Place:Meirionnydd District, Gwynedd, Wales

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Meirionnydd is a coastal and mountainous region of northern Wales. It has been a kingdom, a cantref, a county (Merionethshire), and a district.

Kingdom

Meirionnydd (-ydd is a Welsh suffix meaning "land") means, literally, "Land adjoined to Meirion". It was a sub-kingdom of the old kingdom of Gwynedd, founded according to legend by Meirion (or Marianus), a grandson of Cunedda, a warrior-prince who brought his family to Wales from the 'Old North' (northern England and southern Scotland today), probably in the early 5th century. His dynasty seems to have ruled there for the next four hundred years. The kingdom lay between the River Mawddach and the River Dovey, spreading toward the northeast.

Cantref

The ancient name of the cantref was Cantref Orddwy (or "the cantref of the Ordovices"). The familiar name came from Meiron's kingdom.

The boundaries of the cantref of Meirionnydd followed the presumed boundaries of the previous kingdom but this time as a fief of the Kingdom of Gwynedd. It continued to enjoy long spells of relative independence. It was divided into the commotes of Ystumanner (administered from Castell y Bere at Llanfihangel-y-Pennant) and Talybont (possibly centred on Llanegryn where there is a memorial mound). Meirionnydd was abolished in 1284 following the Statute of Rhuddlan and reorganised, with the addition of some neighbouring cantrefi, to form the county of Merionethshire.

County

In 1885 Meirionnydd was made both an historic county and an administrative county, with its borders expanded to include the old cantrefi of Penllyn and Ardudwy (shown as Dunoding in the Wikipedia map of medieval cantrefi). It took the name Merionethshire under English Law. In 1974 the administrative county was merged with those of Caernarvonshire and Anglesey to create a new district municipality of Gwynedd. (See also the Wikipedia article, Merionethshire.)

District

Meirionnydd was one of five "districts" of Gwynedd from 1974 to 1996. The district comprised the majority of the former administrative county of Merionethshire and reverted to the Welsh spelling of the county's name.

The district was created by the Local Government Act 1972, and replaced the following local government areas of Merionethshire:

• The urban districts of Bala, Barmouth, Dolgellau, Blaenau Ffestiniog and Tywyn
• The rural districts of Deudraeth, Dolgellau and Penllyn

Meirionnydd District was abolished in 1996 by the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994, becoming part of the unitary authority of 'Caernarfonshire and Merionethshire', which was immediately renamed 'Gwynedd' as the first act of the new council. An area committee of Gwynedd Council now covers the area.

Research Tips

• A 1900 Ordnance Survey map of the historic county of Merionethshire is available on the A Vision of Britain through Time website. This shows all the old parishes within their urban and rural districts. Large farms and estates are also marked.