Reconstruction of the Votive offering at Llyn Fawr lake on Craig y Llyn circa 650 BC.
Map reference: SN90SW
Grid Reference: SN9177003470
If you travelled East from the village of Cwmgwrach as the crow flies, for just over 3 miles you would come to the famous Llyn Fawr reservoir. It wasn’t always a reservoir it was once a glacial lake, but was converted to a small reservoir to supply the Rhondda valley with water between 1911/13.
It was made famous when a late Bronze Age / Early Iron Age hoard was discovered while deepening the lake bed when it was being converted into a reservoir. It is one of the most significant prehistoric metalwork hoards to be found in the UK.
Such was the importance of the find that the official name of the start of the Iron Age in Britain (800 – 600 BC) has been named:
`The Llyn Fawr Phase`.
Below I will set out to explain a little bit about the history and context on how and when the lake was formed, its conversion to a small reservoir and the timeline that led to the discovery of the Llyn Fawr hoard within the lake.
Geology of Llyn Fawr (Large Lake) and the surrounding area:
Standing over the village on the Eastern side of the Neath valley is the majestic pennant sandstone plateau of Craig y Llyn (Rock/Cliff of the Lake); it is the highest point of the ancient kingdom of Morgannwg, and the later county of Glamorgan.
It’s highest point stands at 600 m (1969 ft) above sea level, at the locally named Carn Moesau (Pile of morals).
The name Craig y Llyn derives from the sandstone cliffs which drop steeply down to the lake Llyn Fawr and it’s smaller sister Llyn Fach on it’s northern slopes.
Both lakes are true `glacial lakes` with the lake Llyn Fach especially known for its mix of acid bogs and rocky heath which support many flowers, plants and ferns. They are the southernmost glacial lakes to be found in the UK.
The lakes themselves lie in a natural amphitheatre called `glacial cirques`, these cirques are a steep walled bowl shaped depression that have been carved by glacial erosion and when the glacier retreat a lake can form at the bottom.
See illustration :-
Site of Special Scientific Interest:
The slopes of Craig y Llyn around the Llyn Fawr and Llyn Fach area are the only remaining significant unaltered landscapes which form part of the Southern Welsh Hills. The area is also a designated `Site of Special Scientific Interest` (SSSI).
They are designated SSSI’s for two special habitat features. The first habitat feature is `standing water with a low nutrient content` which supports many aquatic plants for example the water lobelia. Some of the plants supported in these waters are to be found the furthest South in the UK. The second habitat feature is `dry heath` which can be found on the slopes above Llyn Fawr and Llyn Fach. These dry heath plants thrive on the screes and upland cliff edges especially some that only flourish out of reach of sheep.
Human activity in the area:
Mesolithic Age: (9000 – 4300 years ago)
Bronze Age: (3300 BC – 1200 BC)
Iron Age: (1200 BC – 550 BC)
It has been estimated that there has been human activity in the Llyn Fawr area from about 8000 years ago. The earliest evidence of human presence were of `chipped stone tools` found at Craig y Llyn in 1963, these stone tools were recorded as being from the Mesolithic, or middle stone age. This and other finds found nearby would suggest seasonal nomadic activity but no Mesolithic structure have been found to date.
Near Llyn Fach a 19th century find of an Iron Age Durotrigian coin was found, which suggests the potential for Iron Age activity at Llyn Fach as well. (Ed note: The Durotriges `fort dwellers` were a Celtic tribe from Dorset, South Wiltshire and the Somerset area prior to the Roman invasion)
To date Llyn Fach has not been investigated, so I wonder what potential finds could be made here in the future?
There is evidence however of later Bronze and Iron Age settlement along the Craig y Llyn escarpment (a long, steep slope, especially one at the edge of a plateau or seperating areas of land at different heights.). Along the escarpment there are four Bronze Age cairns (burial mounds), namely Craig y Pant, Y Foel Chwern, Garn Fach and Garn Foesen. Unfortunately these cairns are now damaged and overgrown and difficult to find.
Then we have Llyn Fawr where the late Bronze Age / Early Iron Age hoard was found, more on that below.
To the North East of the Llyn Fawr there are a further three Bronze Age cairns to be found, namely Twyn Canwyllyr, Craig y Bwlch and Tarren y Bwlch, and in close proximity to these cairns can be found two Iron Age settlements, Tarren y Bwlch and Mynydd Cefngyngon.
There are also three Iron Age Hill-forts to be found within a five mile radius of the Llyn Fawr. One at the Dinas Rock, one at Brynhyfryd Glynneath and one on top of the Resolven mountain half way between Cwmgwrach and Resolven.
