Cuneglas (also known in
Latin
as
Cuneglasus and in modern
Welsh as
Cynlas. He is
sometimes referred to as
Cynlas Goch meaning
Cynlas the Red). He is recorded as a son of
Owain Danwyn, a popular contender for an
historical basis to the famous
King
Arthur.
Both father and son were, according to one
Old Welsh genealogical source, Kings of
Rhos, later a Welsh cantref and afterwards a part of Denbighshire, in mid-North Wales
. They
lived in the early 6th century.
Cuneglas is one of the 'tyrants' denounced by the contemporary
writer,
Gildas, in his
De Excidio Britanniae. This
indignant monk calls him:
- "You bear, you rider and ruler of many, and guider of the
chariot which is the receptacle of the bear"
- "You contempter of God and vilifier of his order"
- "You tawny butcher, as in the Latin tongue thy name signifies"
(This is incorrect: his name means Blue Hound)
- one who raises war against men, indeed against his own
countrymen, as well as against God
- one who has "thrown out of doors your wife" and lustfully
desires "her detestable sister who had vowed unto God, the
everlasting chastity of
widowhood".
The "receptacle of the bear" is more generally interpreted as the
"home of the bear". In Welsh, this might be
Din Arth or
Din Erth - "Fort of the Bear" - still the name of a
Dark Age hillfort
at
Llandrillo-yn-Rhôs in
Cynlas' old kingdom.
Although there is also a Dinerth
in Ceredigion.