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SELECTED CONTENT FROM THE ANGLESEY GUIDEBOOK WILL CONTINUE TO BE ADDED IN THE FOLLOWING WEEKS. Pictures will also be included.
AN INTRODUCTION TO THE ISLAND
Two high bridges over the Menai Strait lead to the island of Anglesey (in Welsh, Ynys Môn), the most northerly part of Wales. From car or train, the bridges offer a fleeting glimpse of glassy waters far below, of small towns, green fields and woods.Anglesey is Britain’s fifth largest offshore island. Much of it is rolling farmland, dotted with working villages and small towns. Traffic hurries west along the A55 to Holyhead, the port for Ireland. In the distance you may see reed-fringed lakes and rivers as well as rocky outcrops and gorse, blazing yellow in spring. Turn off the expressway and take your time. The island has more to offer.
Look back at the mountains of Snowdonia on the mainland, looming through a summer heat haze, sprinkled with snow in winter or spring, sometimes dark and sullen under a grey, rainy sky. The Menai Strait swirls between wooded banks, overlooked by the city of Bangor and Caernarfon castle on the south side, by Beaumaris castle and Menai Bridge town on the north.
Walk the coast and discover long expanses of rippled sand, high dunes tufted with marram grass, sheer cliffs, small pebble coves, offshore islands, wind-whipped reefs and lighthouses, saltmarsh and estuaries. Almost the entire coastline has been designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
If one does run into traffic jams on the bridges, staring at coaches and caravans, or has to queue at the chip shop on a bank holiday weekend, remember that just a short distance away are peaceful meadows and hedgerows bursting with wildflowers, bluebell woods by a blue sea, perhaps even a prehistoric burial chamber as old as the pyramids. Môn Mam Cymru (‘Anglesey, the mother of Wales’) has certainly played an important part in Welsh history, from the epic confrontation between the ancient druids and the Romans, to the coming of the railway and the industrial age. Not everywhere on the island is idyllic, but people are beginning to realise that industrial ruins or Victorian housing terraces can be every bit as fascinating as ancient standing stones or views of the mountains.
Of course the Anglesey of a hundred or even fifty years ago, with its isolated farms and chapels and the closeness of its people to land and sea, is fading fast. Even so, the island of today is rooted in that old way of life, and is sustained by it as it grows new shoots. The Welsh language is spoken as a matter of course alongside English, whether in garage, supermarket, school or council offices.
Once only Anglesey’s seafarers travelled the world. Today the world comes to Anglesey, and many of the islanders themselves jet off here and there. Despite this new mobility, a strong sense of community remains. The guidebook Môn Mam Cymru is an in-depth exploration of these landscapes and these communities.
Land and sea
The island is surrounded by the shallow waters of the Irish Sea. These may lack the deep swell of the open ocean, but can nevertheless brew up furious storms, as shipwrecks in each generation bear witness.Anglesey’s western part forms a separate island, called Holy Island or Ynys Gybi. The most easterly part of Anglesey forms a broad headland at Penmon, culminating in another offshore island, Puffin Island or Ynys Seiriol.
Anglesey is separated from the Welsh mainland by the Menai Strait, Afon Menai, which runs diagonally along the island’s southeastern flank. This narrow stretch of water experiences powerful currents and tidal surges. Sand banks have built up around both approaches to the Strait.
Anglesey has an area of 276 square miles (714 sq km), being slightly larger than the Isle of Man. Its highest point is Holyhead Mountain at 722 feet (220 metres).
Population
At the time of the 2001 census, Anglesey had a population of around 68,000. Holyhead, with 11,200 inhabitants, is the island’s largest town. Other residential areas include Llangefni (4,500), Amlwch (3,700), and the eastern section of the Menai Strait (Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll through to Menai Bridge town, Llandegfan and Beaumaris). Seaside resorts include Benllech, Cemaes, Rhosneigr and Trearddur.Climate
Anglesey has a climate typical of western coasts, Wales being moister than Britain’s eastern regions. The seas around its shores, warmed by the currents of the North Atlantic Drift, keep the climate mild. Growth can be lush in sheltered spots away from sea breezes and salt spray.Temperatures generally vary between extremes of -3° and 27°C (27° and 81°F). Mean temperatures for January are 5°C (41°F), for July 15°C (59°F). High annual rainfall, averaging 44 inches (1107mm) per year, keeps the island green. Prevailing winds are southwesterly. The island enjoys more sunshine than the mountains of Snowdonia, immediately to the south. The sunniest month is generally May.
