Under powers secured in 1884, the town obtains its chief water supply from a gathering ground near the sources of the Taff on the old red sandstone beyond the northern out-crop of the mineral basin and on the southern slopes of the Brecknock Beacons. Here two reservoirs of a combined capacity of 668 million gallons have been constructed, and a conduit some 36 m. long laid to Cardiff at a total cost of about £1,250,000. A third reservoir is authorized. A gas company, first incorporated in 1837, supplies the city as well as Llandaff and Penarth with gas, but the corporation also supplies electric power both for lighting and working the tramways, which were purchased from a private company in 1898. The city owned in 1905 about 290 acres of parks and “open spaces,” the chief being Roath Park of 100 acres (including a botanical garden of 15 acres), Llandaff fields of 70 acres, and Cathays Park of 60 acres, which was acquired in 1900 mainly with the view of placing in it the chief public buildings of the town.
Commerce and Industries.—Edward II.’s charter of 1324 indicates that Cardiff had become even then a trading and shipping centre of some importance. It enjoyed a brief existence as a staple town from 1327 to 1332. During the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. it was notorious as a resort of pirates, while some of the ironfounders of the district were suspected of secretly supplying Spain with ordnance. It was for centuries a “head port,” its limits extending from Chepstow to Llanelly; in the 18th century it sank to the position of “a creek” of the port of Bristol, but about 1840 it was made independent, its limits for customs’ purposes being defined as from the Rumney estuary to Nash Point, so that technically the “port of Cardiff” includes Barry and Penarth as well as Cardiff proper. Down to the end of the 18th century there was only a primitive quay on the river side for shipping purposes. Coal was brought down from the hills on the backs of mules, and iron carried in two-ton wagons. In 1798 the first dock (12 acres in extent) was constructed at the terminus of the Glamorgan canal from Merthyr. The commercial greatness of Cardiff is due to the vast coal and iron deposits of the country drained by the Taff and Rhymney, between whose outlets the town is situated. But a great impetus to its development was given by the 2nd marquess of Bute, who has often been described as the second founder of Cardiff. In 1830 he obtained the first act for the construction of a dock which (now known as the West Bute dock) was opened in 1839 and measures (with its basin) 19½ acres. The opening of the Taff Vale railway in 1840 and of the South Wales railway to Cardiff in 1850 necessitated further accommodation, and the trustees of the marquess (who died in 1848) began in 1851 and opened in 1855 the East Bute dock and basin measuring 46¼ acres. The Rhymney railway to Cardiff was completed in 1858 and the trade of the port so vastly increased that the shipment of coal and coke went up from 4562 tons in 1839 to 1,796,000 tons in 1860. In 1864 the Bute trustees unsuccessfully sought powers for constructing three additional docks to cost two millions sterling, but under the more limited powers granted in 1866, the Roath basin (12 acres) was opened in 1874, and (under a substituted act of 1882) the Roath dock (33 acres) was opened in 1887. All these docks were constructed by the Bute family at a cost approaching three millions sterling. Still they fell far short of the requirements of the district for in 1865 the Taff Vale Railway Company opened a dock of 26 acres under the headland at Penarth, while in 1884 a group of colliery owners, dissatisfied with their treatment at Cardiff, obtained powers to construct docks at Barry which are now 114 acres in extent. The Bute trustees in 1885 acquired the Glamorgan canal and its dock, and in the following year obtained an act for vesting their various docks and the canal in a company now known as the Cardiff Railway Company. The South Bute dock of 50½ acres, authorized in 1894 and capable of accommodating the largest vessels afloat, was opened in 1907, bringing the whole dock area of Cardiff (including timber ponds) to about 210 acres. There are also ten private graving and floating docks and one public graving dock. There is ample equipment of fixed and movable staiths and cranes of various sizes up to 70 tons, the Lewis-Hunter patent cranes being largely used for shipping coal owing to their minimizing the breakage of coal and securing its even distribution. The landing of foreign cattle is permitted by the Board of Trade, and there are cattle lairs and abattoirs near the Cardiff wharf. The total exports of the Cardiff docks in 1906 amounted to 8,767,502 tons, of which 8,433,629 tons were coal, coke and patent fuel, 151,912 were iron and steel and their manufactures, and 181,076 tons of general merchandise. What Cardiff lacks is a corresponding import trade, for its imports in 1906 amounted to only 2,108,133 tons, of which the chief items were iron ore (895,610 tons), pit-wood (303,407), grain and flour (298,197). Taking “the port of Cardiff” in its technical sense as including Barry and Penarth, it is the first port in the kingdom for shipping cleared to foreign countries and British possessions, second in the kingdom for its timber imports, and first in the world for shipment of coal.
