Prince Madoc "mythical Welsh discoverer of America"

For the best current source of information on Madoc: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madoc

(Excerpt from Wiki):

"Madoc or Madog ab Owain Gwynedd was, according to folklore, a Welsh prince who sailed to America in 1170, over three hundred years before Christopher Columbus's voyage in 1492. According to the story, he was a son of Owain Gwynedd, and took to the sea to flee internecine violence at home. The "Madoc story" legend evidently evolved out of a medieval tradition about a Welsh hero's sea voyage, to which only allusions survive. However, it attained its greatest prominence during the Elizabethan era, when English and Welsh writers wrote of the claim that Madoc had come to the Americas as an assertion of prior discovery, and hence legal possession, of North America by the Kingdom of England." - WIKI

Other sources - videos:

• Prince Madog An excellent informative documentary:
• Did the Welsh Discover America?
• The Beginning Of America: Who Got To The Shores First?

10 Part discussion of Madoc as one of the early explorers and colonizers of the North Americas:

Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aa6c6pqgTK8

Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBrbffQ-wqA

Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0ZRFdyK0Qk

Part 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXkaxz80TUo

Part 5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMoiwYg3JOg

Part 6: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkFJUZVIvI8

Part 7: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLbQOrm77PI

Part 8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwnZ3EmnVs4

Part 9: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0or92GDAU0

Part 10: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07cQ13LoctY

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madoc

Madoc or Madog ab Owain Gwynedd was, according to folklore, a Welsh prince who sailed to America in 1170, over three hundred years before Christopher Columbus's voyage in 1492. According to the story, he was a son of Owain Gwynedd who took to the sea to flee internecine violence at home. The legend evidently evolved out of a medieval tradition about a Welsh hero's sea voyage, only allusions to which survive. However, it attained its greatest prominence during the Elizabethan era, when English and Welsh writers made the claim that Madoc had come to the Americas as a ploy to assert prior discovery, and hence legal possession, of North America by the Kingdom of England.[1] The story remained popular in later centuries, and a later development asserted that Madoc's voyagers had intermarried with local Native Americans, and that their Welsh-speaking descendents still lived somewhere on the American frontier. These "Welsh Indians" were accredited with the construction of a number of natural and man-made landmarks throughout the American Midwest, and a number of white travelers were inspired to go look for them.

The Madoc story has been the subject of much speculation in the context of possible pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. However, no historical or archaeological proof of such a man or his voyages has been found in the New or Old World. Still, it has provided fertile inspiration for generations of poets and novelists, and cultural historians.

Madoc's purported father, Owain Gwynedd, was a real prince of Gwynedd during the 12th century and is widely considered one of the greatest Welsh rulers of the Middle Ages. His reign was fraught with battles with other Welsh princes and with Henry II of England. At his death in 1170, a bloody dispute broke out between his heirs Dafydd, Maelgwn, and Rhodri. Owain had at least 13 children from his two wives and several more children born out of wedlock but legally acknowledged under Welsh tradition. According to the legend, Madoc and his brother Rhirid were among them, though no contemporary record attests to this.

The story claims that Madoc was disheartened by this fighting, and he and Rhirid set sail from Llandrillo (Rhos-on-Sea) in the cantref of Rhos to explore the western ocean with a small fleet of boats. They discovered a distant and abundant land where one hundred men disembarked to form a colony, and Madoc and some others returned to Wales to recruit settlers. After gathering ten ships of men and women the prince sailed west a second time, never to return. Madoc's landing place has been suggested to be west Florida or Mobile Bay, Alabama, in the United States.

Although the folklore tradition acknowledges that no witness ever returned from the second colonial expedition to report this, the story continues that Madoc's colonists traveled up the vast river systems of North America, raising structures and encountering friendly and unfriendly tribes of Native Americans before finally settling down somewhere in the Midwest or the Great Plains.