The GazetteerThe Gazetteer

Where the boar and his young killed all the cattle and people of Kynwas Kwrr y Vagyl, the first bloodshed once Arthur's hunt had picked up the trail from Porth Clais.

where I put itRhys read Aber Gleddyf as the mouth of the Cleddau, the great tidal haven now called Milford Haven, and every later editor follows him; the text gives no fixed point along the haven's considerable length, so the record sits at its seaward mouth near Dale rather than at the modern town that borrows the estuary's name.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeLongstone, Mabesgate, St Ishmaels, a standing stone, 3.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

Another stand at the mouth of the Teifi, where the boar killed Kyflas son of Kynan and Gwilenhin, king of France, who rode with Arthur's host.

where I put itAberteivi, the Welsh name for Cardigan at the tidal mouth of the Teifi, is unchanged from the medieval text to the modern town, and no edition disputes it; the crossing from Pembrokeshire into Ceredigion at this point follows naturally from a hunt already moving north-east along the coast from Preseli.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeManian-Fawr, Round Barrow, a round barrow, 2.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Pwyll's chief court, the seat he sets out from to hunt at Glyn Cuch and the place he returns to sit on the Gorsedd and see Rhiannon; here Pryderi is born and here Rhiannon serves her seven years' penance at the horseblock by the gate.

where I put itThe Welsh name survives unbroken in the modern town of Narberth, whose castle occupies the same defensible spur named as Pwyll's court throughout the First and Third Branches; the identification is not disputed in the scholarship and the town has been a recognised commote centre since at least the twelfth century.

nearest NeolithicPenblewin Neolithic site, a settlement, 2.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeNewhouse, Barrow I, a round barrow, 5.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

The four cantrevs Pryderi adds to Dyfed and Ystrad Tywi, completing the Seven Cantrevs of Seissyllwch.

where I put itThe tale's "four Cantrevs of Cardigan" map directly onto historic Ceredigion, whose name and approximate bounds have persisted since the early medieval period into the modern county of the same name; the identification is uncontested in the scholarship on early Welsh territorial units, and no rival district has ever been proposed for it.

nearest NeolithicCerrig Clochesti, Cist, a cist, 5.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeWaun Clawdd, Cairn I, a cairn, 4.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 6 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

The boar's first stand, where he killed four of Arthur's champions and then, in a second stand on the same ground, Arthur's own son Gwydre.

where I put itFoel Cwmcerwyn, the highest summit of Preseli, and the combe below it still carry the name, and Rhys's identification is standard in every later study of the hunt; Bronze Age cairns crown the summit itself, giving the episode a monument-rich setting whether or not the naming is coincidence, and no rival location has been proposed.

nearest NeolithicMynydd Bach, Possible Prehistoric Enclosure, a enclosure, 2.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 9 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFoel Cwm-Cerwyn II - IV, Cairns, a cairn, 0.1 km away. 2 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 18 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891); Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where Grugyn Gwrych Ereint went after parting from the main hunt at Llwch Tawy, before pressing on north into Ceredigion, the last stage the tale gives him before he drops out of the story unkilled.

where I put itThe name means simply the fort on the Tywi, and Bromwich and Evans leave it otherwise unfixed; Dinefwr, the Iron Age hillfort later refounded as the seat of the kings of Deheubarth at Llandeilo, is the obvious candidate on etymological grounds alone, since it is the one major fortified site of that description on the river's course, but the tale gives no further detail to confirm it and no editor claims the match as secure.

the disputeThe identification with Dinefwr is an inference from the name's meaning rather than a documented equation, and it remains unconfirmed in the scholarship.

nearest NeolithicGaer Fawr Y;Carn Goch Cairn Long Cairn, a cairn, 8.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBurnt Mound, Caeglas, a burnt mound, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where two more of the boar's young, Banw and Bennwig, were killed, leaving only Grugyn and Llwydawg alive of the whole brood.

where I put itDyffryn Amanw is simply the valley of the Aman below the mountain of the same name, now Cwm Aman around Glanaman and Garnant, and the reading follows directly from Mynydd Amanw named a sentence earlier in the text; the valley's continuous settlement history since the tale was written gives the identification an unusually short chain of transmission for this stretch of the itinerary.

nearest NeolithicBurial Chamber near Carn Llechart, Mynydd Carnllechart, Pontardawe, a chambered tomb, 7.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePen-y-Coed Maen Hir, Standing Stone, a standing stone, 2.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 5 within 3 and 24 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

Where all Arthur's huntsmen but one were killed by two of the boar's offspring, Grugyn Gwallt Ereint and Llwydawg Govynnyad, before Twrch Trwyth himself came to their aid.

where I put itThe river Llychwr, the modern Loughor, gives its name to the valley running from Ammanford down to Pontarddulais, and the identification of the text's Dyffryn Llychwr with this valley is unanimous in the scholarship; only the precise point of the ambush within the valley's length is unrecoverable, which is why the record sits at probable rather than certain.

nearest NeolithicGraig Fawr Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 6.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBrownhill Round Barrow, a round barrow, 4.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 8 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where Llwydawg Govynnyad fought and killed Rhudfyw Rhys and other men, one of the boar's offspring's last stands before Ystrad Yw.

where I put itA hill called Garth Grugyn survives in the Ceredigion countryside near Llanilar, and the coincidence with the piglet's own name Grugyn Gwallt Ereint has long been noted; but the district was also home to Eli, one of the two huntsmen the text names as pursuing the boar into Ceredigion, in the nearby place name Garth Eli, so the naming pattern may run in more than one direction and the precise hill meant by the tale is not established beyond doubt.

the disputeThe exact position of Garth Grugyn is, in Rhys's own words, still uncertain, and the coincidence of naming with the character Grugyn may be folk etymology rather than evidence.

nearest NeolithicLlanilar Bronze Age Cemetery; Gwarfelin, Llanilar Schoolfield Urn Burials, a settlement, 0.7 km away. 1 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeLlanilar Bronze Age Cemetery; Gwarfelin, Llanilar Schoolfield Urn Burials, a settlement, 0.7 km away. 1 within 1 km, 5 within 3 and 9 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

Pwyll's hunting ground at the tale's opening, where he loses his own hounds to those of Arawn and strikes the bargain that sends him to Annwfn for a year; the same valley is where Arawn meets him again to close the exchange.

where I put itThe river name Cuch survives directly as the Afon Cych, which still marks the county boundary and gives its name to the hamlet of Cwmcych; Ifor Williams's notes to Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi accept the identification without reservation, and the valley's dense woodland matches the tale's description of a hunting ground on the edge of Pwyll's own dominions.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePengelli Fawr, Mound, a round barrow, 4.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 5 within 5.

in the TriadsTriad 26, Three Powerful Swineherds of the Island of Britain, names the place.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the First Branch

Where the warriors ranged themselves on both banks of the Nyfer before the hunt moved up onto the ridge and closed at Cwm Cerwyn.

where I put itThe river Nyfer, now the Nevern, gives its name to the village of Nevern and to the historic cantref divisions of Uwch Nyfer and Is Nyfer, and it runs along the northern foot of Preseli; Rhys's reading of the text's two banks of the Nyfer as this valley is followed by Bromwich and Evans, though no single settlement is named as the mustering point.

nearest NeolithicTrefael Burial Chamber, a site of another kind, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 9 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeRound Barrows Northeast of Dryslwyn, a round barrow, 2.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 7 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

