Cardiff

The Romans built a fort beside the River Taff in AD 75 to control the Welsh tribesmen.
The city's Welsh name of Caerdydd, meaning City of Dydd.

The town first grew up around the fort, and in 1581 it was given its first royal charter by Elizabeth I. At that time Cardiff was a haunt for pirates raiding in the Bristol Channel.

Coal from the valleys to the north fuelled Cardiff's expansion at the dawn of the 19th century. In 1794 a riverside dock was linked by canal to Merthyr, then the largest town in Wales and centre of the chief iron and coal-producing region of Britain.

Much of Cardiff had passed by marriage into the hands of the Bute family in 1776. It was the energy of the 2nd Marquis of Bute that finally launched the city into the industrial age. In 1839 he began building more docks, and these were soon linked by rail to pits and ironworks inland.
The quayside to the east of the Taff had many taverns with exotic names like The Bucket of Blood and The House of Blazes. The area itself became known as Tiger Bay, one of the toughest seaports in the world.