ABSTRACT
The notion of national identity is a complex one and it is never easy to define what constitutes national identity without recourse to stereotypes. In the case of Wales, the endeavour is complicated by the fact that it is only in the last 200 years or less that it has begun to be seen as a nation, with a distinctive national identity. Before the second quarter of the nineteenth century, at the earliest, Wales was seen by most people as part of England, with its own cultural peculiarities to be sure, including its own language, then widely spoken, but no more a nation than Cornwall or Yorkshire. Its relationship to England was felt to be rather like that of the Highlands to the rest of Scotland and Wales had been seen, from the outside at least, in a similar way: remote, sparsely populated, picturesque and rather uncivilised. It was the perception of the Welsh as in need of civilisation and salvation, two conceptions then inextricably bound up together, which led to the sustained financial support coming from England for Griffith Jones’ circulating schools. There was similar support for ambulatory schools in the Scottish Highlands from the Edinburgh-based Scottish Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge.
