Y Groes Naid

 

On 25 June 1283, at Rhuddlan, Edward I announced that the sacred relic known as Y Groes Naid (the Cross of Neith) had been recently handed over to him, at Conwy, by Reynold Grey, Justiciar of Chester. Grey had obtained the relic from a group of Welshmen. These were Einion son of Ifor and his three sons, and Gronw son of Dafydd and his four sons.

They had surrendered: '...the most holy wood of the Cross which is called by the Welsh 'Crosseneyht', which Llewelyn son of Griffin, late prince of Wales, and his ancestors, princes of Wales, owned'.

This was supposed to be a portion of the true cross, held inside a reliquary. As a reward, these Welshmen and their heirs were exempted from doing military service for the king outside the Perfeddwlad, unless at their own will, and at the king's cost instead of their own. The handing over of the cross was probably a staged presentation, symbolic of conquest. Einion son of Ifor, the leader of the band of Welshmen, was a former clerk of Prince Llywelyn's. For his action he was rewarded with a robe worth 20 shillings, and sufficient funds to enable him to study at Oxford.

The cross was taken regularly by Edward on his travels. Surviving household accounts show he worshipped before it every day, in his private chapel, and spent lavishly on decoration: for instance, in 1293-4 he spent the considerable sum of £104 on adorning its pedestal with gems set in gold. After the king's death in 1307, an inventory of relics in his chapel included:

'The Cross of Naid embellished with gold and precious stones, together with the foot of that Cross, of gold and gems, in a small leather case the shape of that foot, outside the coffer.'

 In 1352 Edward III gave the relic to the Dean and Chapter of St George's Chapel, Windsor, which the king had established as a major centre of devotion. In 1552 it was confiscated, along with all the other relics and treasures in the chapel, on the orders of Edward VI, to “await the king's further instruction”.

There is a certain irony in a Tudor king, descended of a Welsh lineage, confiscating a relic that had been taken by a Plantagenet conqueror. However, Edward VI was probably acting out of Protestant zealotry rather than thoughts of historical revenge. There are no further references to Y Groes Naid, and it was probably destroyed by Oliver Cromwell (another Welshman in disguise) and his Puritan commandos in the 1640s.