Where the hunters and the dogs lost the boar's trail entirely, the one place in the itinerary where the chase goes cold.

where I put itRhys read Glyn Ystu as Clyn Ystun, a farm name he placed between Carmarthen and the junction of the Amman with the Llychwr near Drefach, and found support in a 1609 survey of the lordship of Carnwyllion describing land of a similar name on the east side of the Gwendraeth Fawr; the identification rests on a chain of later documentary spellings rather than an unbroken name, so it stays a candidate rather than a certainty, fittingly for the one stretch of the story where the tale itself says the trail was lost.

the disputeThe 1609 survey evidence is suggestive rather than conclusive, and no modern place bears the name directly.

nearest NeolithicMynydd Llangyndeyrn, Burial Chambers, a chambered tomb, 4.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeMynydd Llangyndern V, Cairn, a cairn, 4.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

The mound above Pwyll's palace where sitting brings either a wound or a wonder; here he first sees Rhiannon ride by uncatchable, and here she finally consents to stop and speak.

where I put itLocal and antiquarian tradition, followed by Bollard and Griffiths' field survey, places the throne mound at Camp Hill, an Iron Age hillslope enclosure a short walk from Narberth Castle and still visible as an earthwork in a private field; the mound's proximity to the certain site of Arberth itself is the strongest argument for it, but the enclosure has not been excavated to confirm any continuity with the tale's gorsedd, so the precise earthwork intended remains an informed guess rather than a settled fact.

the disputeThe enclosure has never been excavated, so its identity with the tale's mound rests on proximity and tradition rather than confirmed archaeology.

nearest NeolithicPenblewin Neolithic site, a settlement, 3.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeNewhouse, Barrow I, a round barrow, 5.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

sourcesBollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006); Coflein, Camp Hill Enclosure, Narberth (NPRN 304260)

The fair and regal spot overlooking the ocean where the seven and Bran's head spend eighty years of feasting and forgetting, the Entertaining of the Noble Head, until the closed door facing Cornwall is opened.

where I put itThe Welsh name Ynys Gwales survives directly as the island of Grassholm off the Pembrokeshire coast, and the text's own "Gwales in Penvro" ties it to Penfro, the historic name for Pembrokeshire, which together make Grassholm the dominant scholarly identification; a minority of commentators note that Grassholm has no fresh water and no view of the mainland, both awkward against a text that implies habitability and a door with something to look through, though no rival island has been seriously proposed in its place.

the disputeGrassholm has no fresh water and the mainland is not visible from it, both awkward for the tale's description, though no alternative island has been agreed on in its place.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze Agenone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Coflein, Grassholm Island (NPRN 404206)

The rival candidate for the stand at which Echel Fordwytwll and Garwyli son of Gwyddog Gwyr were killed, a lost bog pool on the south side of the Amman valley.

where I put itRhys proposed that Llwch Ewin survived as a bog mere he found marked above a farmhouse called Llwch on the southern slope of the Amman valley near Bettws, though the map he consulted named the same feature Llwch is Awel, pool below the breeze, which weakens the onomastic link considerably; Bromwich and Evans call the evidence thin and prefer other candidates, recorded as the alternate to this entry.

the disputeRhys's own source names the pool differently from the reading he builds on, and Bromwich and Evans regard the identification as unconvincing.

nearest NeolithicGraig Fawr Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 6.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePen-y-Cwar Cairn, a round barrow, 3.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 13 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

Where Arthur overtook the boar again and lost two more men, Echel Fordwytwll and Garwyli son of Gwyddog Gwyr, one of several candidate waters proposed for this stage of the chase.

where I put itBromwich and Evans set out several candidates for Llwch Ewin without preferring one: Llangadog castle, previously recorded as Castell Luchewein; Llyn Llech Owain on the ridge above Gorslas; the Black Mountain generally; or a point west of the mouth of the Wye. Llyn Llech Owain is the strongest of these on onomastic grounds, since Ewin and Owain are close enough in form to have been confused in transmission, but the case remains circumstantial and the alternate record below carries the field's other leading guess.

the disputeRhys instead proposed a lost bog pool above a farm called Llwch in the parish of Bettws in the Amman valley, a reading Bromwich and Evans call thin; see the alternate record.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeY Naw Carreg, a stone circle, 4.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where the first of the boar's own young, Twrch Llawin and Gwys, were killed once Arthur's dogs finally caught up with the whole herd.

where I put itRhys read Amanw as the river and district name Aman, still current in Brynamman and the Amman valley on the Carmarthenshire side of the Black Mountain, and later editors have not moved from this reading; the upland rather than a single summit is what the text seems to intend, so the record sits on the high ground above Brynamman rather than at a named peak.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeNant Melyn Round Barrow, a round barrow, 0.8 km away. 1 within 1 km, 7 within 3 and 27 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891); Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where Arthur mustered on hearing that the boar had landed, a short ride from Porth Clais and named in the same breath as the landfall.

where I put itMynyw is the Welsh name for St Davids, Latinised as Menevia in the see's own medieval records, and the identification is not disputed; the text names it as the place from which Arthur set out once word reached him of the boar's landing, tying the muster directly to the cathedral settlement rather than to any other point on this stretch of coast.

nearest NeolithicClegyr Boia, a settlement, 1.5 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 5 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePont Crug-Glas, Barrow;Pen-y-Bont, Barrow, a round barrow, 6.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bollard & Griffiths, Companion Tales to the Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (Gomer Press, 2007)

Where Arthur overtook the boar after Cwm Cerwyn and lost three more men, Madog son of Teithion among them.

where I put itPelumyawc is read as Peuliniog, a lost medieval commote that Rhys places between Llanddewi Velfrey, Henllan Amgoed and Laugharne, roughly the parishes of Whitland and Llandysilio; the commote has left no surviving settlement of that name, so the location is Rhys's inference from later administrative boundaries rather than a fixed point, and Bromwich and Evans do not improve on it.

the disputeRhys's reconstruction of Peuliniog's bounds is itself provisional, built from later manorial and parish evidence rather than any securely dated medieval source.

nearest NeolithicPenblewin Neolithic site, a settlement, 3.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeLlangan, Plough-Levelled Round Barrow (Ring Ditch), a round barrow, 2.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 3 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Rhŷs, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Clarendon Press, 1891)

The point on the Pembrokeshire coast where Twrch Trwyth and his seven young pigs come ashore from Ireland, opening the long chase that runs the length of south Wales to the Severn.

where I put itPorth Clais is the small tidal inlet immediately south-west of St Davids, at the mouth of the Alun, and the name survives unchanged from the tale to the modern harbour; Melville Richards' onomastic work and the standard edition by Bromwich and Evans place the boar's landfall here without dispute, and the adjoining Mynyw named in the same sentence confirms the district independently.

nearest NeolithicClegyr Boia, a settlement, 1.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 5 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePont Crug-Glas, Barrow;Pen-y-Bont, Barrow, a round barrow, 7.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

The upland ridge Twrch Trwyth crossed after Aber Gleddyf, and the high ground on which Arthur's hunt closed for the first pitched stand at Cwm Cerwyn.

