Historic Landscape Characterisation
Llŷn - Area 9 Rhoshirwaun and
Bryncroes PRN 33479
Rhydlios, Rhoshirwaun
Cottage, Bryncroes
Farm, Rhoshirwaun
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Historic background
Early prehistoric activity is indicated by
discoveries of stone tools: a flint scraper near Bryncroes;
a stone axe-hammer from Cae Wern, Trygarn, south of Sarn Meyllteyrn;
a stone axe at Cae Llyn Gelod, Rhoshirwaun, and standing stones,
or the record of standing stones at Llangwnnadl and at Maen
Hir, Pen y Groeslon.
Settlement in later prehistory is indicated by the identification of
circular features and enclosures at Cwm Ci, Rhoshirwaun; Rhydlios and
a concentric earthwork enclosure below the western slopes of Mynydd
rhiw at Meillionydd. More certainly, nucleated hut circle settlements
have been identified at Pant y Gwnil, Pen y Groeslon (PRNs 5215, 5216)
and a polygonal enclosure at Gorphwysfa, north of Pen y Groeslon (PRN
4371).
There are holy wells in the north-east of the character area at Ffynnon
Lleuddad and Fynnon Fair on the south side of the village of Bryncroes.
Bryncroes is an ancient church which was extensively restored in 1906
by the architect Harold Hughes. Hyde-Hall, in 1810, regarded the church
as ‘little deserving of description’. Nevertheless, the
round-headed doors may be original and the church was certainly in
existence in the thirteenth century, recorded in the Valuation of Norwich,
1254, as receiving tithes, obventions and oblations to the value of
10s. The Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1535 identifies Bryncroes as a chapel
of the Monastery of Bardsey, together with Tudweiliog and Llangwnnadl.
The chapel received tithes of wool, lambs, dairy produce and tithes
of grain from its parish.
In administrative terms, before 1283, the area to the east of Bryncroes
church would have been intimately associated with the royal maerdref
of Neigwl. The tir cyfrif (demesne bond tenure) township of Dyndywydd,
described, in this study, within the character area of Rhiw, had its
focus on the northern slopes of Mynydd Rhiw. However, its interests
extended across the sloping ground towards the Soch to the hamlet of
Crugeran. Equally Trygarn, to the east of Bryncroes, had been a hamlet
of the demesne centre at Neigwl. Memorials to members of the Trygarn
family from the mid-seventeenth century lie within the church. The
house at Trygarn is an important eighteenth century two-storied house
that has survived.
Rhoshirwaun, to the west of Bryncroes had been a wet moor. It provided
fuel from peat cuttings, pasture for animals, at least in the summer
months, and accommodated squatters, particularly fishermen who, it
seemed, had encroached on the common with the tacit acceptance of the
community.
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An Act for Inclosure was drawn up in 1802,
by which it was the intention that all squatters with less
than 20 years occupation would be removed from the land. Resistance
to the prospect of evictions and the loss of the turbaries
was fierce and was only suppressed with the arrival of a contingent
of dragoons. There was much sympathy with the predicament of
the squatters. Hyde-Hall, a contemporary observer, commented
that ‘of some hardship … the cottagers perhaps
have a right to complain, if the illegality of their settlement
has not in the first instance been most clearly and formally
made manifest to them; but with considerations of wrong or
right, the community has nothing to do when any of its members
resort to force as their argument’.
The Inclosure Act was applied in 1814. New roads were driven across
the moor, boundaries were established, allotments allocated and nearly
two thousand acres of wetland was reclaimed (see historical introduction
for the process of inclosure). The road from Nefyn and Tudweiliog to
Aberdaron now became the principal route south to that part of the
peninsula. Previously an unfenced road crossed the marsh and during
wet periods the coastal road had been preferred.
Key historic landscape characteristic
•A large area of former marsh, reclaimed
and enclosed by Act of Parliament.
•Evidence of ancient enclosures and encroachment cottages.
•A landscape characterised by several single-storey
cottages, many with crog-lofftydd surviving, some survivors
showing evidence of mudwall construction.
•Contrasting field patterns reflecting the small,
compact clusters of fields around settlement on the fringe
of the enclosed march
•Ruler straight road improvements in consequence of
the Inclosure Act.
•Long sinuous parcels of relict quillets of former
arable open fields can be recognised in the vicinity of Bryncroes
Rhoshirwaun common is a relatively flat,
wet moorland. It is drained to the north-west by the Afon Fawr
to Traeth Penllech; to the north-east, through Bryncroes to
join the Soch at Sarn Meyllteyrn; to the west at Porth Ty Mawr
and south-west to Aberdaron Bay. For centuries, peat deposits
have built up on this low plateau. The present character is
of reclaimed wetland and relatively recent enclosure. The characteristics
are regular drainage ditches and the ruler-straight roads and
the low rectilinear boundaries of earth, occasionally of stone,
represent the Parliamentary Inclosure. The occasional irregular
enclosure characteristic of pre-nineteenth-century encroachment
may also be found. Several encroachment intakes, particularly
in the area south-east and south of Gyfelan and Llangwnnadl
are plotted by John Evans on his map of the 1790s. The early
nineteenth-century division of this landscape includes a number
of larger paddocks and clusters of smaller plots associated
with new building on the former common. Clusters of settlement
occur within the Parliamentary Inclosure at the crossroads
at Pen y Groeslon; at Rhydlios and along the road to Aberdaron
at Rhoshirwaun.
The traditional cottage in the Rhoshirwaun
to Bryncroes area in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth
century was single storey, often with croglofft . These cottages
would represent the majority in the area of the enclosure although
now they are increasingly rare through modification and replacement.
The traditional building materials of these cottages are random
rubble but, also, a significant proportion has been recognised
as mudwall build. Twenty of these mudwall cottages have been
recorded with or on the fringe of the Parliamentary Inclosure.
Good examples of single storey cottages in the area, some with
croglofft surviving and some which still retain an earth core
to their walls, can be found at Ardd Las, Efail Rhos with smithy,
Rhoshirwaun; two examples at Penrhos; at Pencruga, Groeslon
and Cilyradwy, north of Rhydlios.
Although slate was likely to be used for substantial
houses there is good reason to believe that thatching was common. ‘As
a covering for houses, thatch is chiefly in use, a practice
which is robbing the land of straw cannot be to much countenanced.
For supplies of slate, nature has afforded the necessary facilities
by the neighbouring sea, and no very distant quarries, but
to avail ourselves of these, even when held out in the greatest
degree, some previous strength and ability are in course necessary ‘,
(Hyde Hall, in Bryncroes parish, 1810).
To the east of Rhoshirwaun similar drainage problems would have been
encountered, albeit outside the Parliamentary Inclosure until the rising
ground was met, at Meillionydd and the Rhiw foothills. Despite changes
in land use, in the area of enclosure, and the enlargement of fields
and removal of boundaries across the farm lands, it is still possible
to recognise the long sinuous shapes of parcels of relict quillets of
former arable open fields. These can be recognised in the vicinity of
Bryncroes, at Melin Trygarn and at Pant.
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