I am often asked what parts of my books are ‘true’ and what are not. I jokingly say that my stories are as historically accurate as I can make them except when they aren’t, but the research that goes into them is extensive in order for them to represent medieval Wales as accurately as possible. While Gareth and Gwen themselves are fictional characters, the court of Owain Gwynedd, his sons, wives, and their circumstances, really existed.
The problem with researching this era is that so few contemporary documents remain.
We do know, for example, that Kells was sacked by the Dublin Danes in the summer of 1144. We know that Hywel burned Cardigan that same summer. We also know that Cristina gave birth to a son, Dafydd, very shortly after her marriage to King Owain. What we don’t have access to is the rest of the story. Imagining what might have been is why I write these books.
Gilbert de Clare, the Earl of Pembroke, had to wait a little longer for the chance to invade Ireland, and in the end, it was his son, Richard, who accomplished it. The deposed King of Leinster sought help regaining his kingdom and invited the Normans in. As Gwen pointed out in The Fallen Princess, however, once the Normans laid eyes on the prize, it was impossible to get them to leave.
As a side note, Calan Gaeaf (or All Saints’ Day) and Nos Galan Gaeaf (or Hallowmas), which take center stage in The Fallen Princess, are just two of many traditions that were incorporated into the Church as Christianity made inroads into Wales. Nos Galan Gaeaf is the Welsh equivalent of Samhain, which has become our Halloween, a traditional day within Celtic societies when the veil between the human world and the Otherworld thins. The Church in the medieval era was ever-present and laid its own traditions over the top of older traditions that it inherited.
Calan Gaeaf is one of those traditions. See my post here for more information: http://www.sarahwoodbury.com/calan-gaeaf/
Thank you for reading The Fallen Princess, the fourth Gareth & Gwen Medieval Mystery. To sign up to be notified whenever I have a new release, please see the sidebar on my web page:
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The next Gareth and Gwen Medieval Mystery, The Unlikely Spy, is available at all retailers!
August 1146. Prince Hywel has called all the bards of Wales to him for a music festival to mark the third anniversary of his rule over Ceredigion. He has invited all the lords of Wales too, including his father, his uncle, and his neighbor to the south, King Cadell. But with the highborn also come the low: thieves, spies, and other hangers-on. And when a murderer strikes as the festival starts, Gareth and Gwen are charged with discovering his identity—before the death of a peasant shakes the throne of a king.
Keep reading for the first chapter The Last Pendragon, the first novella in The Last Pendragon Saga:
Rhiann knows that demons walk the night. She has been taught to fear them. But from the moment Cade is dragged before her father’s throne, beaten and having lost all of his men to her father’s treachery, he stirs something inside her that she has never felt before. When Cade is revealed to be not only Arthur’s heir but touched by the sidhe, Rhiann must choose between the life she left behind and the one before her—and how much she is willing to risk to follow her heart.