Wales is one of the four “countries” that make up the United Kingdom of Northern Ireland (United Kingdom). Wales islocated southwest ofGreat BritainBristol StraitEnglandthe east,Irish Seato the west and north.
Welsh heraldic badge. It depicts St. David , the patron saint of Wales, and the leek , which symbolizes Wales itself.
It has a history of supporting the British Industrial Revolution by producing abundant underground resources such as coal.
The Welsh Britons were ruled by the Roman Empire , but were not conquered by the Anglo-Saxon people. The legend of King Arthur in England is said to be the story of a Briton king who resisted Anglo-Saxon .
In the Middle Ages, Heol Senni and small tribal nations flocked to form local kingdoms such as the Kingdom of Gwynedd ( Gwynedd ) , the Kingdom of Powys ( Powys ) , and the Kingdom of Dehuvers . Several temporary political unifications were made, such as Gwynedd King Llywelyn ap Griffith taking control of most of Wales in the middle of the 13th century , but a permanent unified kingship like England was established. In reality, it was governed by the Manor vassals according to the Lizlan Code .
Traditionally, Wales has continued to show strong resistance to invaders. Although the Conqueror Guillaume conquered England in 1066 ( Norman Conquest ), the Norman invasion and colonization of Wales was not a permanent success except in southeastern Wales. Since then, he has been repeatedly invaded by England, but he has repelled and defended his independence each time.
In 1258, the de facto ruler of Wales, King Llewellyn ap Griffith , named himself the Prince of Wales , and the Principality of Wales was established. However, in addition to the pressure from England, the intensification of the power struggle within Wales and the common law rule after the Oxford Clause weakened Wales, forcing him to gradually obey England. After the defeat of King Edward I of England in 1282 , Wales was occupied by England and placed under its control ( Conquest of Wales by Edward I ). Wales became a province of England, and Edward I gave his eldest son Edward ( Edward II ) the title of Prince of Wales and ruled Wales as the monarch of Wales (from then on, Prince of England was Prince of Wales for generations .・ The title of Of Wales (Prince of Wales) will be taken over).
Through this process, Wales was conquered and ruled by England, which in turn strengthened the Welsh people’s national consciousness. The Welsh people stubbornly refused to assimilate with England, and most of the foreigners who settled here became Welsh. Even in England, the Welsh longbow corps has made a name for itself as a powerful force and has become an indispensable force for the army of the King of England.
During the War of the Roses ( 1455-1485 ) , Wales was the stage for the political struggle, with Earl of Richmond, who won the Battle of Bosworth in 1485 , reigning as Henry VII and the Welsh pedigree. And settled in the English royal family ( Tudor dynasty ). The Welsh people became a unitary state ” Kingdom of England ” or ” England and Wales ” by the integration of Wales by the joint law of 1536 , and the Welsh people became an important position in the vassals of this dynasty. Occupied. For this reason, the Welsh people showed a supportive attitude toward the establishment of the Anglican Church promoted by the kings of the dynasty from Henry VIII to Elizabeth I.
After the dictatorship by Cromwell (Commonwealth of England ), although politically weakened, the Welsh identity has not been lost and is said to be very strong even today in the 21st century .
In 1997, a referendum was held on the establishment of the National Assembly for Wales (English: National Assembly for Wales, Welsh: Cynulliad Cenedlaethol Cymru), and the establishment of the National Assembly was decided . In 1999, the first election was held. In 2000, a fixed number of 60 members will be elected for a term of four years, and a mixed -member proportional representation system will be used . Has limited legislative power. In 2020, the Senedd National Assembly was renamed the Welsh Parliament ( English : Welsh Parliament , Welsh : Senedd Cymru ). Also known as Senedd ( equivalent to the English sentate ).
The number of seats in each party in the 2021 election is as follows.
Since April 1, 1996, Wales’ local administration has been divided into 22 single administrative bodies (unitaries), of which 9 states (county), 3 cities (city) * and 10 states (county borough). It becomes †. The relationships between administrative bodies are equal, and there is no hierarchical relationship.
Numbers correspond in the map, in parentheses in Welsh.
Wales is located approximately 200km west of London, separated from Ireland by the sea, and is surrounded by Liverpool Bay, Cardigan Bay and the Bristol Channel. Most of the land is mountainous, with the Cumbrian Mountains running from north to south. Its name is the ancient name of Wales, and it was also named in the Paleozoic Cambrian period of the geological time. In addition, geologists who investigated the area named the Ordovician and Silurian from the tribal names . The highest peak, Snowdon Mountain (elevation 1085m), rises in Snowdonia National Park in the north . The national parks of Snodnia, Brecon Beacon, the Gower Peninsula with the Pembrokeshire coast, and the Cardegan Bay with the Pembrokeshire coast are scenic and designated as heritage coasts, but the coast facing the Atlantic Ocean is numerous wreckages. I’m leaving a ship. Major cities include Cardiff, Swansea, Lexham and Newport.