Recommended times to visit Anglesey are in spring and early summer, or perhaps during a fine spell in early autumn. An Indian summer is known in Welsh as haf bach Mihangel, ‘a small summer at Michaelmas’. Visitors come to the island throughout the year, but the most popular period for sandcastles and paddling remains the school summer holidays in August.
Religion
The island’s churches mostly belong to the disestablished Church in Wales, which is part of the Anglican communion. Some belong to the Roman Catholic Church, and a few to other Christian Churches.The strongest Christian representation on the island is that of the Nonconformist chapels, such as those of Calvinistic Methodists and Baptists. Old rivalries between the various churches and chapels are largely a thing of the past.
Society has become increasingly secular, although perhaps less so in Anglesey than in urban England. Attendance is falling at both church and chapel: some churches and many chapels have closed.
Architecture
The vernacular architecture of the island includes long, low, whitewashed cottages, originally thatched (as is Swtan at Church Bay) but later capped with slate or rendered roofs. In recent decades many of these have been demolished or converted into modern bungalows. Ruined windmills dot the island; the restored Llynnon mill near Llanddeusant represents one in current working order. Some fine, large stone farmhouses of the sixteenth- or seventeenth-century survive. Plas Newydd the family seat of the Marquesses of Anglesey, is in the care of the National Trust and is open to the public.Anglesey has some interesting and sometimes eccentric church architecture. Some parish churches were founded very early in the Middle Ages, but many were heavily restored in the Victorian era. Every town, village and hamlet has its Nonconformist chapels, most commonly dating from the eighteenth to the late-nineteeth centuries.
The chief town of architectural interest is Beaumaris with a range of impressive domestic and public buildings dating from the thirteenth to the twenty-first centuries.
Crafts
Until the beginning of the twentieth century, small-scale rural industries on the island thrived on the supply of goods and services to working farmers and their families. The bootmakers of Llannerch-y-medd had a high reputation, and the speciality of Llaneilian and Penysarn was clogs. Marram grass, which binds the sand-dunes of Newborough and Aberffraw, was the raw material for poorly-paid women who made mats, grass ropes and brushes for whitewashing. In the island’s cottages (and later in fulling mills and small-scale woollen mills) yarn was spun, and tweed and flannel woven and finished, for clothing and blankets.Although, like many other regions of Britain, there has not been an unbroken tradition of production in any particular medium, craftspeople are today working again on the island. Many are members of a local Craftworkers’ Guild (with a showroom next to Llynnon windmill) and some are firmly established and produce work to a high standard. Craft fairs and retail outlets feature the work of the island’s potters, textile workers, glass makers, woodworkers and metalworkers.
Arts and Eisteddfodau
The arts on the island have traditionally been chiefly associated with poetry and music, which are also the traditional fare at the eisteddfodau. These festivals, at school, community, national and international level, have their orgins in bardic contests of the Middle Ages. Eisteddfod Môn (the Anglesey eisteddfod) is held annually in various districts of the island. Its centenary was celebrated at Bodffordd in 2007.Eisteddfod Genedlaethol (the National Eisteddfod) alternates each year, at the beginning of August, between locations in north and south Wales; it is a Welsh-language festival but welcomes English-speaking visitors. It came to Anglesey in 1999, and before that in 1983. (The 2008 eisteddfod took place in South Wales, at Cardiff. The 2009 National Eisteddfod is proclaimed to be held at at Bala). Other annual arts festivals are held on Anglesey in Beaumaris and Holyhead.
Traditional harp music, choirs, brass bands, classical music, jazz, folk and pop music in both Welsh and English, Welsh folk dancing, amateur dramatics, ballet and modern dance all thrive on Anglesey. Recent years have seen a rise in the profile of the visual arts. Studios open their doors to visitors during the Easter Arts Weeks. Regular venues for the arts include Oriel Ynys Môn in Llangefni (together with its newly-opened Kyffin Williams gallery) and the Ucheldre Centre in Holyhead.