The east moors, stretching towards the outlet of the Rhymney river, have become an important metallurgical quarter. Copper works were established here in 1866, followed long after by tin-stamping and enamel works. In 1888 the Dowlais Iron Company (now Messrs Guest, Keen & Nettlefold, Ltd.) acquired here some ninety acres on which were built four blast furnaces and six Siemens’ smelting furnaces. There are also in the city several large grain mills and breweries, a biscuit factory, wire and hemp roperies, fuel works, general foundries and engineering works. At Ely, 3½ m. out of Cardiff, there are also breweries, a small tin works and large paper works. The newspapers of Cardiff include two weeklies, the Cardiff Times and Weekly Mail, founded in 1857 and 1870 respectively, two morning dailies, the South Wales Daily News and Western Mail, established in 1872 and 1869 respectively, and two evening dailies.
History and Historic Buildings.—In documents of the first half of the 12th century the name is variously spelt as Kairdif, Cairti and Kardid. The Welsh form of the name, Caerdydd (pronounced Caerdeeth, with the accent on the second syllable) suggests that the name means “the fort of (Aulus?) Didius,” rather than Caer Dâf (“the fortress on the Taff”), which is nowhere found (except in Leland), though Caer Dyv once existed as a variant. No traces have been found of any pre-Roman settlement at Cardiff. Excavations carried out by the marquess of Bute from 1889 onward furnished for the first time conclusive proof that Cardiff had been a Roman station, and also revealed the sequence of changes which it had subsequently undergone. There was first, on the site occupied by the present castle, a camp of about ten acres, probably constructed after the conquest of the Silures a.d. 75-77, so as to command the passage of the Taff, which was here crossed by the Via Maritima running from Gloucester to St David’s. In later Roman times there were added a series of polygonal bastions, of the type found at Caerwent. To this period also belongs the massive rampart, over 10 ft. thick, and the north gateway, one of the most perfect Roman gateways in Great Britain. After the departure of the Romans the walls became ruinous or were partly pulled down, perhaps by sea rovers from the north. In this period of anarchy the native princes of Glamorgan had their principal demesne, not at the camp but a mile to the north at Llystalybont, now merely a thatched farmhouse, while some Saxon invaders threw up within the camp a large moated mound on which the Normans about the beginning of the 12th century built the great shell-keep which is practically all that remains of their original castle. Its builder was probably Robert, earl of Gloucester, who also built Bristol castle. Then or possibly even earlier the old rampart was for two-thirds of its circuit buried under enormous earthworks, the remainder being rebuilt. It was in the keep, and not, as tradition says, in the much later “Black Tower” (also called “Duke Robert’s Tower”), that Robert, duke of Normandy, was imprisoned by order of his brother Henry I. from 1108 until his death in 1134. Considerable additions of later date, in the Decorated and Perpendicular styles, are due to the Despensers and to Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, while the present residential part is of various dates ranging from the 15th century down to the last half of the 19th, when a thorough restoration, including the addition of a superbly ornamented clock-tower, was carried out. The original ditch, about 20 yds. wide, still exists on three sides, but it is now converted into a “feeder” for the docks and canal. Geoffrey of Monmouth was at one time chaplain of the castle, where he probably wrote some of his works. The scene of the “sparrow-hawk” tournament, described in Geraint and Enid, one of the Arthurian romances, is laid at Cardiff.
