the valleys had turned to English, Wales had been more closely integrated into English society, and publishing in Welsh had to turn to government subsidies to survive. Most rural communities were still intensely Welsh, but in many places, the new English-medium structures of modern life were replacing Welsh ones, as chapels declined. In the 1960s and 1970s, a youth protest movement centered on Cymdeithas yr Iaith (The Welsh Language Society) through direct action challenged the government to acknowledge the existence of Welsh, and to provide services in it. This tactic was based on the perception that the presence and pressure of English in Welsh communities had increased so much that these communities would gradually be transformed, unless they made a stand.
(A brother and sister, the group Siddi. They're from the Bala area.)
The tactic was successful, in many ways, and it might be said that it woke the Welsh nation. A small renaissance occurred in these decades, with Welsh rock and pop, new popular magazines, television (eventually), a renewal of traditional poetry, and so on. The position of Welsh in education was strengthened. The language was now an asset, and Welsh-speaking young people were assured jobs in education and media. The future was bright.
But 40 years of young people moving away from rural Welsh-speaking communities to go teach in the cities or work for Welsh television has weakened those communities. English second-home-buyers, retirees or downsizers have moved in, buying up houses at prices local people can't match. The attempt to provide modern music and entertainment and literature in Welsh to match those available in English, a world language, faltered
Above, Dewi Pws from the Cwm Tawe area of west Glamorgan (I think) talks about what living in Welsh means to him. Most of the houses above the beach are owned by English vacationers.
Below a video from the 1960s of the Mari Lwyd tradition in Glamorgan--Llangynwyd, to be specific. The speaker does pretty well speaking Standard Welsh for the interview, but the sonorous slow cadence of Glamorgan Welsh comes through. The dialect is almost extinct now.
Below, children from probably the only school in Dyfed (outside the top of the Amman valley industrial area, Cwmann and Llanllwni) where there is a large majority of children who speak Welsh as their normal language; in the Gwaun Valley, north Pembrokeshire.
Whether because of a collapse of confidence, the delayed impact of the collapse of the older structures of Welsh life (chapels, etc.) in some areas, or because of closer and closer integration into English society, the Welsh language is dying almost everywhere outside of the Northwest (west Gwynedd). Census statistics may still show large numbers of Welsh speakers, and local schools may still be designated as 'Welsh-language, but these facts are misleading.
A singer from Trefdraeth, north Pembrokeshire, where local people have been swamped by wealthy "White Settlers" come from England. The song is about the Little People (Pobl Bach) who decide not to take their money anymore.
More and more Welsh speakers have learned it in school, and rarely use Welsh outside of school. The Estyn individual school inspection reports available on-line provide teachers' estimates on the percent of pupils who speak Welsh at home. The percentage is now below 20% in almost all of Dyfed, Powys and Clwyd, even in areas that recently were strongly Welsh-speaking.
In all Dyfed, only the Gwaun valley (one school), and the top of the Amman valley industrial area in Carmarthenshire, but bordering Glamorgan, one school in Carmarthenshire near Lampeter, and one other school, have a substantial Welsh majority.
In all Montgomeryshire, only Llanbrynmair has a Welsh majority. In Denbighshire, only a few communities on the moors (Llansannen, etc.) are Welsh. In Meirionydd, there are now only the communities around Bala, and some near Dolgellau. All Anglesey except the center is now more English the Welsh.
The future appears uncertain.
But still better than Breton, sadly enough.
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