NATURAL HABITATS
Anglesey is of great interest to geologists and naturalists, especially for the age and variety of its rocks and for its coastal environment. Rare birds are often blown on to the island’s shores and many migrant species are seasonal visitors. Anglesey marks the northern limit of some southern species, and the southern limit of some northern species. Conservation schemes have had their successes, but the environment still comes under pressure from developments, from people who come to beaches for racing quad-bikes and jet-skis, from intensive farming methods and chemicals and from global factors such as air pollution and climate change.Geology
Anglesey’s diverse geology has been likened to ‘the world on a pocket handkerchief’. The island is a designated ‘Regionally Important Geological Site’. Presently under consideration is its recognition as a European Geopark – a status only awarded to places of international significance.The island’s Precambrian rocks, some of them 660 million years old, are amongst the world’s most ancient. Known as the ‘Mona Complex’, they comprise two series, one bedded, the other metamorphic. Their structures are deformed by folds, thrusts and intrusions. Occasionally, minor earth tremors do still occur along the North Wales coast, reflecting its geological history.
The Mona Complex is overlain by rocks of other periods, from the Ordovician to the Carboniferous. Across the island you will find limestone and sandstone, as well as granite and gneiss. Evidence of the last ice age includes clays and large isolated boulders (‘erratics’) left behind by retreating glaciers.
Many rock groups have been given local names: hence the Church Bay Tuffs, the Skerries Group and the Baron Hill Volcanics. One mineral takes the English name of the island itself: Anglesite (lead sulphate) occurs on Parys Mountain. It is crystalline, usually pale yellow or white, and is formed from the oxidation of galena (lead sulphide).
VISIT: Ynys Llanddwyn (pillow lava), Parys Mountain (richly mineralised), Penmon Point (limestone), South Stack (intensely folded Pre-Cambrian strata).
Cliffs and stacks
The island’s geology is best exposed in the cliffs (with the exception of the Menai shore) of its coastline. The highest and sheerest rockfaces are on Holy Island, opposite South Stack. Amidst the springy turf on clifftops, look for tiny blue spring squills and wiry cushions of pink-flowered thrift. Guillemots, razorbills and puffins gather on the vertiginous ledges in the breeding season. Choughs (rare maritime crows with scarlet legs and beaks), perform comical displays of acrobatics and freefall. By way of contrast watch the streamlined peregrine falcon hurtle after a pigeon in a deadly, high-speed dive. Peregrines have even nested on the central piers of the Britannia Bridge.VISIT: South Stack, Ynys y Fydlyn, Rhoscolyn, Llanlleiana, Point Lynas – or take a boat trip to see the limestone cliffs of Puffin Island.
Marine habitats
Herring gulls squabble down at shore level, on sand or pebbles or promenades, fixing tourists’ sandwiches with an implacable eye. Great black-backed gulls, black-headed gulls and common gulls may also be seen.Beach-combing may reveal dog whelks, razor shells, cowries, hermit crabs or washed up starfish and jellyfish. A boat trip to offshore islands and reefs may acquaint you with grey seals and their pups, basking on their slabs of rock or heads bobbing in the sea. Offshore, look for black cormorants and shags, beating low over the waves or perched on a rock with their wings stretched out to dry. Black-and-white oystercatchers pipe on the shore, and ringed plovers dance along the waterline or fly off in tight formation. In summer, you may spot Arctic and Common terns (known as ‘sea-swallows’, môr-wenoliaid, in Welsh) as they plummet into the waves, or even a school of porpoises out to sea.
The strand line offers just a tiny sample of the riches of Anglesey’s seas. Visit at a low spring tide to explore rockpools for sea anemones, shrimps and crabs. The wave-sheltered races of the Menai Strait bring food to filter-feeders such as sponges. Remember to replace any boulder that you move – it is somebody’s home. On beaches of limestone pebbles look for finger-sized holes, bored by bivalved piddocks.
