THE WOLF. 129 
from paying any acknowledgment to the king of 
England.” 
The amount of the original tribute commuted for 
this tax of Wolves, the time when that tribute was 
appointed, and the cause for which it was imposed, 
are altogether circumstances not very generally under- 
stood. It is vaguely imagined to have been a de- 
grading tax paid by the people of Wales to the 
English monarch, in token of their subjection to his 
sovereignty as theirconqueror. “This,” says Powel, 
“ig not the fact ; it arose from a local cause : from one 
of those cruel dissensions among the native princes 
which too often disgrace the Welsh annals, and to 
settle which the weakest never failed to invite the 
aid of foreign force. 
About the year 953, Owen, the son of Griffith, was 
slain by the men of Cardigan ; and Athelstane, upon 
this pretext, entering with an army into Wales, 
imposed an annual tribute upon certain princes to 
the amount of £20 in gold, £300 in silver, and 200 
head of cattle, but which was not observed by these 
Welsh princes, as appears by the laws of Howel Dha, 
wherein the levy is appointed. It is there decreed 
that the Prince of Aberffraw should pay no more to 
the English king than £66 tribute, and even this sum 
was to be contributed to the prince of Aberffraw by 
the princes of Dinefawr and Powis, upon whom this 
tax was virtually imposed. The principality of Dine- 
fawr, it may be observed, included Cardigan, by the 
men of which district the alleged crime had been 
committed; and Powis, which was close to the 
