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 immediate descendants little is known. They appear to sink into comparative insignificance by the side of Maelgwn, Rhun, and Cadwallon, and other than they may possibly have loomed larger in the life of Britannia and its Britons. But whenever the mists rise which conceal the affairs of these centuries from our view, we always discern the main stem of Cunedda Wledig towering amid the rest of the royal stems of Wales, and generally paramount. Moreover, we may be certain, in view of its prestige in the ninth century, that its history in the preceding centuries is that of a house which has been gradually gaining strength until it is now in a position to effect a change in Welsh political conditions which will mark the beginning of a new era in the slow and steady development of Cymric nationality.

We have seen that the first period in the history of post-Roman Wales must have come to an end in the year 577, although many years before this date the centre of political interest in Wales was shifting from