National Museum of Wales

The National Museum is located in the civic square where all the buildings are made of Portland Stone and no commercial activities are allowed as part of the original agreement between the Marquis of Bute and City of Cardiff.

The museum has a good range of displays covering the Natural History, Geology and History of Wales. There is one exhibit on loan from the British Museum.

The usual selection of minerals

An animatronic Woolly mammoth and baby.

And the usual skeletons.

This display is recording the increasing distance between Wales and the United States.

 This is just a large stone slab and they are using a video projector to display information. It is certainly more decorative than a flat screen.

The big thing they have on display at the moment is the Mold Gold Cape  It is a very beautiful gold Cape. I have included the link because getting a good photo through the glass of the cabinet with lighting (No Flash Allowed) would have been difficult.

The tour guide on the bus tours suggested the following book of welsh tales The Mabinogion. It covers some of the legends and folk tales of Wales.

Apparently JRR Tolkien was a big fan of these stories which is reflected in the Lords of the Rings.

Welsh is an interesting language but some of the unusual spellings are explained when you realise that some two letters groups in groups are actually a single sound (dd)

There are lot of towns starting with Caer which  means fort and was the the location of a fort (usually roman or norman)

When I went to the roman amphitheatre yesterday the tour guide said that some historians think that it could have been the round table of legend where leaders of various tribes met.

Probably going to take it easy tomorrow as I leave for London on tuesday and am worn out from all this sightseeing.

But It have been very interesting.