Google Doodle is celebrating St David’s Day, or Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Sant, on March 1.
Wales celebrates its patron saint on the first day of March, marking the day in the year 589 that St David was canonised.
The Google Doodle was inspired by items from Wales, and was hand-crafted using cut acrylic glass inspired by traditional stained-glass windows.
It features Wales’s national flower, the daffodil, in vases that spell out the word Google.
Google has celebrated St David’s Day in previous years with other iconic symbols from Wales, such as leeks and a red dragon.
It is tradition for women to wear daffodils and for men to wear leeks on March 1. According to legend, Welsh soldiers would wear leeks on the battlefields so they could recognise each other among the Saxons.
In 2018, the Google Doodle on March 1 featured a woman in traditional Welsh costume playing the harp, in a field of daffodils against the backdrop of a mountain.
The Welsh harp is considered to be the national instrument of Wales and has been an important part of the county’s musical history for years.
In 2016, the Doodle featured the word Google written in ancient lettering, featuring the Celtic knot, while last year’s Google Doodle featured a red dragon, as featured on the Welsh flag.
According to legend, a Celtic king named Vortigern was looking for somewhere to build a castle, and found a spot on the hillside of Dinas Emrys.
But this spot was directly above an underground lake, where two dragons were fighting. The king’s digging freed the dragons and, once free, they continued their battle. Legend says that the red dragon won.
In 2017, the St David’s Day Doodle saw the word Google engraved into a traditional Welsh Lovespoon, which have historically been gifted by suitors to their love interests.
From daffodils to dragons, Google has long celebrated Wales’s patron saint, and this year is no different.
