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gwydir castle
Gwydir Castle is situated in the Conwy valley, Wales, a mile to the west of the ancient market town of Llanrwst and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to the south of the large village of Trefriw. An example of a fortified manor house dating back to c1500, it is located on the edge of the floodplain of the river Conwy, and overlooked from the west by the now-forested slopes of Gwydir Forest.
History
There have been fortifications associated with this site since AD 600. In the Early Middle Ages numerous skirmishes were fought in the area between the post-Roman kingdoms of Wales. Two significant encounters were in AD 610,when Llywarch Hen, a bardic prince of Rheged, fought a bloody battle nearby (Gwydir might be derived from gwaed dŭr - the bloody land) and later when the Kingdoms of Gwynedd and Deheubarth fought a major battle near Llanrwst in AD 954 .
The entrance
By the 14th century, the Wlesh knight Howell ap Coetmor, who had fought in the Hundred Years' War as a commander of longbowmen under Edward, the Black Prince at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356 is recorded as the first owner of a manor house on the site. He would later go onto support the rising led by Owain Glyndŵr.
By the 16th century, Gwydir had become the seat of the powerful Wynn family who were descendants of the Kings of Gwynedd. The Wynns were one of the most significant families of north Wales during the Tudor and Stuart periods.
Following the Wars of the Roses the castle was rebuilt by Meredith ap Ieuan ap Robert, the founder of the Wynn dynasty. The house incorporated re-used mediaeval material from the dissolved Abbey of Maenan. The square turret at the rear of the Solar Tower contains a spiral staircase taken from the Abbey and many elaborately carved stones can also be seen. The turret was added around 1540 and Sir John Wynn's initials can be seen above the main entrance in the courtyard gatehouse along with the date of 1555. The surviving buildings date from around the year 1500, and there were alterations and additions in c1540, c1600 and c1828, the latter after Lord Willoughby had done a fair bit of demolishing in c1819.
Although called a castle, it is an example of a Tudor architecture courtyard house or fortified manor house, rather than a traditional castle, such as those built in North Wales by Llywelyn the Great and Edward I.
Gwydir was home to Katheryn of Berain. King Charles is said to have visited Gwydir in 1645 as the guest of Sir Richard Wynn, 2nd Baronet, Treasurer to Queen Henrietta Maria, and Groom of the Royal Bed Chamber.
More recently King George V and Queen Mary stayed here as the Duke and Duchess of York, in April 1899.
The Gwydir Estate
The yew walk
During the 16th and 17th centuries the Gwydir Estate under the Wynn family dominated north Wales, and at the centre of this huge estate, Gwydir itself stood in a deer park of some 36,000 acres (150 km2). In 1678 it passed by marriage to the Barons Willoughby de Eresby, based in Lincolnshire (and from 1892 also to the Earls of Ancaster). The 18th century consequently saw a period of some neglect, and by the early 19th century the estate largely comprised the parishes of Dolwyddelan (where the Wynns also had an ancestral home), Llanrhychwyn, Trefriw, and Gwydir, totalling some 55 square miles (140 km2). This land, however, was mostly mountainous and of poor quality, and although there were some 30 slate mines on the land, of varying sizes, this slate was not of a particularly good standard, much of it more suited to slabs than roofing slate. Nor was production high, and the output of all the quarries over the 150 years of their existence totalled, for instance, just two years' worth of output from the Blaenau Ffestiniog quarries. Prior to the arrival of the railway in the 1860s, most slate was carried by cart to the quays at Trefriw. The estate also owned a number of mineral mines, mostly in the area of today's Gwydir Forest.
Much of the estate was, however, under continuous mortgage, and in 1894 Dolwyddelan was sold off, followed in the next two years by most of Llanrhychwyn and Trefriw. The sale of the house in 1921 by the Earl Carrington saw it passing out of inherited ownership for the first time in over 400 years, and virtually all other lands were subsequently sold off. Today the estate comprises just the 10 acres (40,000 m2) in which Gwydir Castle sits.
gwydir castle
Gwydir Castle is situated in the Conwy valley, Wales, a mile to the west of the ancient market town of Llanrwst and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to the south of the large village of Trefriw. An example of a fortified manor house dating back to c1500, it is located on the edge of the floodplain of the river Conwy, and overlooked from the west by the now-forested slopes of Gwydir Forest.
