Welsh Journals

A CAIRN CEMETERY ON ESGAIR GERWYN, CEREDIGION Following information supplied by one of the authors (D.M.M.) about a number of cairns in South-East Ceredigion close to the border with Powys, a cemetery consisting of four surviving cairns was surveyed for the National Monuments Record of the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments in Wales. The site, at SN 8027 5737, lies at about 360m above Ordnance Datum on a shelf on the south-east facing slope of Esgair Gerwyn, above Nant y Gerwyn and close to the junction of the Gerwyn and Towy valleys. Situated at the side of the road from Tregaron to Abergwesyn, the site holds a commanding view across the Upper Towy valley. The cairns (fig. 15) are grass-covered and heavily denuded. They can only be identified on close inspection, though cairn i can be seen from the roadside, revealed by its open cist. Cairn 4, though standing to a greater height than the others resembles surrounding outcrops of rock. Cairn i is roughly circular, about 3.5m in diameter and about 0.1m high (0.3m above road level). Its most prominent feature is a roughly rectangular cist measuring internally about 1.1m long north-east to south-west by o.8m wide. One side-slab is missing. Probable remains of this, or the capstone, lie on the south. No further structural features are visible, but a large stone lies embedded in the roadside. This cairn appears to have been incorporated into a later field boundary following the line of the road and which no doubt includes material from this and the other cairns. The nearby road and possibly even local car parks may also have used material from the cairns in their construction. Cairn 2 survives as a mound only on its eastern side. Its original diameter was probably greater than 5m and its present height is about 0.15m. A roughly circular hollow 1.8m in diameter could mark the site of a former cist. Close to this are a number of what appear to be earthfast stones (orthostats). This interpretation, however, is open to question because local rock formations lie so close to the ground surface. Cairn 3 is a roughly circular stony mound some 6.5m in diameter, its maximum surviving height being about 0.25m. A robbing hollow on the east might once have been the site of a cist. Several possible orthostats are noted but the same reservations apply to these as to those in cairn 2.