Wales developed its industry in the 18th century and produced the coal , copper , iron , silver , lead , gold and slate that had been buried . From the late 19th century , mining and metallurgy became a major part of Wales’ economy, changing the landscape and society of the industrial areas of southern and northeastern Wales. Once the southern part of Wales was the world’s largest coal exporter, with about 200,000 people working in more than 600 coal mines during the peak of the first half of the 20th century . After that, the coal industry declined due to the “energy revolution” from coal to oil, and various heavy industries located mainly in the south supported the Wales economy.
In the 1970s , Wales made a major shift from the traditional heavy industry to the light or service industry . Although it succeeded in attracting foreign companies, many of the new industries were essentially branch factories and did not require skill in assembly line work. Wales has a low economic absolute amount such as population, and Cardiff is smaller than other cities in the United Kingdom such as Leeds Manchester Bristol and the capital of a small country, Dublin Copenhagen Helsinki , and it can be called a big city in Wales. There is no. Nevertheless , it developed the fields of finance and R & D and created high value -added employment.
Compared to the rest of the UK, Wales’s economic performance per capita is low. In 2002, it was 80% of the UK average and 90% of the EU25 country average. However, it should be noted that the cost of living varies from region to region. The difference between the UK region and the actual standard of living is not large.
Wales’ GDP in 2002 was £ 26 billion ($ 48 billion ) and £ 12,651 ($ 19,546) per capita. As of 2006, the unemployment rate was 5.7%, higher than the UK-wide average but lower than the EU average.
Most of Wales’ soil is poor and unsuitable for farming, so the center of agriculture has traditionally been livestock farming . The Welsh landscape, as well as its unique culture, attracts many tourists . Tourism is a particularly important part of the rural economy, with three protected as national parks .
Until the mid-18th century, Wales’ economic development was restrained due to topographical factors centered on mountainous areas, a sparse population, and poor means of communication . [2] The most advanced area was a small coastal port with regular exchanges with Bristol and Liverpool.
Industrial development has progressed since the middle of the 18th century, and the abundant underground resources of Wales were utilized to support the Industrial Revolution. Explosive growth in the early 1900s faced economic difficulties in the 1920s and remained dependent on the old heavy industry, but Britain’s richer light industry sector grew. In the 1970s Wales transformed traditional heavy industry into light and service industries.
NHS Wales (National Health Service Wales) Wales (Welsh: GIG Cymru) is a public medical institution . It was founded by the National Health Service Act 1946 in 1946 . With 90,000 staff, it is Wales’ largest employer.
In today’s Wales, Welsh is an official language alongside English. Road signs and official documents are written in two languages. For example, when you enter Wales by train or car from England, the signboard near the border says “Welcome to Wales” and “Croeso i Cymru” in two languages.
It is not often spoken in the south, but there are many areas in the central and northern regions that are spoken on a daily basis. However, there is a large difference in dialects, and there is a tendency for the older and more venerable form to remain as it goes north. There are many Welsh speakers, especially in the Gwynedd region near Snowdon , the highest peak in Wales. In this area, children learn English only after they enter elementary school, and until then they generally speak Welsh with family and friends in the neighborhood.
As of 2001, 20.5% of all Welsh people can speak Welsh. In Wales, the proportion of Welsh-speaking population has declined significantly since the 20th century, but due to population growth, the absolute number of Welsh-speaking people has stopped declining and has increased slightly. The main reasons for this are the implementation of Welsh language education in elementary and junior high schools and the broadcasting of Welsh-language TV programs (BBC Wales, HTV [now ITV Wales], and S4C) [3] . In the north and west, Welsh is spoken as the first language and English is the second language. 21.7% of the Welsh population can read or write Welsh (as of 2001), and only 16% can speak, read and write, although it interferes.
Soccer is also a popular sport in Wales, and in 1992 the Welsh Premier League , a professional soccer league, was founded. So far, TNS has won the league’s most 14 times, including eight consecutive victories. The Welsh national football team has participated in the FIFA World Cup once in the 1958 tournament and achieved the best eight results. He has participated in the UEFA European Championship twice, and at the 2016 tournament , the team has made great strides and shined in the top four , led by Gareth Bale , the ace of the country’s national team and captain . In addition, Vail was the left side back at the beginning of his debut, but it was converted to the front line by the offense power and was appointed mainly in the right wing , and it goes without saying that he has been active since then [5] .