Wandering Welsh Wales
Castell Dinas Brân (for that is the fortification that my knees remember) translates to "The Castle of Crow Fortress", the original name being from the Middle Welsh—originally a pre-Roman Celtic language—for fortress (Dinas) and crow (Brân). The addition of "Castell" looks like a redundancy that might have come into existence when the Medieval stone castle was built atop the existing hill fort. Redundancy in place names isn't all that unusual. For example, there are numerous of British rivers that in various linguistic guises are simply synonyms for "river" (or some variant on flowing water). Possible examples are the river Avon (there are two in England), the river Don (there are three in England and one in Scotland. The river Don in South Yorkshire also has a tributary, the Little Don, alternatively known as the Porter), the river Ouse (there are at least two: one that flows through York and one in Sussex), the Mersey, Tyne, Wye, and even, possibly, the Thames. These may all, effectively, be "the river River".
I took the photos above and immediately below on holiday in 2003 looking west, with Castell Dinas Brân to the left (above) and the town of Llangollen under the hill (below). There's nowt much left of the castle, but the views from its elevated height over the River Dee and the surrounding country are good.
More views, from an earlier trip. Dinas Bran from a distance, probably to the west of the hill:
A curious native observing my ascent of the hill. She's quite a distance from her pals in the fields below:
Almost at the top:
The earthworks of banked ramparts and ditches are from the Iron Age, the very ruined stonework is Medieval:
The view from the Dinas Brân hilltop, south over Llangollen:
Below, looking east from near Castell Dinas Brân along the Dee valley towards England. The river and, close by, the Llangollen canal can be seen—white—in the plain. In the distance is the arcade of the Cefn Nawr viaduct carrying the railway over the river and, beyond that, a more recent road bridge. Also crossing the river more distantly (but not visible here) is the double arcade of the Chirk viaduct and aqueduct, carrying both the railway and the Llangollen canal over the valley into England.
Closer than Cefn Nawr, but not visible because of topography, is the famed Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, a Grade I listed building and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Telford-designed aqueduct was completed in 1805, has a span of 18 arches over 300 metres and carries the canal over the river at a height of 38 metres. The mortar used in its construction was made from lime, water and ox blood (the latter ingredient helping maintain bonding through large or sudden temperature changes). The aqueduct is a small marvel.
Above, at the lower reaches of the fort's hill looking west, the path bounded by an ancient earthwork rampart. The large house in the distance is Dinbren Hall, a handsome 17th Century edifice that's a conspicuous landmark.
Above, a view west from beside the fort's hill. You can see how the descent from the ruin might be tough going for old knees! The valley on the right (north) of the image above (beyond the hill behind Dinbren House) brings the river Eglwyseg to join the Dee.
The Dee curves around the headland at the left (south) of the image in its eastward progress into England. On leaving Wales the Dee flows through Chester and is then canalised and diverted from its earlier natural course, joining Liverpool Bay at the border of Wales and England.
A little way farther west up the Eglwyseg valley is the substantial Medieval ruin of Valle Crucis Abbey (pronounced Valley Crewis). In England such sites are now administered by the charity English Heritage, but here in Wales they are in the care of EH's Welsh affiliate, Cadw (pronounced Cadu).
Though topography didn't always allow east/west orientation of an abbey's church, this example gets pretty close to approved standard. This is a view across the site from the southwest, looking diagonally across the cloister to the corner where the eastern range meets the south wall of the church. The tall, gabled wall on the left is the west front of the church, inset with three almost lancet-style windows with plate tracery and, above them, a small rose window. Tall, narrow windows are usually an indicator of earlier Gothic ("Early English") architecture.
Only the foundations remain of the western range and the frater on the southern side of the site, while the eastern range, including the abbey's chapter house, remains remarkably complete. A tall, lancet-style window can be seen in the upper story of the south transept, presumably to let light onto the night stairs from the brothers' dorter down to the church. Its tracery is nearly all gone.
Above, a closer view over the cloister from the southwest. The wider arches of the middle Gothic period ("Decorated") are evident, along with the curvilinear tracery in the chapter house window.
