Name | Merionethshire |
Alt names | Meirionnydd | source: Wikipedia | | Meirionydd | source: Times Atlas of World History (1993) p 349 | | Merioneth | source: Getty Vocabulary Program |
Type | Historic county |
Coordinates | 52.8°N 3.8°W |
Located in | Wales ( - 1974) |
Also located in | Gwynedd, Wales (1974 - ) |
- source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
- source: Family History Library Catalog
| :the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia
Merionethshire or Merioneth (Welsh: Meirionnydd or Sir Feirionnydd) is one of the thirteen historic counties of Wales and a former administrative county. The spelling of the Welsh name in standard modern orthography is "Meirionnydd" (for the geographical area) or "Sir Feirionnydd" (for the county), with a double <nn>, but the variant with a single <n> is sometimes found in older works.
Merionethshire was a maritime county, bounded to the north by Caernarvonshire, to the east by Denbighshire, to the south by Montgomeryshire and Cardiganshire, and to the west by Cardigan Bay. With a total area of 1,731 km² (668 sq miles) and a population of 38,310 in 1961 (before it was absorbed into Gwynedd), it is one of the more sparsely populated counties in Great Britain.
The Merioneth area remains one of the strongest Welsh-speaking parts of Wales. The coastline consists alternately of cliffs and stretches of sand and the area generally is the most mountainous in Wales; a large part of the Snowdonia National Park lies within it. The greatest heights are Aran Fawddwy 905 m (2,970 ft) and Cadair Idris 893 m (2,929 ft). The chief rivers are the Dwyryd, the Mawddach and the Dyfi. Waterfalls and small lakes are numerous, the largest being Bala Lake (4 miles long and 1-mile (1.6 km) broad).
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Medieval History
The county was formed in 1284 under the terms of the Statute of Rhuddlan from the Cantrefi of:
- Meirionnydd
- Dunoding (but only the larger Ardudwy commote)
- Penllyn and the Lordship of Dinmael
A cantref was a medieval Welsh land division. Cantrefs (or cantrefi) were divided into commotes and/or hundreds.
Economy
Merioneth was an important part of the Welsh slate industry in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, with major quarrying centres at Blaenau Ffestiniog in the north of the county and Corris in the south.
Slate tiles (shaped from the natural material) were a very popular roofing material for housing up until 1950. For the most part, they have been replaced by clay tiles or concrete tiles, but slate is still used.
Administration (since the late 19th century)
An administrative county of Merioneth was created under the Local Government Act 1888 on 1 April 1889. In 1894 a series of urban and rural districts were established as they were in England at the same time. No town in Merionethshire was large enough to be made a municipal borough.
The county was abolished under the Local Government Act 1972 on 1 April 1974. The bulk formed the Meirionnydd District of Gwynedd, with a small area in the northeast, Edeirnion Rural District, becoming part of the Glyndŵr District of Clwyd.
As a result of the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994, which came into force on 1 April 1996, the Glyndŵr area was made a part of the new Denbighshire principal area, with the rest forming a new "Caernarfonshire and Merionethshire principal area". The latter area was, however, renamed Gwynedd almost immediately.
Research Tips
- The National Library of Wales has just uploaded (Feb 2018) a website covering the tithe maps of Wales with accompanying apportionment documents using original and present-day maps. There are over 300,000 entries. Landowners and small villages are included. The presentation looks very good.
- 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.
- Some words in Welsh come up time and time again and you may want to know what they mean or how to pronounce them. For example,
"Eglwys" is a church and the prefix "Llan" is a parish. "w" and "y" are used as vowels in Welsh. "Ll" is pronounced either "cl" or "hl" or somewhere in between. "dd" sounds like "th". The single letter "Y" is "the" and "Yn" means "in". "uwch" means "above"; "isod" is "below" or "under"; "gwch" is "great", "ychydig" is "little"; "cwm" is a "valley".
- In both Welsh and English all these words are commonly used in place names in the UK. Place names are often hyphenated, or two words are combined into one. Entering your problem phrase into Google Search, including the term "meaning in Welsh", will lead you to Google's quick translation guide. I'm no authority; these are just things I have picked up while building up this gazetteer for WeRelate.
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