Dunes and slacks
Sand dunes are characteristic of Anglesey’s west coast, and are especially impressive at Newborough and Aberffraw. Their seaward margins shift in the wind, but they are anchored by colonies of plants: coarse spikes of marram grass, sand sedge, sea rocket, seaside pansy. Common blue butterflies fly from flower to flower amongst the vetches. Wetland hollows called slacks sprout creeping willow. Rabbits burrow in the dunes and many other sandy shores around the island. The harmless grass snake is not common, but has been seen on the dunes at Newborough and Aberffraw.VISIT: Newborough Warren, Aberffraw, Rhosneigr
Saltmarsh and mudflats
The tidal estuaries of the Dulas and the Cefni rivers expose rich expanses of soft mud for probing bills. Below Malltraeth Cob are saltmarshes and brackish pools, flooded by incoming tides. Plants thriving in this constantly changing world include the edible glasswort or marsh samphire, sea arrowgrass, sea lavender and cord grass. Shore crabs scuttle and grey herons stand stock-still and beady-eyed in the shallows. Other long-legged wading birds are common: redshanks, greenshanks, curlews. Geese and shelduck visit the mudflats, and sometimes a marsh harrier flies low, its legs trailing like an undercarriage.VISIT: Malltraeth, Dulas, Four Mile Bridge (for the ‘Inland Sea’)
Marshes
Despite the efforts of generations of farmers to drain the shallow valleys of Anglesey, many small wetlands remain. Where these are irrigated by waters from the limestone of eastern Anglesey, a succession of reeds, sedges and orchid-rich fens develop. Dragonflies dart amongst pools in former peat diggings and grasshopper warblers herald the warmth of summer. In the north and west of the island, acidic marshes are filled with sphagnum bog mosses, cotton grasses and cross-leaved heath.VISIT: Cors Goch, Cors Bodeilio
Freshwater sites
Anglesey is dotted with many natural lakes, both large and small, as well as lakes created as reservoirs or for fishing, such as Llyn Alaw – the largest on the island at 777 acres (314ha). The lakes attract a wide range of wildfowl, and you may see mallard, tufted ducks,moorhens and coots, swans and great crested grebes. Greylag and Canada geese are found on Anglesey. Small numbers of whooper swans arrive in the winter on Llyn Alaw and at Capel Coch.Sea trout, grey mullet and eels swim upstream along the islands’ rivers. After the dramatic decline in their population in the ’50s and ’60s (mainly due to the use of agricultural pesticides), otters were seen again on Anglesey in 1995 and are now increasing in numbers along some of the rivers, in particular Afon Braint.
Marginal plants along streams and ditches include the yellow flag (a common wild iris) and the rare water violet of the Cefni marshes. Seventeen species of damselflies and dragonflies occur in Anglesey. The common frog, common toad and palmate newt are the island’s most numerous amphibians with the great crested newt – a tiny Welsh dragon – in a few locations.
VISIT: Llyn Alaw, Cors Goch, Llyn Cefni, Llyn Maelog, Llyn Penrhyn
Woodland and forest
Estates of large houses were often planted with impressive stands of beech or sometimes exotic introductions. Pheasants raised for shooting populate many woods. Small areas of ancient oak woods do survive, often shrouded in lichens and mosses.Large conifer plantations such as Newborough Forest stand in dark, serried ranks amidst beds of pine needles. They attract sparrowhawks, coal tits, goldcrests and crossbills as well as a wide range of butterflies and moths.
Grey squirrels invaded the island in the 1960s, but the smaller, native red squirrels survived in a few locations and have been encouraged to re-establish themselves in areas of mature conifer woodland, such as Mynydd Llwydiarth. To assist this repopulation, efforts have been made to eradicate Anglesey’s grey squirrels.
VISIT: Newborough Forest, Plas Newydd, Mynydd Llwydiarth, Llangefni’s Nant y Pandy (The Dingle’).
Fields and heath
Hedgerows are a fine sight across the island, with blackthorn blossom and sloes, old man’s beard, blackberry brambles, foxgloves, primroses and violets and the red berries of lords-and-ladies. Ivy and red or white valerian root in old walls.Meadows may be yellow with buttercups or fringed with the creamy, pungent tufts of meadowsweet. Intensive modern agriculture has greatly reduced the opportunities for wildlife, but field margins still abound with birds and small rodents. Hares are a common sight, powering their way down rural lanes or raiding outlying gardens.