where I put itThe name Preseleu survives directly as Preseli, the upland range that dominates northern Pembrokeshire, and its identification with the tale's assembly ground has never been disputed; the point given here is Foel Cwmcerwyn, the range's highest and most conspicuous summit. The same hills carry Carn Goedog, the spotted-dolerite outcrop that Bevins, Ixer, Parker Pearson and others have shown to be the principal bluestone quarry for Stonehenge, with quarrying charcoal dated there to around 3000 BC, so the tale's meeting-place sits inside one of the best-dated prehistoric quarry landscapes in Britain.

nearest NeolithicBedd-yr-Afanc, a cairn, 0.8 km away. 1 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 6 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFoel Feddau, Cairn, a cairn, 1.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 8 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

Where the nobles of Dyfed meet Pwyll to press him, gently but insistently, to take a wife who can give him an heir; the meeting that sets Rhiannon's whole story in motion.

where I put itThe name Preseleu survives directly as Preseli, the upland range that dominates northern Pembrokeshire, and its identification with the tale's assembly ground has never been disputed; the point given here is Foel Cwmcerwyn, the range's highest and most conspicuous summit. The same hills carry Carn Goedog, the spotted-dolerite outcrop that Bevins, Ixer, Parker Pearson and others have shown to be the principal bluestone quarry for Stonehenge, with quarrying charcoal dated there to around 3000 BC, so the tale's meeting-place sits inside one of the best-dated prehistoric quarry landscapes in Britain.

nearest NeolithicMynydd Bach, Possible Prehistoric Enclosure, a enclosure, 2.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 9 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFoel Cwm-Cerwyn II - IV, Cairns, a cairn, 0.1 km away. 2 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 18 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Parker Pearson et al., 'Megalith quarries for Stonehenge's bluestones', Antiquity 93 (2019)

Pryderi's own court in this branch, on the north bank of the Teifi, where Gwydion and his eleven false bards are received and where, over one night's storytelling, Gwydion talks Pryderi out of Arawn's swine.

where I put itThe name Rhuddlan Teifi survives directly onto a small hamlet on the Teifi's north bank near Llanwenog, two miles west of Llanybydder, and the identification of this as the court the Fourth Branch means is the standing scholarly view; no excavation has confirmed an actual llys on the ground there, so the precise footprint of Pryderi's hall within the hamlet remains unproven even though the name is secure.

the disputeNo archaeological survey has confirmed a llys site within the hamlet; the identification rests on the onomastic survival rather than excavated remains.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeDerlwyn Round Barrow Cemetery, a round barrow, 3.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the Third and Fourth Branches

The name given to Pryderi's enlarged realm once Dyfed, Ystrad Tywi and Ceredigion are held together as seven cantrevs.

where I put itThe territorial name is real and well attested as Seisyllwg, but Ifor Williams and later commentators note that it belongs properly to the eighth-century political union under Seisyll ap Clydog, who flourished around 730, several centuries after Pryderi's own setting, so its use here reads as the redactor's own anachronistic label for the combined lands rather than a name Pryderi's contemporaries would have used.

the disputeIfor Williams treats the name as an anachronism, an eighth-century political term retrojected onto Pryderi's earlier realm.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeDerlwyn Round Barrow Cemetery, a round barrow, 0.8 km away. 1 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 5 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the First Branch

The three cantrevs Pryderi adds to his seven, part of the enlarged realm that becomes Seissyllwch.

where I put itYstrad Tywi, the valley of the river Tywi, is one of the best-attested territorial names in early Welsh administrative geography and its extent through Carmarthenshire is not in question; the identification is textual, philological and cartographic all at once, and no rival location has ever been proposed.

nearest NeolithicFfynnon Newydd Henge, a henge, 4.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeGlyn Myrddin Mound 2, a round barrow, 0.7 km away. 2 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where the seven survivors bring Branwen ashore from Ireland; here she looks back and forth between the two devastated islands, breaks her heart with grief and is buried in a four-sided grave on the riverbank.

where I put itThe river name Alaw survives directly as the Afon Alaw, which still enters the sea on the north-west coast of Anglesey within the historic commote of Talybolion, exactly as the text describes; the identification of the estuary itself is not in dispute, though the precise spot of Branwen's grave on its banks is a separate question, addressed under Bedd Branwen.

nearest NeolithicTrefignath Burial Chamber, a chambered tomb, 4.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeMaen Hir Standing Stone, North-West of Tregwehelydd, a standing stone, 4.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

A second, rival tradition for Pryderi's grave, naming the spot Aber Gwenoli rather than the churchyard stone at Maentwrog.

where I put itThe early Stanzas of the Graves, preserved in the Black Book of Carmarthen, locate Pryderi's grave at Aber Gwenoli, a spot within Coed Felenrhyd near the site of the later Maentwrog hydroelectric power station rather than at the parish church; this is an older and textually independent tradition beside the churchyard stone, but the two cannot both be right, and neither has been confirmed by excavation, so the grade for each candidate is possible.

the disputeRival to the St Twrog's churchyard stone tradition; the Stanzas of the Graves and the churchyard identification cannot both mark the same grave, and neither is confirmed archaeologically.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCairns, y Gryn, a cairn, 3.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 7 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ywain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020)

The point from which Matholwch and Branwen embark for Ireland with thirteen ships after the second night's feasting at Aberffraw.

where I put itAbermenai Point, the sand spit at the western mouth of the Menai Strait, carried the principal ferry crossing to the mainland from at least the eleventh century, recorded under Gruffudd ap Cynan, and its name is a plain survival of the tale's Aber Menei; because the spit is a shifting sandbank rather than a fixed structure, its exact historical extent has moved over the centuries, which is why the identification is graded probable rather than certain.

nearest NeolithicNeolithic activity at Dinas Dinlle, a site of another kind, 5.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBuried Soil, possible Burnt Mound, Dinas Dinlle, a burnt mound, 5.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

The place chosen for Branwen's wedding to Matholwch, where the two hosts feast under tents because no house could ever contain Bendigeidfran.

where I put itAberffraw was the chief royal seat of the kings of Gwynedd from at least the ninth century until the thirteenth, and its identification with the tale's wedding site has never been questioned; excavation in 1957 and 1959 on the traditional llys field found only the remains of a later farmstead, so the medieval court's exact footprint is unconfirmed even though the place itself is certain.

the disputeThe 1957–59 excavation on the traditional llys field found only an eighteenth-century farmstead, so the precise footprint of the medieval court is unconfirmed.

nearest NeolithicBarclodiad y Gawres Burial Chamber ;'The Giantess's Apronful', Aberffraw, a chambered tomb, 3.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeTrwyn Du Cairn near Aberffraw, Overlying A Mesolithic Site, a cairn, 1.0 km away. 1 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Coflein, Aberffraw, Traditional Site of Llys (NPRN 15012)

The commote in which Harlech stands, named once by the text to place Bran's court precisely within the wider kingdom.

where I put itArdudwy is a securely attested medieval commote of Gwynedd running along the coast from the Traeth Bach to the Mawddach, and its identification with the district the text names is not in question; the name itself survives in modern use for the same stretch of coastline.

nearest NeolithicBron-y-Foel, Burial Chamber, a chambered tomb, 2.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 4 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeMeini Hirion, Llanbedr, Standing Stones, a standing stone, 2.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 18 within 5.

in the TriadsTriad 30, Three Faithless War-Bands of the Island of Britain, names the place.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

The folk-named site of Branwen's grave on the banks of the Alaw, upstream of the river mouth where the text has the seven survivors land and bury her.

