The World in 1883

The University’s Royal Charter is issued by Queen Victoria.
Liberal reformer William Gladstone is Prime Minister.

Here in Wales –

• Cardiff is a relatively small town with an important dock exporting South Wales’ coal to the world.
• Cardiff Castle’s clock-tower is newly finished, but the famous animal wall is yet to be created. 
  
• The National Eisteddfod visits Cardiff for the first time.

Elsewhere in the world –

• The Orient Express begins its first services, crossing Europe from Paris to Istanbul.
  Krakatoa erupts, killing 40,000 people. Clouds of ash and gas plunge the world into an early ‘winter’.
• The world mourns the deaths in this year of composer Wagner, painter Manet and philosopher Karl Marx.