HLW (D) 7

Preseli  

2002  

Outstanding  

Designated  

Today, mainly on visual grounds, the Preseli Hills appear to form a single area of open, upland landscape, a fact accentuated by their inclusion within the otherwise wholly coastal Pembrokeshire Coast National Park. However, in terms of their historic interest, they comprise a series of discrete blocks which encompass areas of the foothills to the north and south. The Newport and Carningli area at the western end of the range forms one such block and the larger area of upland at its eastern end another. The best surviving and most complete, typical historic cross-section across the central block described here encompasses the Preseli ridge between Foel Eryr in the west and Foel Drygarn in the east, the foothills and slopes on either side, and some of the deeply incised, narrow valleys at the headwaters of the Eastern Cleddau and its tributaries between Maenclochog and Llangolman in the south. The gradient rises steeply, from below 100m above OD in the valley floors, to the foothills which are between 150m and 250m above OD, before rising sharply again to the top of the Preseli ridge, the highest point of which is Foel Cwmcerwyn at 536m above OD. The area contains a rich legacy of upstanding, prehistoric and later remains, and carries with it several important historic associations, including that of being the source area of the Stonehenge bluestones. The open, unimproved upland contains a palimpsest of prehistoric relict landscapes with monuments from the Neolithic through to the Iron Age and Romano-British periods. Some of these elements, like the triple enclosures with their numerous hut platforms surrounding the three massive Bronze Age cairns of Foel Drygarn, are prominent and famous monuments. Other monuments are less prominent but sited in conspicuous locations as, for example, Beddarthur, a prehistoric ritual site near the summit of Carn Bica. Other features such as clearance walls, hut groups, field enclosures, are often less apparent, but with multiple relationships to the prominent monuments. Although well-studied by generations of field archaeologists, there is still scope for further recording and interpretation. The concentration of ritual and funerary monuments, particularly on the southern slopes, over possibly two to three millennia, argues strongly for a religious significance to the crags of Carn Menyn, the source area of the spotted dolerites or bluestones of Stonehenge and, earlier still, rhyolite used for Neolithic polished stone axes. The sequences of enclosure and chronology of the dispersed settlement pattern of small farms in the foothills are less well-studied, but relevant to how the uplands were, and are, used by farmers on its margins, not just in this area, but throughout Wales, wherever similar topographical relationships exist. Whilst some of the enclosure may be medieval, other areas preserve the distinctive imposed, regular pattern of 19th century Parliamentary Enclosures. Within these areas of modern enclosure there are still upstanding, though often denuded, prehistoric monuments similar in character to those better preserved in the uplands. Excavations around the now poorly surviving ritual and religious complex of monuments at Glandy Cross, centring on the embanked stone circle of Meini Gwyˆr, demonstrate the high, buried archaeological potential in this area. A distinctive area of modern enclosure lies north of Maenclochog, where Parliamentary Enclosure in the 1820s provoked a riot amongst the dispossessed cottagers and small freeholders, who had lost their right of common and turbary. The areas north and south of the Preselis have never been dominated by any major landowners. Even today, most of Mynydd Preseli is common land with actively exercised rights of common by adjacent, foothill farms. Traditions of freedom of conscience in political and religious beliefs were exemplified in this century by the life and work of the Welsh poet, teacher and pacifist, Waldo Williams and, in an earlier period, by the celebrated Baptist chapel at Rhydwilym. There may have been a decline in population in the post- Roman period and a contraction of settlement to the deep, narrow river valleys of the foothills. Ancient woodland edges onto the famous site of the Pentre Ifan Neolithic chambered tomb and obscures a possible Iron Age/Romano-British farmstead within Tyˆ Canol wood. Early medieval ecclesiastical sites such as the long-deserted, ruined church of Llandeilo Llwydiarth, one of the seven Bishop Houses of Dyfed recorded in the 8th century material within the later texts of the Welsh Laws, tend to be sited deep in the hidden valleys characteristic of the headwaters of the many streams on the south side of the Preselis within the catchment area of the Eastern Cleddau. However, this possible contraction of settlement did not mean abandonment of the major cross and lateral routes which are an important feature of the Preseli range. The Brynberian Pass which forms the western limits of this area is marked by standing stones, monumentally sited, and by a small group of Class II Early Christian Monuments. It is still an important cross route, carrying the B4329 today. Of equal antiquity is the so-called Fleming’s Way, an east-west route surviving as a footpath along the crags of Carn Menyn, Carn Bica, Foel Feddau and Foel Eryr, marked by boundary stones along its length. It is significant that in an area where most parish boundaries follow streams, this line marks the junction of parishes on the north and south side of the mountain. Not only does this indicate the antiquity of the route, but also, since parish boundaries generally reflect older territories, the sharing out of the upland grazing and resources of the Preseli Hills between the settlements north and south of the uplands.