Mapping Mountains – Significant Name Changes – 100m Twmpau and Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales

  

Lan (SN 441 196)

There has been a Significant Name Change to a hill that is listed in the 100m Twmpau and Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales, with the summit height, its location and drop of the hill initially confirmed by LIDAR analysis and subsequently by a summit survey with the Trimble GeoXH 6000 which were conducted by Myrddyn Phillips, with latter taking place on the 31^st July 2018.

Lan (SN 441 196)

The criteria for the two lists that this name change applies to are:

100m Twmpau - Welsh hills at or above 100m and below 200m in height with 30m minimum drop, with an accompanying sub list entitled the 100m Sub-Twmpau with the criteria for this sub category being all Welsh hills at or above 100m and below 200m in height with 20m or more and below 30m of drop, with the word Twmpau being an acronym standing for thirty welsh metre prominences and upward.

Y Trechol – The Dominant Hills of Wales – Welsh P30 hills whose prominence equal or exceed half that of their absolute height.  With the criteria for Lesser Dominant status being those addition Welsh P30 hills whose prominence is 33.33% or more and below 50% of their absolute height.  The list is authored by Myrddyn Phillips with the Introduction to the start of the Mapping Mountains publication of this list appearing on the 3^rd December 2015.

LIDAR image of Lan

The hill is adjoined to the Mynydd Sylen group of hills, which are situated in the western part of South Wales (Region C, Sub-Region C1), and is positioned with the Afon Tywi (River Towy) and the B 4300 road to its north, and has the town of Caerfyrddin (Carmarthen) to the west north-west.

The hill originally appeared in the 100m P30 list on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website under the name of Allt Cystanog, which is a name consistently given to the wooded northerly slopes of this hill on Ordnance Survey maps.

Allt Cystanog

115m

SN441196

159

177

During my early hill listing I paid little regard to name placement on the map, or the meaning of names and to what feature the name was appropriately applied to.  Therefore I prioritised names for listing purposes that I now understand are either inappropriate or where another name is viewed as being more appropriate. 

Extract from the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explorer map

As the summit of this hill comprises bounded land the details for it were examined on the Tithe map.  The term Tithe map is generally given to a map of a Welsh or English parish or township and which was prepared after the 1836 Tithe Commutation Act.  This act allowed tithes to be paid in cash rather than goods.  The Tithe maps gave names of owners and occupiers of land in each parish and importantly for place-name research they also included the name of enclosed land.  This enclosed land is usually based on a field system, however not every field is given a name, but many are and especially so in Wales.

Extract from the Tithe map

The enclosed land where the summit of this hill is situated is given the number 626 on the Tithe map, this can be cross referenced against the apportionments; it is these apportionments that give the name of the owner or occupier of the land as well as the name of the land.  The land where the summit of this hill is situated is named as Lan in the apportionments, with the details on the Tithe map appearing in the parish of Llangunnor [sic] and in the county named as Carmarthen.

Extract from the apportionments

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in the 100m Twmpau and Y Trechol - The Dominant Hills of Wales is Lan, and this name was derived from the Tithe map.

The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Mynydd Sylen

Name:  Lan

Previously Listed Name:  Allt Cystanog 

  

OS 1:50,000 map:  159

Summit Height:  115.5m (converted to OSGM15)

Summit Grid Reference:  SN 44107 19652

Bwlch Height:  37.0m (LIDAR)

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SN 44956 19487 (LIDAR) 

Drop:  78.5m (Trimble summit and LIDAR bwlch)

Dominance:  67.97% (Trimble summit and LIDAR bwlch)

For details on the summit survey of Lan

Myrddyn Phillips (January 2019)