A little Mother's Day Outing

 

Here are my Mother's Day flowers from the kids, which were accompanied by a bottle of white wine and two lovely bars of Italian soap.

Following on from my last post, I wanted a little jaunt up the road to see the site of Prince Llywelyn's death at Cilmeri - just 3 or 4 miles from here - less if we were to walk across the fields (but that would involve fording the River Irfon - not ideal!!)

It was raining - hence the big spot on the camera. If Derek Acorah from "Most Haunted" were still about and with us, he would probably say it was A Visitation from the past - an orb.  As you can see, on the anniversary of the battle on 11 December last year, tributes were laid - Welsh flags and two beautiful shields - one carved wood (on the left) and a smaller painted one on the right.

What this signage doesn't say can be found on the Coflein site, which puts the site of the actual battle actually IN Builth, and just across the River Irfon from the Groe, where we walk each day.  In fact, the Golf Course may actually be a huge burial site - if only Time Team were still around! With the conjunctures of the rivers Irfon and Wye, this would make sense as to the English army being shown a ford and crossing to the flank of the Welsh army. If this was the site, then it is possible that Llewellyn HAD been shriven at Llanynis Church, which is just a few fields from Cilmeri, and was making his way towards the battle.  Cilmeri is 3 miles from Builth.  Was he lured there?  Was he betrayed? We'll never know for sure.

Here's another take on it.

We made our way down to the well, which is by the stream (marked as Nant Llewellyn on the map).  There were coins in the bottom though why someone would think to turn this into a wishing well is open to debate.

Looking across the slow Heart of Wales train line and the fields in the direction of our new home - though it's out of sight behind the trees where there's a white building on the left a little down from the hills.

From there we drove a little way down the road to Llangammerch Wells - popular in Victorian times for the "taking of the waters" (as was Builth too of course).  Here is was Barium Chloride wells which were discovered in the late 18th C.   At the height of its fame, bottled water was being distributed by the rail network all over Britain and they were even selling their own brand of cigarettes!

The original settlement here dated from Medieval times, and there was a Medieval church but this one (which looked a MOST unlikely recipient for what I was searching) dates from 1915/16 with additions from 1927, and stands high on a promontary looking across to the Eppynt Hills.

This is what I was looking for - a relict from that very Medieval church of which nothing else survives.  This was formerly built into the Churchyard wall and later into the west wall of the church when it was restored c.1870.  The old red sandstone of which is made is not local - and could have been provenanced to a deposit some 20 km to the south.  Redknap and Lewis describe it thus:  "Carved with a ring-cross with sunken quadrants.  Beneath the cross are several pecked devices:

a)   a human figure with arms outstretched.

b)   a spiral.

c)   sunken squares, rings and a triangle.

The disposition of motifs is strange, and suggests that the stone might be an architectural fragment such as an altar front or tympanum.   However, the original edges of the slab on the top right corner and lower left side indicate that it originally had an upright rectangular form, like other cross-slabs.  Nash-Williams attributed the stone to the seventh to ninth centuries (but Redknap & Lewis think ninth to 10th Centuries). 

There are similarities with the cross- and spiral forms at several other churches, but they are also suggestive of stones from Co. Dublin and Co. Wicklow.

Right, lesson over for today, here are some views from the churchyard.