where I put itBedd Branwen is a real Bronze Age round cairn, opened when a cremation urn was recovered from a cist in 1813 and properly re-excavated by Frances Lynch in 1967; the cairn yielded eight further urns around a central standing stone, and radiocarbon determinations on material from the cairn ring and the cremations cluster between about 1400 and 1270 BC, many centuries before any plausible historical Branwen. The tale itself specifies only "the banks of the Alaw" and never names this cairn, so its identification with the literary grave is a piece of onomastic folklore attached to a genuine prehistoric monument rather than a location the text pins down itself, which is why the grade here is possible rather than certain or probable.

the disputeThe cairn's radiocarbon dates, roughly 1400 to 1270 BC, are many centuries earlier than any plausible historical setting for the tale, so the name records a folk association rather than a claim the text itself makes.

nearest NeolithicPresaddfed Megalithic Burial Chambers, a chambered tomb, 4.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBedd Branwen - Cairn South-West of Glanalaw, a round barrow, 0.0 km away. 1 within 1 km, 3 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesCoflein, Bedd Branwen Round Cairn, Tref Alaw (NPRN 302327); Lynch, F., 'Report on the re-excavation of two Bronze Age cairns in Anglesey: Bedd Branwen and Treiorwerth', Archaeologia Cambrensis 120 (1971)

Arianrhod's own court, reached by Gwydion and the boy Lleu disguised as shoemakers in a boat of sedges and seaweed, where Lleu is first named and armed against his mother's own curses.

where I put itAn oval reef roughly 450 metres by 215 metres lies about 900 metres off the coast at Llandwrog, exposed only at the lowest spring tides, and has carried the name Caer Arianrhod in local tradition for as long as it has been recorded, which is why Coflein lists it under that name; RCAHMW aerial survey in 2010 found no convincing trace of walling on the reef itself beyond a possible later fish-weir, so while the toponymic identification is effectively unchallenged, the physical court the text describes is folklore rather than confirmed archaeology.

the disputeRCAHMW's 2010 aerial survey found no convincing structural remains on the reef beyond possible fish-weir lines closer to shore; the tale's palace is not archaeologically demonstrated, only the reef's name.

nearest NeolithicNeolithic activity at Dinas Dinlle, a site of another kind, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBuried Soil, possible Burnt Mound, Dinas Dinlle, a burnt mound, 1.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 3 within 3 and 8 within 5.

sourcesBollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006); Coflein, Caer Arianrhod Reef, Llandwrog (NPRN 411089)

Where Bendigeidfran is conferring with his household when Branwen's tamed starling finds him and delivers her letter, its feathers ruffled to show the message bound to its wing.

where I put itCaer Seint is the Roman fort of Segontium, occupied from AD 77 to around 394 and still standing above the river Seiont at Caernarfon, its Welsh name a direct survival of the Roman one; the identification is accepted throughout the scholarship, and the fort's continued visibility as a ruin through the medieval period made it a natural setting for a court scene in the redactor's own imagination.

nearest NeolithicBurial Chamber (Poss), N.E. of Bryn, Felinheli, a chambered tomb, 4.7 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBuarthau, Burnt Mound, a burnt mound, 2.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Coflein, Segontium Roman Fort (NPRN 93511)

The highest town of Arllechwedd, where Gwydion's company finally pens the stolen swine in a hastily built sty before reporting to Math at Caer Dathyl, giving the town its name.

where I put itSir Ifor Williams derived the modern Cororion, a medieval township on the flank of Moel y Ci north-west of Tregarth, from an original Creu-wyrion, which is the very form the text gives; crau is a pig-sty, and the township lies in the uplands of Arllechwedd exactly where the tale puts its highest town of Arllechwedd. Llyn Cororion and the Cororion woodland still carry the name on the modern map. No rival site has been proposed, though nothing on the ground has been excavated to tie the name to a sty, so the grade sits at probable rather than certain.

nearest NeolithicBurial Chamber, Frondeg, a chambered tomb, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCarnedd Howel, Cairn, a cairn, 0.7 km away. 1 within 1 km, 6 within 3 and 17 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ifor Williams, Enwau Lleoedd (1945), on Cororion from Creu-wyrion

The river by which Gronw kills the stag he has been hunting, by which he and Blodeuwedd first meet and on whose bank Lleu is struck down and, a year later, Gronw is killed in his turn.

where I put itThe Afon Cynfal is a real river rising on the Migneint and falling through a sequence of gorges and waterfalls, Rhaeadr y Cwm and Rhaeadr Cynfal among them, before joining the Dwyryd near Maentwrog; its name is an unbroken survival of the tale's Cynvael and its identification with the river along whose bank the whole final act of the Fourth Branch plays out is not in question.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeY Garnedd, Ring Cairn, a cairn, 4.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the Third and Fourth Branches

Where Gwydion brings up Lleu Llaw Gyffes after restoring his form, until he can manage any horse and is perfect in features, strength and stature.

where I put itDinas Dinlle is a substantial Iron Age and Roman-period coastal hillfort, still owned by the National Trust and protected as a scheduled monument, its polygonal double rampart enclosing around four hectares though severe cliff erosion has already removed roughly a fifth of it; the name is a direct, unbroken survival of the tale's Dinas Dinllev and the identification has never been seriously disputed.

nearest NeolithicNeolithic activity at Dinas Dinlle, a site of another kind, 0.2 km away. 1 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBuried Soil, possible Burnt Mound, Dinas Dinlle, a burnt mound, 0.3 km away. 1 within 1 km, 3 within 3 and 7 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Coflein, Dinas Dinlle Hillfort, Llandwrog (NPRN 95309)

The strongest place in Lludd's kingdom, in Snowdon, where he buried the sleeping dragons in their stone chest after their mead-drunk fight in the pit at Oxford; the tale notes it was called Dinas Ffaraon before that day.

where I put itDinas Emrys is the steep wooded hillfort above Beddgelert, and the tale's own aetiology, that the hill changed its name from Dinas Ffaraon once the dragons were hidden there, matches the story told independently in Nennius' ninth-century Historia Brittonum of Vortigern's tower and the prophet Ambrosius, Emrys in Welsh; excavation on the summit in the 1950s found a stone-walled pool and high-status early medieval occupation, giving the identification both textual and archaeological grounding that few places in this atlas can match.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBurnt Mound, N. of Llyn Llagi, a burnt mound, 3.7 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 11 within 5.

in the TriadsTriad 37, Three Fortunate Concealments and Three Unfortunate Disclosures of the Island of Britain, names the place.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Lludd and Llevelys; Coflein, Dinas Emrys (NPRN 95284); Bollard & Griffiths, Companion Tales to the Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (Gomer Press, 2007)

The home in Arfon of Pebin, father of Goewin, Math's footholder; named once, in the single line that introduces her as the fairest maiden of her day.

where I put itThe text places Dôl Pebin in Arfon and nothing more; a farm called Dolbebin is recorded in the Dyffryn Nantlle area close to the Caer Engan hillfort, and local place-name tradition ties it to Goewin's father, but this is an onomastic inference from a surviving farm name rather than a documented identification in the academic apparatus, so it is graded possible.

nearest NeolithicCropmark Enclosure East of Penarth Burial Chamber, a enclosure, 6.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeWest of Bryn-Gwyn-Bach Burnt Mound, a burnt mound, 1.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 7 within 3 and 19 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the Third and Fourth Branches

