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South Wales (the Pembrokeshire clusters) are not all that less distinct than the North Welsh are from the English. I think some people forget that Wales is almost entirely 'upland'. King Offa of Mercia built a freakin' dyke to protect his subjects from being raided by those from the mountainous west. To this day, the Dyke basically forms the modern Anglo-Welsh border. Excluding the hills of Shropshire, the rest of the Anglo-Welsh border is defined by the contrast of mountains on one side (Cymru) and a more pastoral landscape on the other (Inglaterra). The Anglo-Saxons mainly settled in southern/central/eastern England owing to its fantastic, fertile farmland, but of the fewer ones who settled further west (modern day Gloucestershire/Herefordshire/Shropshire/Cheshire) I don't think there is much that would have enticed them any further west into the rather inhospitable rugged landscape of modern-day Wales. The most sparsely populated part of Wales is actually the central portion of the country. It's often remarked on as to how 'empty it feels. The rugged landscape that defines the centre was totally unattainable to sustain any kind of worthy population. Aside from that it goes without saying it acted as a bulwark against 'English' incursions.
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