There are records of foxes being killed in Amlwch in 1787, but they were rare on the island until the 1970s when the population was said to be showing ‘an alarming increase’. During the last forty years they have become well established. Airborne predators or scavengers include kestrels, buzzards (present in ever-increasing numbers), ravens and, by night, tawny owls and barn owls. Five species of bats certainly live on the island, most commonly the pipistrelle. Three other species may also be present.
Anglesey’s heath and rocky uplands, with their barricades of prickly gorse, offer another habitat. Gorse flowers throughout the year – it is said on Anglesey that ‘the kissing stops when the gorse is not in bloom’. Adders are widespread on heaths, railway embankments and disused quarries. They have been persecuted over the centuries because of the dangers they pose, but in reality they are timid snakes. Warm days may bring out common lizards and the harmless legless lizards known as slow-worms.
VISIT: Cors Goch (south of Brynteg), Llaniestyn Common, Bodafon Mountain
A CHRONICLE OF THE PAST
Some of the main events in Anglesey’s history.The rising sea
From about 30,000 to 15,000 years ago, during the Palaeolithic or Old Stone Age, ice-bound North Wales was a hostile environment for human hunters. Anglesey was still joined to the mainland. It did not become an island until well after the final ending of the last ice age, about 10,000 years ago.As glaciers lost their grip on the mountains, melting ice filled the oceans, and higher temperatures made the sea water expand. Rising levels flooded the Menai Strait and almost succeeded in creating a second channel between what is now the Cefni estuary and Red Wharf Bay.
Hunting bands
During the Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age, nomadic bands gathered roots and berries in the forests, hunted deer and caught fish. They were skilled at making fine, precise weapons and tools from flint, wood, bone and antler. Traces of a hearth and flints, and several camps dating from about 10,000 years ago, have been discovered on the banks of Afon Ffraw. No Mesolithic burials have been found here. The distribution of worked flints suggests that coastal areas, such as Aberffraw or Penmon, were favoured over the densely vegetated interior, but the sea level then was much lower than it is now.Farmers and burials
About 5,500 years ago the warming climate encouraged the growing of crops. The first farmers began the long process that eventually transformed a forested island into the patchwork of fields, separated by walls and hedges, that we know today.Assured food supplies allowed for permanent farming settlements, long-distance trade and more complex social organisation. This was the Neolithic or New Stone Age and is marked by the introduction of pottery vessels and carefully made polished stone axes.
We know that Neolithic people had strong traditional beliefs, because for more than a thousand years their dead were buried together inside stone tombs covered by mounds of earth. Twenty impressive megalithic burial chambers, of different styles, survive on the island.
Barclodiad y Gawres, set into the headland above Cable Bay has decorated stones in the Irish style. Bryn Celli Ddu, near Llanddaniel-fab, has a similar feature. At this site and at Castell Bryn Gwyn there are remains of ritual stone rings and ditches, known as henges. Neolithic settlements are much scarcer than burial or ritual sites, perhaps because they have a slighter archaeological record. The rectangular wooden houses the farmers built have not survived, but archaeologists sometimes discover the holes in the ground where house posts were set.
VISIT: Bryn Celli Ddu, Barclodiad y Gawres, Castell Bryn Gwyn
Beakers and bronze
The Bronze Age came to the British Isles about 4,200 years ago. At about this time copper was excavated at Parys Mountain and the Great Orme to produce new tools and, later, weapons. New burial rites tended to place more emphasis on individuals than on groups. Round barrows and cairns were built over inhumations in stone-lined graves, and later over cremations placed in urns that were often inverted at burial. Standing stones and stone circles reflect new rituals, although the purpose of these sites remains a mystery. During the second millennium BC the climate deteriorated, and this seems to have resulted in the abandonment of the Early Bronze Age ritual and burial sites. Emphasis was subsequently placed more on weapons and on defensive enclosures, perhaps as cultivable land became increasingly scarce.Visit: Bryn Gwyn standing stones; Llanfechell standing stones, Gwynedd Museum (Bangor), Great Orme Mines
Ancient Celts
The ‘Celtic’ way of life originated in mainland Europe and from about 2,600 years ago came to dominate all regions of Britain and Ireland. Over the centuries there were specific incursions and settlements by bands of Celts around coasts of the British Isles, but the spread of the culture was mostly due to its assimilation by the original inhabitants of the islands.The British Celts (or ‘ancient Britons’) were master workers of iron as well as bronze and were famed for their gold and jewellery, their chariots and their bravado in battle. In the British Isles the Celts lived in round houses with thatched, conical roofs. These were often gathered within a hill or promontory fort, surrounded by stockades and defensive walls. An aristocratic elite provided each tribe with its kings and queens and with its priests and lawmakers, known as druids.