The view of Valle Crucis Abbey from the southeast, showing the rear of the eastern range. The window to what later became the Abbot's camera (chamber) has a small rectangular window with vertical mullions, an indicator of a later inclusion, as non-arched windows were largely unknown in pre-Tudor times. Other, arched windows display more curvilinear tracery.
The abbey, of course, sits by a river—in this case, as stated, the Eglwyseg, almost unpronounceable to any but a Welshman. This view is toward the west, so this is the east end of the abbey's church, again fenestrated with early Gothic lancet windows. Overall, Valle Crucis is a much more substantial fragment than that remaining at good old Roche Abbey in Yorkshire.
Back to Llangollen. This is a view eastward, downstream to the town:
Below: a contre-jour view of the Dee, westward/upstream, taken from Llangollen's Medieval bridge. The buildings on the north bank are part of the old station now used by the heritage railway; the buildings on the south bank were once a mill but are now a restaurant. We used the restaurant on a later visit to the town, wherein an irregular feature of a stone wall struck me as resembling a large, somewhat sinister face (not dissimilar to the flying head in the terrible SF film Zardoz). With my first digital camera I took a picture of the feature. My camera immediately seized up and it took quite some jiggery-pokery to coax it back into good behaviour once we were home. Zardoz didn't want me to take its picture, obviously.
Here's that Medieval bridge (dating from the 16th Century) across the Dee in a view looking east/downstream. The corn mill (dating from the 15th Century) referenced above is out of shot to the right-hand side of the image, the railway station ditto to the left (in fact, the railing in the bottom left-hand corner is the perimeter fence of the station). In those days, it looks like nature was making a fair stab at colonising the rocks in the river near the bridge. I don't know whether that's been tidied up or not, in the intervening years. The bridge looks quite busy, but I think there was a steam event on the heritage railway that day which probably accounts for it. Perhaps not, though: Llangollen is also the location of an annual, six-day international music and poetry festival (an eisteddfod, as the Welsh have it) that takes place at its pavilion and show ground, a little to the west. It's a very big deal. Not only does it feature the expected Welsh cultural standards, but international guests of high standing from the spheres of Classical, Popular and World Music. Annual audiences over the six days can run into tens of thousands.
Above is the road into town from Llangollen Wharf, from where canal trips can be taken, and where colourful narrow boats are often moored. It's also where one can join the canal towpath for extensive walks along the waterway in either direction. It was via this pleasant route that we used to walk the three miles to Valle Crucis Abbey, with steam locos occasionally passing us on our southern side.
This is the bridge where one leaves the canal and its towpath to strike north over farmland to Valle Crucis. However, just along the towpath, beyond the telegraph pole in the photo, there is a turning that brings you to a small motor museum by the waterway.
Another stretch of nearby canal and towpath. Barely visible under the bridge is an approaching passenger barge. Imagine a time when this was the last word in industrial logistics, not only before metalled roads and heavy goods vehicles, but before even the railways. What a quiet, more gently paced world it must have been outside of the nascent industrial cities of 1795, when this canal was built.
The photo above shows the railway viaduct at nearby Berwyn. The magpie house is, if I recall correctly, the station building there. The low wall in the foreground runs along the road after it passes from its course parallel to the railway line behind the station, and sweeps under the viaduct, bridging the River Dee in the process. The river is beneath the road on which the photographer stands. On the bank opposite to the railway station there is an hotel above the river that connects to the station by way of a 19th Century chain bridge. Not far upstream are the Horseshoe Falls: not a naturally occurring feature, but a wide, semi-circular weir necessary for the supply of water to the canal.