History
There have been fortifications associated with this site since AD 600. In the Early Middle Ages numerous skirmishes were fought in the area between the post-Roman kingdoms of Wales. Two significant encounters were in AD 610,when Llywarch Hen, a bardic prince of Rheged, fought a bloody battle nearby (Gwydir might be derived from gwaed dŭr - the bloody land) and later when the Kingdoms of Gwynedd and Deheubarth fought a major battle near Llanrwst in AD 954 .
The entrance
By the 14th century, the Wlesh knight Howell ap Coetmor, who had fought in the Hundred Years' War as a commander of longbowmen under Edward, the Black Prince at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356 is recorded as the first owner of a manor house on the site. He would later go onto support the rising led by Owain Glyndŵr.
By the 16th century, Gwydir had become the seat of the powerful Wynn family who were descendants of the Kings of Gwynedd. The Wynns were one of the most significant families of north Wales during the Tudor and Stuart periods.
Following the Wars of the Roses the castle was rebuilt by Meredith ap Ieuan ap Robert, the founder of the Wynn dynasty. The house incorporated re-used mediaeval material from the dissolved Abbey of Maenan. The square turret at the rear of the Solar Tower contains a spiral staircase taken from the Abbey and many elaborately carved stones can also be seen. The turret was added around 1540 and Sir John Wynn's initials can be seen above the main entrance in the courtyard gatehouse along with the date of 1555. The surviving buildings date from around the year 1500, and there were alterations and additions in c1540, c1600 and c1828, the latter after Lord Willoughby had done a fair bit of demolishing in c1819.
Although called a castle, it is an example of a Tudor architecture courtyard house or fortified manor house, rather than a traditional castle, such as those built in North Wales by Llywelyn the Great and Edward I.
Gwydir was home to Katheryn of Berain. King Charles is said to have visited Gwydir in 1645 as the guest of Sir Richard Wynn, 2nd Baronet, Treasurer to Queen Henrietta Maria, and Groom of the Royal Bed Chamber.
More recently King George V and Queen Mary stayed here as the Duke and Duchess of York, in April 1899.
The Gwydir Estate
The yew walk
During the 16th and 17th centuries the Gwydir Estate under the Wynn family dominated north Wales, and at the centre of this huge estate, Gwydir itself stood in a deer park of some 36,000 acres (150 km2). In 1678 it passed by marriage to the Barons Willoughby de Eresby, based in Lincolnshire (and from 1892 also to the Earls of Ancaster). The 18th century consequently saw a period of some neglect, and by the early 19th century the estate largely comprised the parishes of Dolwyddelan (where the Wynns also had an ancestral home), Llanrhychwyn, Trefriw, and Gwydir, totalling some 55 square miles (140 km2). This land, however, was mostly mountainous and of poor quality, and although there were some 30 slate mines on the land, of varying sizes, this slate was not of a particularly good standard, much of it more suited to slabs than roofing slate. Nor was production high, and the output of all the quarries over the 150 years of their existence totalled, for instance, just two years' worth of output from the Blaenau Ffestiniog quarries. Prior to the arrival of the railway in the 1860s, most slate was carried by cart to the quays at Trefriw. The estate also owned a number of mineral mines, mostly in the area of today's Gwydir Forest.
Much of the estate was, however, under continuous mortgage, and in 1894 Dolwyddelan was sold off, followed in the next two years by most of Llanrhychwyn and Trefriw. The sale of the house in 1921 by the Earl Carrington saw it passing out of inherited ownership for the first time in over 400 years, and virtually all other lands were subsequently sold off. Today the estate comprises just the 10 acres (40,000 m2) in which Gwydir Castle sits.