Editing Dafydd ap Gwilym (section)

== Welsh literature after the Norman invasion ==
While Dafydd’s work displays the role literature played in forming Welsh culture in the early 14th century, artistic expression of culture was not as prevalent in the centuries prior. A large majority of cultural expression was demonstrated militarily, as the Welsh suffered many incursions by Norman and English invaders.

As the English kingdom fell to William I’s Norman conquest, Welsh holdings that were already contested by the English fell to Norman power. Immediately, William I placed William fitz Osbern in charge of managing the defence of the holdings. Quickly, Norman and trusted Anglo-Saxon nobility were put into centers of control within Welsh lands.<ref>Walker, ''Medieval Wales'', 21.</ref> The Norman Invasions began a long period where the preservation of Welsh culture coincided with the need for military defence.

In the following decades, the Norman advance grew slow, as the Welsh had time to plan defences unlike their English counterparts.<ref>Walker, ''Medieval Wales'', 44.</ref> As the campaigns drew on, marcher lordships were established on the border of Wales to help facilitate a defence against any counter-incursions. Due to the relative freedom granted to marcher lords, local marcher lords would often compete over territory.<ref>Max Lieberman, “The Medieval ‘Marches’ of Normandy and Wales, ''The English Historical Review'' 125, no. 517 (December: 2010): 1359.</ref> The lack of pressure exercised on Welsh authorities during the period of marcher lordships allowed Welsh cultural authority to strengthen in regions not controlled by the Normans or English.

In 1277, after multiple attempts to gain more local authority by the Welsh, Edward I began his conquests of the Welsh territories to firmly plant control in English hands. Within 5 years of the conquest’s start, most of Wales was under English control.<ref>Walker, ''Medieval Wales,'' 126.</ref> Under English control, the newly acquired Welsh territories saw a large expansion of English influence. The English made large investments into Welsh infrastructure and instituted new laws that would align more similarly to English law.<ref>Walker, ''Medieval Wales,'' 142-7.</ref> This period of Welsh history saw Welsh culture physically dominated by English occupation; however, the peace brought under English rule allowed for Welsh culture to manifest in more artistic means. Poetry, like Dafydd’s, became a more popular expression of Welsh culture because there was less of a united interest on warfare and defence.