Where Pryderi's retreating army halts a second time and sues for peace, giving hostages including Gwrgi Gwastra to secure safe passage back toward Dyfed.

where I put itThe name survives unbroken as Dolbenmaen, a village on the Afon Dwyfor that was the administrative centre of the commote of Eifionydd until the thirteenth century; a motte still stands south of the village, on a ridge commanding the river ford, and RCAHMW's own account of Pryderi's itinerary follows the retreat along the old track through neighbouring Garndolbenmaen to this same point, matching the text closely enough that the identification is not disputed.

nearest NeolithicCefn-Isaf Burial Chamber; Rhoslan Burial Chamber, a chambered tomb, 3.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeGryn Goch, Cairn, a cairn, 0.6 km away. 1 within 1 km, 7 within 3 and 44 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ywain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020)

The court of Bendigeidfran where the tale opens and the thirteen ships of Matholwch are first sighted from the rock; the seven survivors return here with Bran's head and feast seven years while the birds of Rhiannon sing.

where I put itThe name Harddlech survives unbroken as Harlech, and the rock the text describes Bran sitting on to watch the sea matches the site's own dramatic outcrop, later chosen for exactly that defensibility by Edward I's castle-builders; the identification is accepted without dissent across the scholarship, from Ifor Williams onward.

nearest NeolithicGwern Einion, Burial Chamber, a chambered tomb, 2.7 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeGroes Las Prehistoric Settlement and Fields, a settlement, 1.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 6 within 3 and 11 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Bollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006)

The slab Gronw begs leave to set between himself and Lleu's returning spear cast, which the spear pierces clean through along with Gronw himself, and which the text says still bears the hole.

where I put itA holed stone answering the text's description, roughly a metre by three-quarters of a metre with a hole about an inch across, was recorded on the Cynfal's bank by Frank Ward in 1934 and a stone believed to be the same, or a successor to it, was rediscovered around the turn of this century on a tributary now called Afon Bryn Saeth, where it stands on a farm of the same name; Patrick Ford's scholarly translation notes the tradition, but the stone's own findspot has shifted twice within living memory, so the identification is graded possible rather than probable.

the disputeThe stone identified as Llech Ronw has been reported at two different findspots within living memory, Ward's 1934 location on the Cynfal itself and a later rediscovery on the Bryn Saeth tributary, which weakens any claim to continuous local memory of a single stone.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeY Garnedd, Ring Cairn, a cairn, 3.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

sourcesPatrick K. Ford (trans.), The Mabinogi and Other Medieval Welsh Tales (University of California Press, 2008); Guest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy

The burial place the text gives for Pryderi after his death at Gwydion's hand, above Melenryd.

where I put itA sandstone pillar stands beside the south porch of St Twrog's church at Maentwrog, and local tradition names it Pryderi's grave-marker; but the manuscript reading is Maen Tyuyawc, which Lady Charlotte Guest herself emended to Maen Tyriawc specifically so that it would resemble Maentwrog, a piece of editorial harmonising rather than an independent scholarly identification, so the stone's link to the tale is graded possible and set against the rival tradition recorded at Aber Gwenoli.

the disputeGuest's own emendation of the manuscript's Maen Tyuyawc to Maen Tyriawc was made in order to produce a resemblance to Maentwrog; the identification is partly an artefact of her translation rather than a name independently attested.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCairn, near Cwm Moch, a cairn, 4.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 3 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ywain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020)

One of the two maenors, with Maenor Coed Alun, in which Math's forces make their stand against Pryderi's advance, and later the manor whose swineherd's sow leads Gwydion to the mutilated eagle in the tree.

where I put itRCAHMW's own account of Pryderi's traditional itinerary suggests that Maenor Penardd is the township of that name adjoining Dinas Dinlle, near Caernarfon, which would place the battle and the swineherd's house on the coastal plain of Arfon; the suggestion is offered as plausible rather than proven, and no excavation ties any surviving earthwork there to the tale, so the grade given is possible.

the disputeRCAHMW's own phrasing is that the identification 'has been suggested', not confirmed; no excavated feature at Penardd township is tied to the battle by independent evidence.

nearest NeolithicNeolithic activity at Dinas Dinlle, a site of another kind, 2.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePenbryn Mawr Standing Stone, a standing stone, 1.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 7 within 3 and 12 within 5.

sourcesYwain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020); Guest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy

Where the war is finally settled by single combat, Pryderi's own body against Gwydion's, and where Pryderi is defeated by Gwydion's magic and strength together.

where I put itThe name Melenryd survives as Coed Felenrhyd, the National Trust woodland above the Dwyryd estuary near Maentwrog, and RCAHMW's own account of Pryderi's traditional itinerary places the single combat here on the strength of that survival; the general stretch of ground is agreed, but no feature within the wood has been pinpointed as the fight's own site, which is why the grade sits at probable rather than certain.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCairn, near Cwm Moch, a cairn, 3.6 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 8 within 5.

sourcesYwain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020); Guest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy

The fourth and last named halt of the swine-drove, in the Cantref of Rhos, before the pigs are finally penned at Creuwyrion in Arllechwedd.

where I put itA village called Mochdre stands to the west of Colwyn Bay, within the historic bounds of the cantref of Rhos, one of the Four Cantrefs of the Perfeddwlad that the text names precisely; as with the drove's other named halts the identification rests on the direct survival of the name rather than on independent record, but the geography of the drove's route north makes the sequence internally consistent.

nearest NeolithicLlandudno Burial Chamber; Llety'r Filiast Chambered Tomb, a cairn, 7.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeGerddi Mound, a round barrow, 3.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 5 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Lleu's own court once Math grants him the cantref of Dinodig, on the confines of Ardudwy; the palace Blodeuwedd rules in his absence, and where Gwydion musters Gwynedd's host before marching to avenge him.

where I put itMur y Castell survives as Tomen y Mur, a Roman auxiliary fort of the late first century on a spur above Llyn Trawsfynydd, its earthwork defences later reused as the outer enclosure of a Norman motte; the double occupation, Roman fort beneath medieval castle, gives the site an unusually legible field presence for a Mabinogi court, and Bollard and Griffiths photograph it directly as Lleu's palace with no serious rival proposed.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCwm Moch, Cairn II, a cairn, 4.2 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Bollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006)

Where Pryderi's routed men are pursued and slaughtered a second time after the fighting at the two maenors, before the survivors fall back again to Dol Pen Maen to sue for peace.

where I put itThe retreat the text describes runs from the coastal plain near Dinas Dinlle south-east toward Dolbenmaen, and RCAHMW's account of the episode places the fighting along an old trackway on that line; a stream called Nant Cyll north of Porthmadog has been proposed as the modern survival of the name, but the identification depends on a name-change too small to be certain and no independent record confirms it, so the grade is possible.

the disputeThe proposed match with Nant Cyll depends on a minor sound-change from Call and is not corroborated by an independent source; RCAHMW itself gives only the general line of retreat, not a named stream.

nearest NeolithicCropmark Enclosure East of Penarth Burial Chamber, a enclosure, 5.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCairn, Cwmbran, a cairn, 0.9 km away. 1 within 1 km, 12 within 3 and 33 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ywain Tomos, 'On the Trail of Pryderi, King of Dyfed', RCAHMW (27 October 2020)

