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Gathering the Jewels features over 30,000 images of objects, books, letters, aerial photographs and other items from museums, archives and libraries throughout Wales.
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Peithynen or wooden book, 1876
The Peithynen, or wooden book, was the invention of Iolo Morganwg (1747-1826) and the literary men of Glamorgan, in support of their claims to be successors to the druids. The lines of a poem are carved on the four sides of each stick. The strange script is known as 'coelbren y beirdd' or bardic alphabet and was claimed to have been used by the early Welsh poets. It was later found to have been invented in the early 19th century by Iolo and his companions. This example won an eisteddfod prize at Wrexham in 1876.
