WALES, PRINCE OF

title reserved exclusively for the heir apparent to the British throne. It dates from 1301, when King Edward I, after his conquest of Wales and execution (1283) of David III, the last native prince of Wales, gave the title to his son, the future Edward II. Since that time most, but not all, of the eldest sons of English sovereigns have been given the title. It is specifically granted by the sovereign, and in due course the recipient is invested as prince of Wales. The title ceases to exist when a prince of Wales becomes king, until a monarch bestows it upon a son. The economy The Welsh economy generally reflects the national trends and patterns of the United Kingdom; however, Wales has higher proportions of employment in agriculture and forestry, manufacturing, and government, and it provides concomitantly fewer jobs in financial and business services. There is active foreign investment in Welsh manufacturing, particularly in its high-technology industries, but Wales's gross domestic product (GDP) per capita and employment rates are far below average for the United Kingdom. The European Union has awarded significant developmental aid to parts of western and southern Wales in order to improve conditions there. Resources Wales has few natural resources beyond coal, agricultural lands, water, and woodlands. Coal is the only significant mineral resource of Wales, but the local coal mining industry is now precipitously diminished from its previous level. The coal deposits of South Wales are far more extensive and contain higher-grade anthracite than those of the northeast. Nonferrous ores occur in small quantities and are not economically viable. Iron ore deposits, which were important during the early development of the industrial regions, are now exhausted. There are three hydroelectric projects in Wales and several reservoirs for domestic and industrial purposes. About half of the hydroelectric power produced in Wales serves areas in England. Several commercial windmill electricity-generation installations, including some of Europe's largest, were established in the late 20th century in the Welsh highlands. The land Relief Glaciers during the Pleistocene Epoch (1,800,000 to 10,000 years ago) carved much of the Welsh landscape into deeply dissected mountains, plateaus, and hills, including the north-south-trending , a region of plateaus and hills that are themselves fragmented by rivers. Protruding from that backbone are two main mountain areas-the Brecon Beacons in the south, rising to 2,906 feet (886 metres) at Pen y Fan, and Snowdonia in the northwest, reaching 3,560 feet (1,085 metres) at Snowdon, the highest mountain in Wales. Snowdonia's magnificent scenery is accentuated by stark and rugged rock formations, many of volcanic origin, whereas the Beacons generally have softer outlines. The uplands are themselves girdled on the seaward side by a series of steep-sided coastal plateaus ranging in elevation from about 100 to 700 feet (30 to 210 metres). Many of them have been pounded by the sea into spectacular steplike cliffs. Other plateaus give way to coastal flats that are estuarine in origin. Drainage and soils The main watershed of Wales runs approximately north-south along the central highlands. The larger river valleys all originate there and broaden westward near the sea or eastward as they merge into lowland plains along the English border. The Severn and Wye, two of Britain's longest rivers, lie partly within central and eastern Wales and drain into the Bristol Channel via the Severn estuary. The main river in northern Wales is the Dee, which empties into Liverpool Bay. Among the lesser rivers and estuaries are the Clwyd and Conwy in the northeast, the Tywi in the south, and the Rheidol in the west, draining into Cardigan Bay (Bae Ceredigion). The country's natural lakes are limited in area and almost entirely glacial in origin. Several reservoirs in the central uplands supply water to South Wales and to Merseyside and the Midlands in England. The parent rock of Wales is dominated by strata ranging from Precambrian time (more than 543 million years ago) to representatives of the Jurassic Period (206 million to 144 million years ago). However, glaciers during the Pleistocene blanketed most of the landscape with till (boulder clay), scraped up and carried along by the underside of the great ice sheets, so that few soils can now be directly related to their parent rock. Acidic, leached podzol soils and brown earths predominate throughout Wales. The people Ethnicity and demographic trends Some coastal caves in Wales were occupied about 200,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic Period (Old Stone Age). Additional waves of settlers arrived from continental Europe and lowland Britain during the Neolithic Period (New Stone Age) and Bronze Age, and iron-wielding Celtic peoples invaded after 2000 BC. The basic culture of these peoples survived the Roman occupation and was later strengthened and broadened by Celtic immigrations from other parts of Britain. Their language, a Brythonic branch of Celtic speech, formed the basis of modern Welsh, while their heroic poetry, dating from the 6th century AD, became the basis of one of the oldest literary traditions of Europe. There were limited Norse incursions during the early Middle Ages, mainly commemorated today in place-names along the coastal fringes. Large Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman groups subsequently entered Wales from the English border and began to dominate the ethnic and linguistic makeup of the country. The Industrial Revolution dramatically increased the Welsh population from around 500,000 people in the mid-18th century to some 2,600,000 by 1921. In the 1890s alone roughly 130,000 migrants were drawn into the coalfields of South Wales from England, Ireland, Spain, Italy, and elsewhere, and many people from rural areas in Wales also migrated to industrial centres. Although new manufacturers and mines provided employment to many Welsh workers, others emigrated, particularly to the northeastern United States. Heavy industry declined during the 20th century, and agriculture became increasingly commercialized and capital-intensive, producing further emigration from Wales, mainly of younger workers, and leaving behind a disproportionately aged population. In the late 20th century new industrial growth stemmed the population loss, except in South Wales and other coalfield regions. There is now a rough balance between inward and outward migration; however, many of the more recent arrivals have been seasonal vacationers or rural retreaters from metropolitan England, which has produced considerable tensions in traditionally Welsh-speaking areas where, in places, up to half of the population was born outside Wales. In contrast, nonnatives account for less than one-tenth of the residents of some southern districts. Many African seamen were attracted to South Wales during the industrial boom at the end of the 19th century, but people of African ancestry now account for only a tiny fraction of Wales's total population. Cardiff is home to one of the oldest black communities in Britain. Language and religion Welsh and English are the two major linguistic traditions in Wales. Welsh was still spoken by about half of the population in 1900, but its use has since declined, and its survival has become one of the main cultural and political themes in national life. It is now spoken by about one-fifth of the population, notably in the heartland-the so-called Y Fro Gymraeg ("Welsh-Speaking Region")-where more than four-fifths of the inhabitants of some localities speak Welsh. The proportion is much diminished in South Wales, falling below one-tenth in the extreme southeast. The Welsh Language Act of 1967 placed it on the same legal standing as English. An official language advisory board was established in 1988, and in 1993 minimum standards were set for the use of Welsh in public service communications. The people of Wales have become increasingly secular in outlook, but many are at least nominally adherents to Protestant and Nonconformist churches, Calvinistic Methodism being perhaps the most widespread denomination, especially in Welsh-speaking areas. The Church in Wales, which is widely and evenly distributed throughout the country, has maintained an autonomous clerical hierarchy, including its own archbishop, since being disestablished from the Anglican church in 1920. Roman Catholicism accounts for a small but growing minority, notably in the northeast.