On the conquest of the district by the Normans under Fitz Hamon, Cardiff became the caput of the seigniory of Glamorgan, and the castle the residence of its lords. The castle and lordship descended by heirship, male and female, through the families of De Clare, Despenser, Beauchamp and Neville to Richard III., on whose fall they escheated to the Crown, and were granted later, first to Jasper Tudor, and finally by Edward VI. in 1550 to Sir William Herbert, afterwards created Baron Herbert of Cardiff and earl of Pembroke. Through the daughter and grand-daughter of the 7th earl the castle and estates became the property of the 1st marquess of Bute (who was created Baron Cardiff in 1776), to whose direct descendant they now belong.
The town received its earliest known grant of municipal privileges sometime before 1147 from Fitz Hamon’s successor and son-in-law Robert, earl of Gloucester. In 1284 the inhabitants petitioned the burgesses of Hereford for a certified copy of the customs of the latter town, and these furnished a model for the later demands of the growing community at Cardiff from its lords, while Cardiff in turn furnished the model for the Glamorgan towns such as Neath and Kenfig. In 1324 Edward II. granted a number of exemptions to Cardiff and other towns in South Wales, and this grant was confirmed by Edward III. in 1359, Henry IV. in 1400, Henry VI. in 1452, and Edward IV. in 1465.
Its most important early charter was that granted in 1340 by Hugh le Despenser, whereby the burgesses acquired the right to nominate persons from whom the constable of the castle should select a bailiff and other officers, two ancient fairs, held on the 29th of June and 19th of September, were confirmed, and extensive trading privileges were granted, including the right to form a merchant gild. A charter granted in 1421 by Richard de Beauchamp provided that the town should be governed by twelve elected aldermen, but that the constable of the castle should be mayor. In 1581 Queen Elizabeth granted a confirmatory charter to the mayor and bailiffs direct without reference to the lord of the castle. The town was treated as a borough by prescription until 1608, when James I. confirmed its status by express incorporation, adding also to its rights of self-government, and granting it a third fair (on the 30th of November). In 1687 the town surrendered this charter to James II., who in a substituted one, which, however, was never acted upon, reserved to the Crown the right of removing any member of the corporation from office. The first step towards the modern improvement of the town was taken in 1774, when a special act was obtained for the purpose. Nineteen private acts and provisional orders were obtained during the 19th century.
Among the many early English kings who visited or passed through Cardiff was Henry II., on whom in 1171, outside St Piran’s chapel (which has long since disappeared), was urged the duty of Sunday observance. About 1153, Ivor Bâch (or the Little), a neighbouring Welsh chieftain, seized the castle and for a time held William, earl of Gloucester, and the countess prisoners in the hills. In 1404 Owen Glendower burnt the town, except the quarters of the Friars Minors. In 1645, after the battle of Naseby, Charles I. visited the town, which until then had been mainly Royalist, but about a month later was taken by the Parliamentarians. In 1648, a week after the Royalists had been decisively defeated by Colonel Horton at St Fagan’s, 4 m. west of Cardiff, Cromwell passed through the town on his way to Pembroke.
Outside the north-west angle of the castle, Richard de Clare in 1256 founded a Dominican priory, which was burnt by Glendower in 1404. Though rebuilt, the building fell into decay after the Dissolution. The site was excavated in 1887. Outside the north-east angle a Franciscan friary was founded in 1280 by Gilbert de Clare, which at the Dissolution became the residence of a branch of the Herbert family. Its site was explored in 1896. The only other building of historic interest is the church of St John the Baptist, which is in the Perpendicular style, its fine tower having been built about 1443 by Hart, who also built the towers of Wrexham and St Stephen’s, Bristol. In the Herbert chapel is a fine altar tomb of two brothers of the family. A sculptured stone reredos by W. Goscombe John was erected in 1896. The original church of St Mary’s, at the mouth of the river, was swept away by a tidal wave in 1607: Wordsworth took this as a subject for a sonnet.
In 1555 Rawlins White, a fisherman, was burnt at Cardiff for his Protestantism, and in 1679 two Catholic priests were executed for recusancy. Cardiff was the birthplace of Christopher Love (b. 1618), Puritan author, and of William Erbury, sometime vicar of St Mary’s in the town, who, with his curate, Walter Cradock, were among the founders of Welsh nonconformity.