Hedd Wyn
| Hedd Wyn | |
|---|---|
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Ellis Evans, c.1910.
Frontispiece in Cerddi'r Bugail (1918) |
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| Born | Ellis Humphrey Evans 13 January 1887 Trawsfynydd, Meirionydd, North Wales |
| Died | 31 July 1917 (aged 30) Pilckem Ridge, Ypres |
| Resting place | Artillery Wood Cemetery, Boezinge, Belgium |
| Occupation | Poet Shepherd/farmer |
| Language | Welsh |
| Ethnicity | Welsh |
| Citizenship | British |
| Genre | Welsh Poetry |
| Literary movement | Romantic and war poetry |
| Notable works | Yr Arwr, Ystrad Fflur, Plant Trawsfynnydd, Y Blotyn Du, Nid â’n Ango, Rhyfel |
| Notable awards | Bard's chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod |
Hedd Wyn (born Ellis Humphrey Evans, 13 January 1887 – 31 July 1917) was a Welsh language poet who was killed near Ypres, Belgium, during the Battle of Passchendaele in World War I. He was posthumously awarded the bard's chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod. Evans, who had been awarded several chairs for his poetry, was inspired to take the bardic name Hedd Wyn (Welsh: blessed peace) from the way sunlight penetrated the mist in the Meirionydd valleys.
His style, which was influenced by romantic poetry, was dominated by themes of nature and religion. He also wrote several war poems following the outbreak of war on the Western Front.
Ellis Humphrey Evans was born on 13 January 1887 in Pen Lan, a house in the middle of Trawsfynydd, Meirionydd, Wales. He was the eldest of eleven children born to Evan and Mary Evans. In the spring of 1887, the family moved to the fathers family 168 acre hill-farm of Yr Ysgwrn, a few miles from Trawsfynydd in Cwm Prysor.
Ellis Evans received a basic education from the age of six at the local primary school and Sunday school. He left school around fourteen years of age and worked as a shepherd on his father’s farm. Despite his brief attendance in formal schooling (6-14) he had a talent for poetry and had already composed his first poem by the age of eleven, "Y Das Fawn" (the peat stack). Ellis's interests included both Welsh and English poetry. Hedd Wyn's main influence was the Romantic poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley and themes of nature and religion dominated his work. He spent his life there, apart from a short stint in South Wales.
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