The Celts, like their predecessors, worshipped the Earth Mother, as well as a ‘horned god’ called Cernunnos and tribal deities. Woods, springs, mountains and animals were held to be sacred, as was the Isle of Anglesey, a major centre of druidism.
The Ordovices were the dominant tribe in northwest Wales. Celtic Iron Age settlements can still be seen on the island, on the slopes of Holyhead Mountain.
The most remarkable archaeological discovery from this age is the treasure hoard retrieved from Llyn Cerrig Bach, near Valley.
VISIT: Din Lligwy, Caer y Twr (Holyhead Mountain), Din Sylwy (Llanddona), Dinas Gynfor (Llanlleiana)
Roman conquest
The Romans first invaded southern Britain in 55BC, but full-scale conquest did not begin until AD43. In AD60 they reached Anglesey, a stronghold of the druids and of warriors intent on resisting the Roman advance.On the Menai Strait (perhaps at Tal y Foel) the Roman governor of Britain, Gaius Suetonius Paulinus, was confronted by an awesome gathering on the far shore, a host of cursing druids, screaming women and taunting warriors. Even hardened legionaries and auxiliaries needed urging on to the assault. As ever, they succeeded ruthlessly, and destroyed the sacred groves of the island. The Romans then had to withdraw hurriedly to southeastern Britain, where a savage uprising was being led by Boudicca, queen of the Iceni.
It was AD78 before the Romans returned to take full control of Anglesey. They governed from Segontium (at present-day Caernarfon) but later established a coastal fort and lookout at Holyhead, where Roman masonry is still visible. The remains at Lligwy, near Moelfre, of a wealthy farmstead in the Celtic style, shows how local chieftains managed to prosper under Roman rule.
VISIT: Holyhead churchyard wall, Din Lligwy, Caer Lêb, Segontium (at Caernarfon)
The making of Wales
The power of the vast Roman empire began to wane in the fourth century AD. Even before legions were withdrawn at the start of the fifth century, raiders from Ireland had begun to attack western coasts.Britain was soon left to its own devices, a patchwork of petty kingdoms. These reflected the old tribal divisions, but saw themselves as inheritors of the Roman tradition. At some point the Venedoti, a northern British tribe, came to defend and govern North Wales. They founded the royal dynasty of ‘Gwynedd’. A memorial stone from Llangadwaladr records in Latin the death of King Cadfan of Gwynedd in AD625.
Germanic peoples such as the Angles and Saxons, ancestors of the English, invaded the Celtic lands to the east. They cut off the West Britons at the Battle of Chester in AD607. To this day the Welsh name for the English is Saeson – ‘Saxons’. The Saxons called the West Britons ‘Welsh’ (meaning ‘strangers’) while the Britons began to call themselves Cymry (‘fellow countrymen’). The seventh century marks the emergence of the Welsh language from Brythonic, and a flowering of Welsh poetry which is a milestone of European cultural development.
From AD784 the eastern border of ‘Wales’ was marked by the earthworks of Offa’s Dyke. Modern Wales was beginning to take shape.
