is own. In one very striking _cywydd_ composed after
Glyndwr's downfall, he calls upon this hero to come again and claim his
own, and addresses himself fancifully to all the countries of the world
where his hero may be in hiding. He died after 1405, and, if the dates
generally given for his birth be even approximately correct, he must
have lived to a prodigious age (cf. _Gweithiau Iolo Goch_, by Charles
Ashton, London, 1896).

Rhys Goch ap Rhiccert claims to be named with Dafydd ab Gwilym as a
writer of lyrics in praise of beautiful women. He has one advantage,
however, over his more famous contemporary in the variety of his metres.
The musical lilt and the delicate workmanship of his poems, with their
recurring refrain, give him a unique position among his medieval
contemporaries as the first purely lyrical poet. His _floreat_ is
probably a little later than that of Dafydd ab Gwilym, for we must not
be misled by the late orthography of his poems.

Dafydd Nanmor is chiefly famous for two exquisite cywyddau, _Cywydd
Marwnad Merch_, or Elegy of a Maiden, and _Cywydd i wallt Llio_, or
Cywydd to Llio's Hair. In both these poems he shows elegance rather than
depth, and a fancy as bold as that of his great master Dafydd. In the
first of these cywyddau his grief is so great that he wishes that he
were but the shroud around his dead sweetheart, and, in the second, Llio
Rhydderch's golden hair over her white brow is compared to the
refulgence of lightning over the fine snow. He is supposed to be a
younger contemporary of Rhys Goch Eryri, but there are many facts to
warrant a supposition that he lived much later, even as late as 1490.

Llywelyn Goch ap Meurig Hen deserves to be mentioned as the author of
the famous _Marwnad Lleucu Llwyd_, an elegy which is far more convincing
in its sincerity than Dafydd Nanmor's _cywydd_. Few of his compositions
are extant, but the one already mentioned is sufficient to place him in
the first rank of the poets of the period. He lived approximately from
1330 to 1390.

The other poets of this period who deserve some mention are Dafydd Ddu o
Hiraddug, who wrote poems on religious subjects, and who is supposed to
have translated part of the _Officium Beatae Mariae_ into Welsh;
Gruffydd Grug, between whom and Dafydd ab Gwilym a most fierce poetic
quarrel raged, but who is the author of a beautiful elegy on his
opponent; Gruffydd Llwyd ab Dafydd, who was the poet of Owen Glyndwr,
and whose cywydd