The brook a sow leads Gwydion up, against the current, to the tree where the mutilated eagle that is Lleu sheds putrid flesh for her to eat below.

where I put itThe text derives the brook's name transparently from Lleu himself, Nant y Llew, and the modern valley and village of Nantlle, with its lake and slate-quarrying history, is the accepted survival of that name; as with the other onomastic endings of the Four Branches the tale supplies its own explanatory legend for a real place-name, which is why the grade sits at probable, tying a genuinely old name to the specific literary derivation the text offers rather than to an independently attested etymology.

nearest NeolithicNeolithic activity at Dinas Dinlle, a site of another kind, 7.7 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeEast of Bryn-Llidiard Cairn, a cairn, 1.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 6 within 3 and 16 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Sioned Davies (trans.), The Mabinogion (Oxford World's Classics, 2007), explanatory notes to the Third and Fourth Branches

The lordship of Gronw Pebyr, out hunting the stag whose pursuit first brings him to Lleu's court, and the land he withdraws to after killing Lleu, and to which he returns once more before the final reckoning.

where I put itPenllyn is a securely attested medieval cantref centred on Llyn Tegid and the town of Bala, originally reckoned to Powys before its annexation to Gwynedd, and its territorial extent is not in dispute in the scholarship on early Welsh administrative units; the identification of the tale's lordship of Gronw with this cantref is equally uncontested.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBoncyn Crwn, a cairn, 4.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

The commote in which Matholwch is finally paid the last of the colts owed for his mutilated horses, giving the district its name in the tale's own telling, and where the seven later land with Branwen's body at Aber Alaw.

where I put itTalybolion is a securely attested medieval commote of the hundred of Cemais in north-west Anglesey, its parishes including Llanfachraeth and Llanfwrog, and the tale's own explanatory aside, that the district was named for the payment made there, is the kind of onomastic tale-within-a-tale typical of the Four Branches; the name's survival into the modern commote is not disputed.

nearest NeolithicPresaddfed Megalithic Burial Chambers, a chambered tomb, 2.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeMaen Hir Standing Stone, North-West of Tregwehelydd, a standing stone, 0.6 km away. 1 within 1 km, 3 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where the two armies, marching in peace after the hostages are given, cannot restrain their foot soldiers from shooting at one another as they approach Melenryd.

where I put itTraeth Mawr, 'the great strand', was the wide tidal estuary of the Glaslyn separating Eifionydd from Ardudwy until William Madocks's embankment, the Cob, reclaimed some seven thousand acres of it between 1807 and 1811; the crossing was proverbially dangerous, guided by local knowledge across quicksand between Borth-y-Gest and Penrhyndeudraeth, and its identification with the tale's named strand between Dol Pen Maen and Felenrhyd is uncontested.

nearest NeolithicCist Cerrig Cup-Marked Outcrop and Rock Exposures, a site of another kind, 4.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFach-Goch, Standing Stone, a standing stone, 1.8 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 3 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where Caradawc son of Bran and the six other guardians are left to keep the Island of the Mighty while Bran sails for Ireland, and where Caswallawn, hidden under the Veil of Illusion, kills six of them and breaks Caradawc's heart with grief.

where I put itEdeyrnion survives directly as Edeirnion, the vale of the upper Dee around Corwen, a commote of the cantref of Penllyn whose name and approximate bounds are not disputed in the territorial scholarship; its allegiance shifted between the kingdoms of Powys and Gwynedd across the medieval centuries, but the place itself, and its identification with the tale's named district, is secure.

nearest NeolithicTan-y-Coed, Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 5.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeRug Castle Mound & Prehistoric Funerary Monument, a round barrow, 3.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 7 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where Grugyn Gwrych Ereint broke away from the rest of the hunt and made for Din Tywi, while the main chase moved on into Ceredigion.

where I put itBromwich and Evans note that a survey of 1584-5 records the source of the Tawe as Llyn Llwch Towe, in Brecon, an old name for what is now called Llyn y Fan Fawr on the northern scarp of Fforest Fawr; the documentary chain from the sixteenth-century survey to the tale's Llwch Tawy is short and specific enough to carry the identification past the merely possible.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeTwr-y-Fan Foel, Cairn, a round barrow, 0.8 km away. 1 within 1 km, 19 within 3 and 52 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

The second night's halt on the swine-drove, reached through Maelienydd, and named because it lay, the text says, between Kerry and Arwystli.

where I put itA village still called Mochdre stands three miles south-west of Newtown, on the historic boundary between the commotes of Kerry and Arwystli exactly as the text describes, and the match of both name and description is the strongest kind of onomastic evidence the Four Branches offer; no rival site has been proposed, though the identification rests on the surviving name rather than an excavated or otherwise independently dated settlement.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeBryn Gwyn, Cairn II, a cairn, 2.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 3 within 3 and 12 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (1930), notes to the Third and Fourth Branches

The third night's halt, a named commote of Powys where the swine-drove rests before turning for the Cantref of Rhos.

where I put itMochnant is a securely attested medieval commote of Powys, its clas church and administrative centre at Llanrhaeadr-ym-Mochnant, later split by the Afon Rhaeadr between Denbighshire and Montgomeryshire until the 1996 reorganisation reunited it in Powys; the tale's own aetiology, that the commote took its name from the swine that passed through, is the kind of onomastic legend typical of the Four Branches, attached here to a genuinely old and well-documented territorial name.

nearest NeolithicPlas Du, Parallel Linear Ditches (Possible Cursus), a enclosure, 2.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePost Coch; Post-y-Wiber; Erw-y-Garreg, Standing Stone, a standing stone, 1.9 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 12 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Math the Son of Mathonwy; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where Llwydawg Govynnyad was finally killed after slaying the king of Brittany and two of Arthur's uncles, the last of the boar's offspring to fall.

where I put itYstrad Yw is a historic commote of Brycheiniog whose name survives directly in the parish of Llanbedr Ystrad Yw near Tretower and Crickhowell, and the identification has never been in dispute; Melville Richards' territorial survey confirms the commote's bounds independently of the tale, giving this stand in the hunt one of the most securely placed locations in the whole itinerary.

nearest NeolithicBlack Mountains Finds XI, a site of another kind, 3.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 5 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgePentir: Cairn I, a cairn, 1.5 km away. 0 within 1 km, 27 within 3 and 44 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units: Medieval and Modern (University of Wales Press, 1969)

The lair of Twrch Trwyth and his seven piglets in Ireland: the ridge Menw scouts in bird form and is poisoned at, where the men of Ireland fight the boar for a day, Arthur's household for a second and Arthur himself for nine days and nights, before Gwrhyr parleys with Grugyn Gwrych Ereint.

where I put itCulhwch names Esgair Oerfel three times as a fixed point of Irish geography, far enough off to anchor a boast about a shout carrying from Cornwall to the north of Britain and to Ireland alike. Sims-Williams reads the second element as reflecting Irish uarbél, a cold gap or cold mouth, and proposes an equation with the townland of Windgates near Delgany in Co. Wicklow, an English rendering of a lost Irish name of similar sense; the wider Irish place name Seiscenn Uarbeoil, a boggy tract in Leinster, has also been linked to the tale's Irish-derived boar-hunt material.