VISIT: Llangadwaladr Church
Saints and holy places
Christianity had become accepted within the Roman empire in the fourth century AD, and it rapidly took root and flourished in the western British Isles. In the fifth and sixth centuries, influences from Gaul, Spain and later Ireland, spread by hermits, monks and preachers, led to the foundation of monasteries and churches. Some of these, for example Holyhead, Penmon and Llaneilian, were considered to be of particular importance, and were referred to as ‘mother churches’, staffed by canons and ruled by an abbot. A number of lesser churches may also date from this period, for example Llangaffo, where there is a collection of important stone crosses, or Llangadwaladr and Llansadwrn, where there are early inscribed stones. However many churches were later foundations, some as recent as the twelfth century.Most churches are dedicated to the local Welsh saint who traditionally founded the church, for example Saint Cwyllog at Llangwyllog. However today it is difficult to prove when these sites were first settled, and few have produced evidence from the earliest period. Some saints, for example Cybi and Beuno, were considered of particular importance and had a wide sphere of influence throughout North Wales, but others only have a single dedication.
VISIT: Churches at Llanbadrig, Llangaffo and Penmon (medieval stone crosses); Saint Seiriol’s well (at Penmon) and Saint Gwenfaen’s well (Rhoscolyn)
Gwynedd attacked
Gwynedd thrived and under Rhodri Mawr (d877) its rule was extended to Powys, Ceredigion and parts of South Wales.In the ninth century Vikings from Norway raided or settled many of the lands around the Irish Sea. They plundered churches and they took cattle and grain, ships and slaves. A few Scandinavian names still exist as root words in some of the island’s English place-names (such as Anglesey itself, the Skerries and the word ‘stack’ in South Stack). Vikings attacked Anglesey many times, and settled on the island too. Later the Gwynedd royal dynasty intermarried with Dublin Vikings.
Half-Viking Gruffudd ap Cynan (c1055-1137) had to battle with the Normans, who launched savage incursions into North Wales after their conquest of England. A Norman motte-and-bailey fort still stands above Afon Lleiniog.
In 1170 the Norman invasion of Ireland meant that they now controlled much of the Irish sea around Anglesey.
VISIT: Aberlleiniog Castle
The Welsh Princes
The most successful ruler of the Middle Ages was Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (‘the Great’, 1173-1240) who was master not just of Gwynedd but of all Wales. Royal courts were convened on Anglesey, most notably at Llys Aberffraw and at Llys Rhosyr (whose ruins have recently been excavated at Newborough).Conflict with the English had been a constant feature of Welsh life for centuries. By the Treaty of Montgomery (1267) Henry III of England recognised Llywelyn ap Gruffudd (c1225-82) as ruler of all Wales, in return for Welsh recognition of the English king as feudal overlord. After the death of Henry III, however, the agreement foundered and Edward I attacked Wales in 1276. In 1282 Llywelyn’s brother Dafydd attacked English forces at Hawarden. In the conflict that followed, Llywelyn ap Gruffudd (‘the Last Prince’) was killed in a skirmish with the English and his severed head was taken to London. Independent Welsh rule was ended.
VISIT: Llys Rhosyr (Newborough), Penmon Priory, Siwan’s coffin (Beaumaris parish church)
Castles and conquest
King Edward I of England subdued North Wales with a chain of castles. Beaumaris castle (1295-98) guarded the eastern approaches to the Strait. Local inhabitants were evicted to Rhosyr (later given its own town charter as ‘Newborough’). The new colony of Beaumaris was settled by English and Gascons.The peace remained uneasy however and in 1400 Owain Glyn Dŵr engaged the English in a war of independence. From 1403-05 the Welsh rebels held Beaumaris castle, but in 1406 the English king, Henry IV, regained control of Anglesey. By 1412 Owain’s uprising was defeated.
VISIT: Beaumaris Castle, Caernarfon Castle, Conwy Castle and town walls.
The Tudors
In the fifteenth century a family from the Penmynydd district of Anglesey came to prominence. Their name was Tudor or Tudur. Owain Tudor (c1400-61) became a squire at the court of Henry V, and on Henry’s death secretly married the king’s French widow, Catherine de Valois. It was their grandson who claimed the throne as Henry VII in 1485, following his success at the Battle of Bosworth. Under his son Henry VIII, Wales was effectively annexed by England in the Acts of Union (1536-43) and detached from the Roman Church by the Reformation. This was a period of religious tumult – a William Davies, who became a Catholic priest in 1585, was imprisoned in Beaumaris castle and was executed in 1593 on account of his faith.Anglesey prospered in the reign of Elizabeth I. Some impressive, large houses were built along the Menai shore at this time.
