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• Part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

• Area: 20,760 sq km (8,015 sq miles) • Population: 2,798,200 • Languages: English (100%), Welsh (20%) • Capital City: Cardiff • National Motto: Cymru am Byth ("Wales for

Ever")

• The history of Wales begins with the arrival of Human beings in the region thousands of years ago. Neanderthals lived in what is now Wales, or Cymru in walsh, at least 230,000 years ago.Homo sapeins  had arrived by about 31,000 BC. However, continuous habitation by modern humans dates from the period after the end of the last ice age around 9000 BC, and Wales has many remains from the Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Bronze Agethe Deceangli.

• Wales came into existence as a country with Henry the VIII’s Act of Union in 1536. The origin of the word Wales is a strange one. It is a variation on a common word used

hundreds of years ago by the Anglo-Saxons to mean foreigners or outsiders. Independent Principality 1400-1416.

Constituent of Kingdom of Great Britain (1707-1801) and United Kingdom (from 1801).

Wales in the Roman era

• The Roman conquest of Wales began in AD 48 and was completed in 78, with Roman rule lasting until 383. Roman rule in Wales was a military occupation, save for the southern coastal region of south wales east of the Gower peninsula, where there is a legacy of Romanisation.The only town in Wales founded by the Romans, Caerwent, is located in South Wales. Both Caerwent and carmarthen, also in southern Wales, would become Roman civitates.[During the occupation both the region that would become Wales and its people were a mostly anonymous part of Roman.

• By AD 47 Rome had invaded and conquered all of southernmost and southeastern Britain under the first Roman Governor of Britain. As part of the Roman conquest of Britain, a series of campaigns to conquer Wales was launched by his successor in 48 and would continue intermittently under successive governors until the conquest was completed in 78. It is these campaigns of conquest that are the most widely known feature of Wales during the Roman era .

Modern history

• The modern history of Wales starts in the 19th century when South Wales became heavily industrialized with ironworks; this, along with the spread of coal mining to the Cynon and Rhhodda valleys from the 1840s, led to an increase in population. The social effects of industrialization resulted in armed uprisings against the mainly English owners.

• The first decade of the 20th century was the period of the coal boom in South Wales, when population growth exceeded 20 per cent. Demographic changes affected the language frontier; the proportion of Welsh speakers in the Rhondda valley fell from 64 per cent in 1901 to 55 per cent ten years later, and similar trends were evident elsewhere in South Wales. The labour party  replaced the Liberals as the dominant party in Wales after the First world war particularly in the industrial valleys of south wales.

• The Red Dragon of Wales was introduced to Britain by the Romans some eighteen hundred years ago.

• St. David is the patron saint of Wales. • The leek is the emblem of Wales since the

16th century. • The daffodil is a Welsh national emblem.

• The origins of the Red Dragon flag, or "y Draig Goch" could date back to the Roman period.

• The dragon was used by Roman military.

• After the Romans left, the Red Dragon remained as a key emblem of Wales.

• Belongs to a branch of Celtic, an Indo-European language.

• Their language is a distant cousin to Irish and Scots Gaelic and a close brother to Breton.

• Welsh is still used by about half a million people within Wales and possibly another few hundred thousand in England and other areas overseas.

• English 100%, Welsh 20%.

Mountain • Snowdon is the highest mountain in Wales and the highest British mountain outside Scotland. The mountain is located inside the Snowdon National Park in the north of Wales; a popular tourist site for hikers. It is 1085 meters high and its name derives from the Saxon Snow Dun which can be translated as Snow Hill.

Bells • The Gresford Bells belong to All Saint’s Church in the old mining village of Gresford near Wrexham. The church dates back to 1492 and was built using a distinctive sandy brown coloured stone called Millstone Grit. The stone used to be mined locally and has been used in most of the area’s construction.

Bridge • Wales is a land of mountains, valleys and bridges. The most famous bridge is the Llangollen Bridge built in 1347 over the River Dee. Llangollen is in north Wales and is also famous for the International Eisteddfod; an annual music festival that has been going strong since 1947.

Well • At Holywell a small village in Flintshire, North Wales, you can visit Saint Winifrede’s well; a holy well with water that is said to have miraculous cures. Christians believe that it was on the site of this well where Saint Winifrede’s decapitated head was miraculously attached once more to her body. Many religious pilgrims continue to visit the well on a regular basis.

Church steeple• The steeple, or tower, of Saint

Giles’s Anglican Church in Wrexham is considered the fifth Wonder of Wales. The design of the tower at Yale University in the U.S.A was based on the one at Saint Giles’s because the university’s benefactor, Elihu Yale, had Welsh ancestry and is actually buried in the grounds of the church.

Trees• At another church, the

Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, in Overton-on-Dee, the yew trees growing in the garden are Wales’s sixth wonder. The oldest trees predate the church itself. They are thought to be around 2000 years old.

Waterfall • the Pistyll Rhaeadr waterfall in the Berwyn Mountains is the seventh wonder of Wales. It is formed by the Afon Disgynfa river flowing over a 75 metre cliff face and is sometimes called “The hidden pearl of Wales”. This is another popular place for tourists to Wales

The popular

rhyme of seven

wonders

Wales is a land of beautiful nature, rich culture and amazing architecture.