the disputeThe Windgates equation is Sims-Williams's own onomastic proposal rather than a settled consensus; other commentators leave Esgair Oerfel as an unlocated Leinster bog, and the name may work as a rhetorical far corner of Ireland as much as a real fixed point.

nearest NeolithicMegalithic tomb - unclassified, a chambered tomb, 7.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFulacht fia, a burnt mound, 0.7 km away. 3 within 1 km, 8 within 3 and 32 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Sims-Williams, 'The Irish geography of Culhwch and Olwen', in Sages, Saints and Storytellers: Celtic Studies in Honour of Professor James Carney (1989), pp. 412-426; Sims-Williams, Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature (2011)

The river the Irish retreat behind and break the bridge over once Bendigeidfran's fleet reaches shoal water, forcing him to lay his own body across it so hurdles can be laid over him and the host walk across.

where I put itGuest renders the name Linon; the modern normalised Llinon is generally read as the Liffey, Dublin's An Life, the obvious defensive line for a retreating Irish court once a Welsh fleet has made landfall on the coast facing Wales. Ifor Williams's edition of Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi treats this as the most economical reading of the tale's own internal geography, and the identification is repeated by Bromwich and by later commentators including Breeze, though it rests on narrative logic and onomastic plausibility rather than a documented medieval place-name equation.

the disputeA minority reading takes Linon for the Shannon instead of the Liffey; the Shannon lies on Ireland's west coast, which sits awkwardly with a fleet crossing the narrow sea from Wales, and this is the chief argument scholars set against it.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeReligious house - Cistercian monks, a cist, 0.6 km away. 3 within 1 km, 4 within 3 and 6 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (Caerdydd: Gwasg Prifysgol Cymru, 1930); Sims-Williams, Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature (2011), ch. 'The Irish Geography of Branwen'; Breeze, The Origins of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi (Gracewing, 2009), ISBN 9780852445532

Offered by a minority reading as the river the Irish retreat behind and break the bridge over, rather than the Liffey.

where I put itThe Shannon is Ireland's longest river and the obvious candidate for a storyteller's idea of Ireland's great water barrier, and this reading survives as an alternate in general and popular retellings of the tale. Against it stands the crossing itself: a fleet sailing the short sea from Aberffraw or Caer Seiont would make landfall on Ireland's east coast, nowhere near the Shannon's west-coast estuary, which is why specialist commentary on the Second Branch's Irish geography prefers the Liffey.

the disputeThe dominant scholarly reading favours the Liffey; the Shannon persists chiefly in general retellings rather than in specialist onomastics.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeFulacht fia, a burnt mound, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 8 within 3 and 31 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi (Caerdydd: Gwasg Prifysgol Cymru, 1930); Wicipedia Cymraeg, 'Afon Shannon' - 'Mae'n debyg mai'r afon yma yw Afon Llinon y cyfeirir ati yn chwedl Branwen ferch Llyr'

The mound at the head of a lake in Ireland from which Llasar Llaesgyfnewid emerges with the cauldron of rebirth on his back, fleeing with his wife Cymidei Cymeinfoll before Matholwch's people burn them out of the iron house.

where I put itMatholwch names the feature precisely in his own account to Bendigeidfran, the mound at the head of the lake which is called the Lake of the Cauldron, but gives no further Irish geography to fix it. Scholars have nonetheless hunted the name through medieval Irish sources, and Sims-Williams finds only two candidates: a Loch Cori in an eleventh-century poem on the lakes of Slieve Aughty in Co. Galway, possibly a scribal error for Loch nGaire, and a Loch nGualai at Devenish on Lower Lough Erne, which Whitley Stokes equated with Branwen's Lake of the Cauldron and which Sims-Williams calls the better of the two. The Book of Leinster sagas hide Conchobar's vast vat, the Iarnguala or Iron Abyss, in that lake and derive the lake's name from it, which supplies the Welsh tale with exactly what it needs: an eponymous vessel beneath an Irish water.

the disputeSims-Williams rejects Stokes's etymology, deriving Loch nGualai from Middle Irish guala 'pit, abyss' rather than any word for a cauldron, so the equation rests on the sunken vessel and not on the name itself; the rival Loch Cori of Slieve Aughty is the other candidate and the whole episode may be aetiology for the cauldron of rebirth rather than located geography.

nearest Neolithicnone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

nearest Bronze Agenone within 5 km. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 0 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Sims-Williams, The Iron House in Ireland (H.M. Chadwick Memorial Lecture 16, Cambridge, 2005), pp. 8-10; Sims-Williams, Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature (2011), ch. 'Llasar and the Lake of the Cauldron'

Lludd's own city, whose walls he rebuilt and encircled with towers, and where he watched by a vessel of cold water through the third plague to catch the magician who stole his food and drink.

where I put itThe tale gives its own explicit etymology, that the city was called Caer Lludd for the king who dwelt there most of the year and at last Caer London, which the stranger-race turned into London or Lwndrys, and no scholar disputes that the tale's capital is the city on the Thames; the story functions almost as a foundation legend for the name itself, tying Lludd's rebuilding of the walls directly to the place's later English name.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Lludd and Llevelys; Bollard & Griffiths, Companion Tales to the Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (Gomer Press, 2007)

The ground between the Tawe and Ewyas where the boar was finally headed off, driving him toward Arthur's last stand at the Severn.

where I put itEwyas was a Welsh-speaking cantref straddling the modern border, its name preserved in Ewyas Harold and Ewyas Lacy in Herefordshire's Golden Valley, and though the territory now sits wholly in England the identification of the historic Ewyas is secure; which of its several parishes the tale intends for the boar's last crossing of Welsh ground is not specified, so the record sits at probable rather than certain.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units: Medieval and Modern (University of Wales Press, 1969)

The White Mount, where Bran commands that his head be buried facing France, and where the seven finally lay it after eighty years at Gwales and a broken door.

where I put itMedieval and later Welsh tradition fixes the White Mount beneath the Tower of London; the Triads' account of the Three Fortunate Concealments and Three Unfortunate Disclosures goes only so far as hiding Bran's head in the White Hill in London, and the association with the Tower's own mound has been repeated continuously enough, not least through the later folklore of the Tower ravens, to count as the dominant identification; but the Tower itself was built by the Normans centuries after the tale's own setting, and no excavation has confirmed a prehistoric mound beneath it, so the identification remains traditional rather than demonstrated.

the disputeNo excavation has confirmed a prehistoric mound beneath the Tower of London; the identification rests on continuous literary and folk tradition rather than physical evidence.

in the TriadsTriad 37, Three Fortunate Concealments and Three Unfortunate Disclosures of the Island of Britain, names the place.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Bromwich, Trioedd Ynys Prydein, no. 37, Three Fortunate Concealments and Three Unfortunate Disclosures

The first English town Manawydan and Pryderi try after the wasting of Dyfed, where Manawydan sets up as a saddler and undersells every saddler in the town, gilding his housings in the blue enamel he learned from Llasar Llaesgywydd, until the saddlers conspire to kill them and the four move on to another town.

where I put itHereford is named outright and its identity is not in question; it was already the seat of a Mercian and then Welsh-marcher bishopric and a working market town by the twelfth century when the Mabinogi was set down in writing, exactly the kind of English craft town the tale needs for Manawydan's saddlery to undercut. The point given is the cathedral quarter, the town's medieval commercial core.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Manawyddan the Son of Llyr; Bollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006)

