Deffroad Cymru (The Awakening of Wales) by Christopher Williams 1911

"The painting shows a female nude emerging from the jaws of a sea-dragaon, a kind of Celtic Birth of Venus. Preliminary drawings of this are in the sketchbook that Christopher Williams used at Caernarfon Castle in 1911 when recording the Investiture of the Prince of Wales. This subject was thus a nationalistic allegory that was both contemporary and of special relevance to the artist."

-taken from Wikipedia

 

 ...

 

 "How long has the Red Dragon been a symbol of Wales? The short answer is that it was probably a symbol of the Celts in Britain since the time of the Romans and probably well before the Anglo-Saxon invasion in the 5th century.

 When the Romans were conquering much of Britain after AD43 they brought with them much of their culture and symbolism. The dragon was one of the most prominent symbols of the Roman military. Roman Legions, military units of a hundred men commanded by a Legate, were led into battle by someone carrying an eagle mounted on a pole. The legions were themselves usually sub-divided into ten smaller Cohorts and each of these would, in turn, be led into battle by a standard-bearer carrying a dragon."

-WelshFlag.org

Deffroad Cymru (The Awakening of Wales) by Christopher Williams 1911.

Source:

https://www.artuk.org/discover/artworks/deffroad-cymru-the-awakening-of-wales-178346


Quote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Williams_(Welsh_artist)#Compositions

https://web.archive.org/web/20120809011046/http://welshflag.org/