Also to be found on the top of Craig y Llyn above Llyn Fawr, is the junction of three Ridgeway tracks. These ridgeway tracks were the motorways of ancient time, as travelling in the valleys was almost impossible due to the dense woodland, brambles, bogs and marshes, wild animals as well as potentially bandits. It has been said that a squirrel could travel from Neath to Pontneddfechan without touching the ground, such was the valley densely populated by trees.
So as you can see from the above there was quite a bit of human activity in the area of Llyn Fawr and the surrounding area around the Bronze and Iron Age time. Human actitivity was mostly on the top of the mountains, as at that time the climate was a few degrees warmer, as shown by trees growing on the top of Craig y Llyn, and as I said above, the valleys were quite inhospitable and dangerous at this time.
Building the Reservoir:
The development of Llyn Fawr glacial lake into a reservoir to serve the Rhondda valley was necessitated as a consequence of the development of the Rhondda coal-field which had grown exponentially in the nineteenth century. Coal was required in vast quantities to feed the American Civil War (1861 – 1865) which led to a massive increase in the population of the Rhondda. In 1811 the population stood at just 576 people, by 1851 it has risen to 951, and by 1901 the population had increased to a staggering 113,735 and rose even further in 1911 to 152,781.
This meant that the river they used to supply drinking water was no longer large enough for the increased population. Therefore in 1909 it was decided to supply water from the neighbouring Neath Valley by tunnelling 1.25 miles under Craig y Llyn and pumping water from Llyn Fawr lake to the Ty’n-y-waun water treatment works at Tynewedd in the Rhondda.
The company A. E. Nunn & Co Ltd were awarded the contract to raise the water level of the lake by 25 feet and work commenced on the 17th May, 1909. The target was to double the size of the lake from 12 acres to 24 acres, which would increase the capacity of the lake to 200 million gallons.
This was achieved by draining the lake, building a 25 foot high embankment on the north-west side of the lake and deepening the lake by removing the peat on the lake bed, the work was completed by 1913. It was during this deepening of the lake bed that the Llyn Fawr hoard was discovered.
Further photogrpahs from the Rhondda Cynon Taf Heritage site of the construction of the reservoir can be seen here.
Finding the Llyn Fawr hoard:
A Mr. T. B. Hughes A.M.Inst.W.F. of the Rhondda U.D.C Waterworks Office says: “The find was made while I was surveying across the old lake after it had been emptied, the surveying chain while being dragged across the surface of the peat was clinking on something metallic. I was curious and went to see what it was and discovered one of the round arm shields Although the depth of the peat was as much as ten feet we did not find any of the implements more than two feet from the surface of the peat.”
The anaerobic, waterlogged and oxygen depleted, peat at the bottom of the lake enabled the finds to be preserved in relatively good condition. In total, between 1911 and 1912, twenty one bronze and iron object were found in the lake.
They included bronze items such as the two large cauldrons, horse harness equipment, crude chisels and axe heads. The iron items found were
A Hallstatt type iron sword, an iron spear and a socketed sickle head with the remains of the wooden handle attached. This mix of Bronze Age and Iron Age artefacts was the first of its kind to be found together in the UK.
The date of the items is uncertain, but the iron items are the earliest to be found in Wales and the iron Hallstatt type sword is thought to date from 650 BC. A number of sickles, chisels, socketed axes, a razor, a spearhead, the sword and the horse harness equipment date from the beginning of the Iron Age (c.750 – 600 BC).
The Iron Age believes were such at the time that they thought that rivers, lakes, and mist shrouded bogs were liminal spaces, (the boundary between) in which it was possible for our world to communicate with the world below the water and hence why they deposited metalwork into their depths as `votive offerings`. They probably believed these offering would give them better weather and harvests.
I have included a better description of some of the finds in a chapter below.
The hoard is now held and displayed at the Museum of Wales in Cardiff (Amgueddfa Cymru).
How did the hoard end up in Llyn Fawr:
There are to possible theories put forward to explain why the hoard was found in Llyn Fawr.
The first is they are the result of a raiding party into the Vale of Glamorgan and were dumped into the lake to be picked up later, but were never retrieved.
The second more plausible explanation was that, like above, they were household goods stolen from a wealthy family in the coastal belt of the Vale of Glamorgan and were subsequently placed in the lake as a `votive offering`, as a sort of contract with their God in return for good harvests and milder winters.
It would have been quite easy for a raiding party to travel to the coastal belt of Glamorgan, as mentioned earlier there are three Ridgeway tracks which converge like (Piccadilly Circus) above Llyn Fawr on the top of Craig y Llyn. You can travel southwards and reach Neath and Margam, 12 miles away, and therefore it was possible to reach the sea without even having to cross a stream.