The city where Mabon son of Modron was found imprisoned, taken from his mother when three nights old; Cai and Bedwyr rode the shoulders of the salmon of Llyn Llyw while Arthur's warriors stormed the castle, and Cai broke through the wall into the dungeon and carried Mabon out on his back.

where I put itKaer Loyw is the standard medieval Welsh name for Gloucester, built on the same root as the Roman Glevum, and Guest translates it directly as Gloucester without comment because no other reading has ever been proposed; the city's Roman and early medieval walls, within which the tale's prison is imagined, still stand in part along the line the Roman fortress laid down.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bollard & Griffiths, Companion Tales to the Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (Gomer Press, 2007)

The seat from which Bendigeidfran is said to be crowned at the tale's opening, and the destination to which the seven survivors finally carry his head to bury at the White Mount.

where I put itThe tale gives its own explicit etymology, that the city was called Caer Lludd for the king who dwelt there most of the year and at last Caer London, which the stranger-race turned into London or Lwndrys, and no scholar disputes that the tale's capital is the city on the Thames; the story functions almost as a foundation legend for the name itself, tying Lludd's rebuilding of the walls directly to the place's later English name.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Branwen the Daughter of Llyr; Bollard & Griffiths, The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006)

Where Lludd, having measured the length and breadth of the Island of Britain, found the exact central point and dug the pit in which he set a cauldron of the best mead under a covering of satin; the two fighting dragons fell onto the satin, drank the mead and slept, which ended the second plague.

where I put itThe tale names Oxford outright as the geometric centre of Britain where Lludd dug his pit, and there is no dispute that the tale's Oxford is the city of that name; whether medieval Britain was in fact measured that way is a separate question from the identification of the place itself, which the text states plainly rather than leaving it to inference.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Lludd and Llevelys; Bollard & Griffiths, Companion Tales to the Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (Gomer Press, 2007)

The second boundary marker of the final stand in the Severn, where Mabon son of Modron rode the boar down and took his razor.

where I put itAber Gwy is simply the mouth of the Wye where it joins the Severn at Chepstow and Beachley, a name unchanged in Welsh from the tale to the present day, and no editor has ever proposed an alternative; paired with Llyn Lliwan in the same sentence, it fixes the finale of the hunt to this specific reach of the estuary rather than leaving it, as so much of the itinerary does, only loosely placed.

nearest NeolithicThornwell Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 1.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeThornwell Round Barrow, a round barrow, 1.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 2 within 3 and 4 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich & Evans, Culhwch and Olwen: An Edition and Study of the Oldest Arthurian Tale (University of Wales Press, 1992)

The older antiquarian candidate for Arthur's Cornish court, resting on the town's Cornish name Callywith.

where I put itCornish antiquarians from the early nineteenth century onward identified Celli Wig with Callington, whose Cornish-language name Callywith was read as a corruption of the same root; the theory gave the modern town its Welsh-facing spelling but has been superseded in most recent scholarship by Bromwich's preference for Kelly Rounds near Egloshayle, recorded as the alternate to this entry.

the disputePadel and later commentators regard the Callington identification as etymologically weaker than Kelly Rounds.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Padel, 'Some South-Western Sites with Arthurian Associations', in Bromwich, Jarman & Roberts (eds.), The Arthur of the Welsh (University of Wales Press, 1991)

Arthur's own court in Cornwall, named at both the opening and the close of the hunt, where he goes to anoint himself and rest once the boar is finally driven into the sea.

where I put itRachel Bromwich, editing the Welsh Triads in which Celli Wig appears as one of the Three Tribal Thrones of Britain, matched the name to Kelly Rounds, the Iron Age hillfort at Killibury in the parish of Egloshayle near Wadebridge, on the strength of the surviving field name; the identification is the scholarly favourite but rests on a single place name surviving into modern estate records rather than continuous attestation, and the alternate record below carries the older antiquarian candidate.

the disputeNo consensus exists; Padel himself treats the site's precise location as unrecoverable from the name alone.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Bromwich, Trioedd Ynys Prydein: The Welsh Triads, triad 1 (Three Tribal Thrones); Padel, 'Some South-Western Sites with Arthurian Associations', in Bromwich, Jarman & Roberts (eds.), The Arthur of the Welsh (University of Wales Press, 1991)

The domain of Teirnyon Twrf Liant, lord of the mare that foals a wondrous colt every May Eve and the man who finds and fosters the infant Pryderi before restoring him to Pwyll and Rhiannon.

where I put itGwent Is Coed, the lowland cantref of Gwent below Wentwood, is a securely attested medieval territorial name centred historically on Caerwent, and no scholar disputes that this is the district meant; what the tale withholds is any more precise seat for Teirnyon's own court within it, so the identification is graded probable on the strength of the surviving territorial name rather than a pinpointed site.

nearest NeolithicHeston Brake Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 4.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 0 within 3 and 1 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeSandy Lane, Mound, a round barrow, 1.4 km away. 0 within 1 km, 6 within 3 and 14 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Pwyll Prince of Dyved; Melville Richards, Welsh Administrative and Territorial Units (1969)

Where Arthur summoned all Cornwall and Devon and made his final stand, forcing Twrch Trwyth into the water and prising the razor and scissors from him between Llyn Lliwan and Aber Gwy.

where I put itThe text places the final battle in the Severn itself, called Hafren throughout medieval Welsh sources, and no edition disputes that the tale's crossing is the modern Severn estuary; the specific stretch is fixed by the two place names either side of it, Llyn Lliwan and Aber Gwy, which anchor it to the reach between Sudbrook and Chepstow rather than to any other point on the long tidal river.

nearest NeolithicThornwell Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 2.0 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeThornwell Round Barrow, a round barrow, 2.1 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 3 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Evans, Nettleship & Perry, 'Linn Liuan/Llynn Llyw: The Wondrous Lake of the Historia Brittonum's de Mirabilibus Britanniae and Culhwch ac Olwen', Folklore 119:3 (2008)

The pool on the Welsh shore of the Severn named as one boundary of the boar's last stand, and independently listed among the marvels of Britain in the Historia Brittonum.

where I put itEvans, Nettleship and Perry's study of the Historia Brittonum's marvels identifies Llyn Lliwan with a lost tidal feature on the Caerwent shore of the Severn, the site locally remembered as the Whirlyholes, and reads the ninth-century Mirabilia's account of the pool's dramatic ebb and flow alongside the tale's own placing of it beside Aber Gwy; the location is well argued rather than certain, since the feature itself is no longer active and its precise historical footprint on the modern shoreline is reconstructed from documentary and place-name evidence.

the disputeBromwich and Evans thought the pool might equally have lain on the Gloucestershire shore; the Caerwent-side identification argued by Evans, Nettleship and Perry is not universally accepted.

nearest NeolithicHeston Brake Chambered Tomb, a chambered tomb, 0.9 km away. 1 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 2 within 5.

nearest Bronze AgeCaldicot Castle Lake, Caldicot (Excavation 1988-92), a site of another kind, 2.3 km away. 0 within 1 km, 1 within 3 and 7 within 5.

sourcesGuest, The Mabinogion, Kilhwch and Olwen; Evans, Nettleship & Perry, 'Linn Liuan/Llynn Llyw: The Wondrous Lake of the Historia Brittonum's de Mirabilibus Britanniae and Culhwch ac Olwen', Folklore 119:3 (2008)