VISIT: Penmynydd Church, Plas Mawr (Conwy)
Squires and scholars
Fishing, farming, cattle droving, coastal shipping and smuggling became the island’s sources of income. A local boy made good in England, David Hughes, founded a free grammar school at Beaumaris in 1603. The island submitted to Parliamentarian forces during the first Civil War in 1646, and during the second, in 1648, Beaumaris castle was beseiged and surrendered.The 1700s saw a growing interest in the island and its history by native-born writers and scholars, and country squires kept alive some aspects of Welsh culture through their patronage of education, music and poetry.
VISIT: Beaumaris Courthouse
The industrial age
The period between the late eighteenth and the early twentieth centuries saw the surge of Nonconformist zeal which populated the island’s landscape with chapels. With the English language being enforced as the medium of instruction in the new schools, it was the chapels’ Sunday schools which helped to keep the Welsh language alive.As the industrial age came to the island along with the railway and the construction of a port at Holyhead, spiritual revival often coexisted with material hardship. There was copper mining at Parys Mountain and quarrying on the island and mainland.
This was the great age of Anglesey seafaring, with ships built at Amlwch, and further afield, not just plying the coasts of the British Isles, but braving the storms of Cape Horn on the voyage to San Francisco.
Political power in the Victorian and Edwardian eras was held by the island’s large landowners, such as the Bulkeleys of Beaumaris, the Pagets of Plas Newydd and the Stanleys of Penrhos near Holyhead. Princess Victoria attended an eisteddfod in Beaumaris in 1832 and the first tourists began to arrive, by steamboat and train.
VISIT: Menai Suspension Bridge, Parys Mountain & Porth Amlwch
The twentieth century
The world wars took the island’s young men away to fight, many never to return. Almost one thousand Anglesey men lost their lives in the First World War, more than three hundred during the Second. On Anglesey, home guards practised drill in village halls, ‘land girls’ toiled in the fields. Bombs were dropped on Holyhead. The Saunders-Roe factory at Llan-faes fitted out Catalina flying boats and launched them on Fryars Bay.Comprehensive education was pioneered on the island, starting at Holyhead in 1949. Anglesey’s education authority became the first in Britain to abandon the 11+ examination and adopt a comprehensive system for entry to all its secondary schools.
Mechanisation drastically reduced the agricultural labour force in the 1950s. Living conditions were improving, with
even remote farms receiving mains water and electricity and council houses being built in the villages and towns.
The 1960s saw new campaigns to safeguard and revive the Welsh language. This was a decade during which the island’s population increased by 15 per cent.
Major constitutional changes which affected Anglesey and Wales included accession to the EEC (later the European Union, 1973), devolution of power to a National Assembly of Wales (1997) and local government reorganisation (1974 and 1996).
The compilation of the following section, describing the island’s main places of interest, is in progress.
AN ANGLESEY GAZETTEER
Descriptions of Anglesey in the Môn Mam Cymru guidebook are grouped into five regional sections … North, South, West, East and Central. The following abridged extracts in this online version include only a very small proportion of the book’s content.Most of the island’s towns and villages are known only by their Welsh names – for example Llangefni. Some additionally have an English name – for example Caergybi is known also as Holyhead. In this English-language guide the English place-name is usually given precedence, and the Welsh name follows in italics – for example Holyhead / Caergybi.
The Gazetter entries follow the order of the English alphabet. (The Welsh language has its own alphabet with combinations such as ff, ng and ll representing single letters). Some of Anglesey’s geographical features are described using the Welsh term only – for example, the River Alaw is Afon Alaw.
More precise locations are indicated in the text using standard Ordnance Survey map references. Anglesey OS locations are prefixed with the letters SH; references are printed in brackets, eg: (SH373931). Explorer Maps 262 (Anglesey West) and 263 (Anglesey East), or Landranger map 114 cover the island.
SELECTED GAZETTEER CONTENT FROM THE ANGLESEY GUIDEBOOK WILL CONTINUE TO BE ADDED IN THE FOLLOWING WEEKS.
The comprehensive guidebook to the island, Môn Mam Cymru, is now available: CLICK THIS LINK.