Written by Gerald Morgan, author of 'Ceredigion: A Wealth of History' which was published by Gwasg Gomer in July 2005:

"Why Ceredigion? Well, first of all, I love the place. Ancient kingdom, long tradition, lovely Welsh, hidden beauty, sea and mountain, great people. But - I'm worried about Ceredigion, as many of you are.

The Cardis - the true born Welsh-speaking Cardis - are almost a minority in their own land. The county now has a large number of people from other parts of Wales, and at least a quarter are from beyond Wales.

So this book, which began in 1973 as an attempt to understand why there is an enormous church in the tiny village of Llanfihangel-y-Creuddyn, has become transmogrified. It is an attempt to remind the Cardis of who they are, and to tell everyone else about where they live.

I began by writing mini-pamphlets about that single church, and I've ended up with a number of articles and four previous books, all related to Ceredigion. I've read wills and inventories, rentals and letters, bills and receipts, accounts and gaol-files, and I've written and lectured about criminals and ships, wills and farmers, scholars and servants, lords and mistresses - all to try to understand the past of Ceredigion.

Years ago, it was difficult to find new books about our county in the shops. In fact, lots had been written but little was in print.

We all stand on the shoulders of Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick - that remarkable man who, at the age of 25, published a huge pioneer volume which we all still use. He was an intriguing figure who, because he chose to marry the girl he loved (daughter of a Cardiganshire murderer), was cut off by his father and had to make his own way.

Later came various volumes - some composite, some the stories of single parishes, one book by Sir John Edward Lloyd, a number by W.J. Lewis and invaluable work by J. Geraint Jenkins. There is the invaluable Ceredigion: Journal of the County Antiquarian Society. Then, of course, the county has produced its own major historians.

The climax of all these efforts is the Cardiganshire County History, of which two volumes have already appeared. Let's be honest here! My original hope was that all three volumes would have appeared years ago, and my intention was to produce a popular digest for people who didn't feel the need for three such mighty and learned volumes. But it wasn't so simple.

Volume One - no problem, I've stolen a lot from it. But of course it's already dated - there's been some major archaeology since 1994, and a great blessing that is.

Volume Two is finally on the way and, because it's so late, I've had the privilege of writing for it.

Then there's Volume 3, which is marvellous on religion and politics, but by now it's clear that there ought to be a fourth volume - what of transport, what of law and order, what of the county in two World Wars?

So I've had to patch in a lot off my own bat, instead of relying on specialists. This was most difficult when dealing with recent decades. It's always amazing how readily people forget when changes happened - and let's face it, history is at one level the story of change.

I once asked Geraint H. Jenkins when the Early Modern period ended in Cardiganshire. Most historians might have said - oh, 1750 or thereabouts. But Geraint laughed, and said "When the first tractor appeared".

He was right in so many ways and what has happened since is simply the story of catch-up. Ceredigion has changed more in fifty years than in the previous hundred - the rate of change is hectic, but we take it largely for granted.

Indeed, the change is so great that arguably it is hardly worth writing about present-day Cardiganshire as a separate entity, because it's so much more like everywhere else than it used to be. Do we not have traffic-lights in Llanbadarn, and a MacDonalds in Parc-llyn?

A hundred years ago we were virtually all Welsh-speaking, church-or-chapel going, and law-abiding. Great. We were also leaving our land in large numbers or staying at home to die of T.B. Not so hot.

By now it seems that change is accelerating all the time. Cardiganshire changed enormously between 1900 and 1950 - but it's changed even more since 1950. Politics, education, transport, population are changing so fast that my final chapter is simply a sketch.

Of all the changes, just consider women's lives. Yesterday on the prom a young woman in jeans sachayed past me on her roller-blades, talking on her mobile phone the while. Unimaginable even in the most recent past.

I don't claim to have got everything right in this book - in fact, when I opened my first copy I immediately saw a blooper of my own making. Ceri Wyn, my excellent editor, insisted that I be careful of the captions to the pictures, and I was. But not careful enough.

There is a page, for you to find out, where the text and caption disagree. The text is right, the caption wrong, and I apologise to my editor and publisher. I lost a night's sleep over that.

But having said that, I hope this book will achieve my purpose. I've tried to restrain the bees that buzz in my bonnet. I haven't been TOO savage about wind-factories in our precious wilderness areas, though I feel strongly about them.

I may have been fierce about the planting of trees on Ceredigion's wonderful landmark of Trichrug and I hope that now they're cut, they won't be allowed to grow again to destroy the county's finest views and obscure its wonderful early monuments on the hill there.

I haven't even mentioned the fact that Alun R. Edwards, arguably the greatest Cardi of the 20th century, isn't commemorated by the brand-new county library and archive which the present staff and readers deserve. If this book is a campaigning volume, it's not about single issues, but about who we are and where we are.

People are already asking me 'What next?' There's a second chapter for Volume 2 of the County History on the stocks, and I'm looking cautiously at the Gogerddan archive in the National Library. Really it's to late for me to start on the Pryses, but Dr Leslie Baker-Jones is working on the Lloyd clan, which is an even bigger project, and he's older than I am!"

Written by historian Gerald Morgan, author of author of 'Ceredigion: A Wealth of History'.