Following are three pictures from the Llangollen heritage steam railway—two of a side-tank engine (the first, standing in Llangollen station, the second pulling into Berwyn station), then the Foxcote Manor, a Great Western Railways 7800 Class locomotive, preparing to pull out of Llangollen:
On yet another trip, I took in a different part of Wales when walking in the Wye Valley. This is a view north-ish from what I think is called Gospel Pass in the Brecon Beacons, on the road to Hay-on-Wye (a town known for its annual literary festival):
On this trip my buddy and I took in Stokesay Castle, a fortified manor just on the English side of the border:
The stone part was largely built in the 13th-15th Centuries. In the below view, the half-timbered gatehouse dates from the 17th Century:
Like all rivers, the Wye meanders about quite a bit, and sometimes it flows through England, at others through Wales. Over 15 miles of its course, directly upstream from its confluence with the Severn, the Wye marks the actual boundary between England and Wales. To the west of the river, in Wales, is the Brecon Beacons National Park. Straddling the river, sometimes in England, sometimes in Wales, is the Wye Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The area along the border of England and Wales is often referred to as the Welsh Marches, though it is not a strictly defined area. Often taken to refer to the English counties adjacent to the border, the Marches might also include areas of Wales similarly adjacent. Not far away are the splendid English Medieval cathedrals of Gloucester (pr "Gloster"), Hereford (pr "Heh-reh-fud") and Worcester (pr "Wuster"), as well as the splendid churches of Great Malvern, Leominster (pr "Lemster") and Tewkesbury Abbey (pr "Tewksberry"), scattered in or near the Malvern Hills AONB.
Due north of Chepstow, but situated in England not far from Hereford, is the parish church at Kilpeck, above. Small as it is, it's important from the point of view of its architecture, being a delightful example of the pre-Gothic, Norman/Romanesque style. Dating from 1140, Kilpeck church is famous for its decorative carving, featured especially in the series of 80+ corbels (or stone brackets) around the exterior roofline—some of which are humorous, some grotesque and at least one obscene—as well as the splendid arch of the building's south doorway. You don't get the doorway in the photo above, nor the detail of the corbels, but you can see the latter positioned beneath the roof. The church's arrangement clearly illustrates its Roman-like plan, with rectangular nave and chancel distinguishable from each other, and an apsidal chapel at the east end of the church (its typically small windows having equally typical semi-circular arched tops). It's a beaut.
The church at Cwmyoy (pr "Coomyoy"), as its name might suggest, sits on the other side of the border in Wales. It's known as the most crooked church in Britain, and the photo tells why. Landslip has affected the building badly over its lifetime and many historical attempts to redress or halt the situation are evident from the excessive buttressing of its south side. Of later date than Kilpeck, Cwmyoy is never-the-less a very old church dating in part from the 12th Century, though subsequent building has taken place from the 13th Century. It lacks Kilpeck's elegance and sophistication, but it has its own character and charm. Unsurprisingly (being in Wales) Cwmyoy's interior arrangements mark it as more aligned with Low rather than High Church ordering and rites.
Close to Cwmyoy lie the remains of Llanthony Priory, a former Augustinian house founded in the very early 12th Century. This is a view from the northeast looking across the church. At the left of the picture is the east end of the church. At midships is the southwest remains of the crossing and its central tower. To the right of the that, the arcades of the church's nave, at the west end of which are two towers, originally part of the west front of the building. You'll see one of those towers is fenestrated and roofed: that's because that southwest tower (as well as other parts of the priory buildings) has been incorporated into an hotel that shares the site. It seems a rather charming idea to put up at a hotel that's part of a Medieval monastery ruin, but at the time that the photograph was taken the facilities were somewhat limited, with all the hotel's guests sharing a single bathroom (not that I stayed there to experience it). It does remind me that, when on honeymoon in Croatia, my wife and I took a trip to a nature reserve on the Adriatic Island of Mljet. An additional point of interest was that—small as the island is—it holds a lake in which lies an even smaller island. On that island was a 12th Century Benedictine monastery which, at the time had been "converted" into an hotel. We didn't stay there either, but what a retreat it would make!
Note that many of the photographs are scans of enprints. I've tried to tidy them up, sharpen and colour-adjust them as much as I can. They remain soft—or grainy—and, as the prints are quite old, you can see in some that the dyes have begun to shift (though that might be thought an attractive effect rather than a defect).