Is Pennsylvania named after William Penn?
Pen is the Welsh word for high or head woodlands. Penn claims in a letter to Robert Turner that he intended to call it New Wales but the secretary, a Welshman, objected. So it became Pennsylvania, meaning head or hill. The intriguing point about this story is that pen in Welsh is spelt with a single n, whereas Penns surname had a double n, like the new name for the county.There are many long standing myths regarding America’s links to Wales. One which was enjoying a period of revival in the 1790s was the Madogiad story; the tale of the Welsh prince, Madoc, who discovered America in 1170, and who lived and married into the native Indians. The fable centres around a tribe of light-skinned, Welsh speaking Indians who many people wished to discover. Morgan John Rhys, a Quaker from Glamorgan, who founded Beulah, was a believer in this story and he publicised his hopes that Welsh people would come to America, under his auspices, to preach to and convert more Indian tribes. William Penn and t
