Thursday 1 October 2020

Mapping Mountains – Significant Name Changes – Y Trichant – The 300m Hills of Wales


Pt. 317.0m (SJ 167 507)

There has been a Significant Name Change to a hill that is listed in the Y Trichant – The 300m Hills of Wales, with the summit height, bwlch height and their locations, the drop and status of the hill confirmed by LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips.

LIDAR image of Pt. 317.0m (SJ 167 507)

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

Y Trichant The 300m Hills of Wales.  Welsh hills at or above 300m and below 400m in height that have 30m minimum drop, with an accompanying sub list entitled the Sub-Trichant with the criteria for this sub category being all Welsh hills at or above 300m and below 400m in height with 20m or more and below 30m of drop.  The list is authored by Myrddyn Phillips, with the Introduction to the list and the renaming of it appearing on Mapping Mountains on the 13th May 2017.

Y Trichant - The 300m Hills of Wales by Myrddyn Phillips

The hill is adjoined to the Bryniau Clwyd group of hills which are situated in the north-eastern part of North Wales (Region A, Sub-Region A2), and it is positioned with the A525 road to its immediate west, south and east, has the town of Rhuthun (Ruthin) towards the north-west.

The hill appeared in the original Welsh 300m P30 list on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website under the partly invented and transposed name of Pen Nant y Garth, with an accompanying note stating; Name from road pass to the West.


Pen Nant y Garth317mSJ168507116256Name from road pass to the West


During my early hill listing I thought it appropriate to either invent a name for a hill, or use a name that appeared near to the summit of the hill on Ordnance Survey maps of the day.  My preference was to use farm names and put Pen, Bryn or Moel in front of them or as in this instance use the name of what I presumed was a road and prefix it with the word Pen.  This is not a practice that I now advocate as with time and inclination place-name data can be improved either by asking local people or by examining historic documents, through this form of research an appropriate name for the hill can usually be found.

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

However, occasionally even when research is conducted an appropriate name for the hill may not be found, and on such occasions the listing protocol is to use the point (Pt. 317.0m) notation, and in the case of this hill, this is such an example.

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in the Y Trichant – The 300m Hills of Wales is Pt. 317.0m, and this is being used as the author has not found an appropriate name for it either through historic research and / or local enquiry.


The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Bryniau Clwyd

Name:  Pt. 317.0m

Previously Listed Name:  Pen Nant y Garth

OS 1:50,000 map:  116

Summit Height:  316.95m (LIDAR)

Summit Grid Reference:  SJ 16791 50742 (LIDAR)

Bwlch Height:  275.55m (LIDAR)

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SJ 16609 51268 (LIDAR)

Drop:  41.4m (LIDAR)


Myrddyn Phillips (October 2020)









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