It has been calculated from seed samples taken from the inside of the cauldron that the hoard was probably placed into the lake in circa 500 BC or at the latest 400 BC.
The Second Cauldron find:
Fifteen years after the original finds at Llyn Fawr the Museum of Wales received a letter from Mr. George Stow who was the director of the company which carried out the engineering work at Llyn Fawr to convert the lake to a reservoir in 1910 – 11.
In the letter he explained that the had in his possession a box which had not been opened for a number of years and contained within was a second cauldron and in the cauldron was a carefully wrapped portion of a sword.
The second cauldron was very similar in size to the first cauldron but with a few design differences. Both cauldrons are designated as `Leeds B type`, and many examples of this type of cauldron can be found in Ireland “which is rich in examples”, one in Scotland, Wales has two but there are none so far found in England.
There is a tale in the Mabinogion which tells of early Celtic traditions.
Matholwch, the Irish king, on a visit to Anglesey, asked his host Bendigaid Fran, a king of Britain; `Lord, whence came to you the cauldron which you have given me?` `It came to me` said he, `from a man who had been to your land; and I know not whether it was there that he found it.` `Who was that?` said he. `Lasser Llaesgyfnewid,` he said, ` and he came from Ireland, and …. His wife with him. And they escaped from an Iron House in Ireland, when it was made white-hot around them, and they escaped therefrom. And it is surprising to me should you know nothing about this.` `I do know lord,` said he, `and as much as I know I will tell you. One day I was hunting in Ireland, on top of a mound which is at the head of a lake in Ireland. And it is called the Lake of the Cauldron. And I beheld a huge, reddish-yellow-haired man coming from the lake with a cauldron upon his back.` Lassar it was.
Mabinogion
Description of some of the items found in the hoard:
Two Cauldrons:
The two bronze cauldrons are probably the most important finds in the hoard and the most difficult to unpick in describing them. Let’s start by saying they were originally from Ireland and probably used as feasting equipment and were regarded as ceremonial possessions and imbedded with deep-rooted symbolic powers of regeneration and fertility.
They were used across Atlantic Europe between 1300 and 600 BC and were made from four sheets of hammered sheets of bronze with a circular base-piece painstakingly riveted together and joined with bossed bronze rivets. The cauldron could be suspended, over a fire or carried, by two circular handles
The first cauldron found was 13.4 inches in height and at the widest point was 21.9 inches in diameter, the circumference of the cauldron was 69.5 inches, therefore you would not be able to put your arms around it, it was that big. The cauldron was capable of holding around 50 litres of stew enough to feed over 100 people.
Hallstatt type sword:
The sword was found in a broken condition although it may have been whole when placed in the lake. It consists of the hilt and hilt plate and a portion of the blade, the pommel for the sword was missing. Dimensionally it fits with other Hallstatt swords that are to be found in the British Museum.
(Ed note: Hallstatt, a lakeside village in the Austrian Salzkammergut southeast of Salzberg)
It is interesting to note that the sword is made from iron but manufactured in the design of the early Hallstatt bronze swords, making it a true bridge between the Bronze and Iron Age time periods.
The most likely source of the sword has been identified as Burgundy (Cote d’Or) in France from a time period of 600 BC. It would have travelled to western Britain along the southern Loire basin and the sword owner would most probably have taken a ship from Charente to arrive in western Britain.
Scythe:
There were three early iron scythes found in the lake, one with part of the wooden handle still in place. This scythe along with the iron spearhead would have been shaped by hand using metal hammers, chisels and metal knives and would have required a lot of skill and time to produce, they are dated to circa 650 BC.
Other Bronze items:
The bronze items found in the hoard are made up of horse harness equipment, crude chisels, a number of socketed axe heads and the two cauldrons as mentioned above,
Resources and References:
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Llyn_Fawr
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_y_Llyn
[3] https://coflein.gov.uk/en/site/405461?term=llyn fawr Iron Age hoard and votive lake
[4] Cauldron from Llyn Fawr
[5] Cynon Valley museum Iron Age Llyn Fawr hoard
[6] Hirwaun historical society article on Llyn Fawr hoard
Reconstruction of the votive offering in Llyn Fawr
Rhondda Cynon Taf photographs of construction of Llyn Fawr reservoir
Further reading:
Finding the second cauldron and Iron Sword, along with an analysis on how they determined the date of the Votive offering from seed samples taken in the area, can be found in the article below.
Fox C, Hyde HA. A Second Cauldron and an Iron Sword from the Llyn Fawr Hoard, Rhigos, Glamorganshire. The Antiquaries Journal. 1939;19(4):369-404. doi:10.1017/S0003581500008015