Cefn Digoll (SJ 275 084)
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 derived from a Trimble GeoXH 6000 survey and subsequent LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips.
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| Cefn Digoll (SJ 275 084) |
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, and the Introduction to the Mapping Mountains publication of the list appearing on the 1st January 2022.
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| Y Trichant - The 300m Hills of Wales by Myrddyn Phillips |
The hill is adjoined to the Stiperstones group of hills, which are situated in the eastern part of South Wales (Region B, Sub-Region B2), and it is positioned with the B4393 road to its north-east, the A483 road to its west and the A458 road to its south, and has the town of Y Trallwng (Welshpool) towards the south-west.
The hill appeared in the original 300m height band of Welsh P30 hills published on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website, under the transposed and invented name of Oak Plantation Top, with an accompanying note stating; Name from wood to the North-West.
| Oak Plantation Top | 381m | SJ275084 | 126 | 216 | Name from wood to the North-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, with little consideration for the meaning of the name and where it was appropriately applied to. My preference was to use farm names and put Pen, Bryn or Moel in front of them or as in this instance transpose the name of a wood and add the word Top to it. 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.
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| Extract from the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explorer map |
When I visited the hill I met Karen and Brian Morris who farm from Longmountain Farm, whose land the summit of this hill is situated on. I had already made enquiries with Brian’s brother who farms the lower fields adjoined to this hill, and they all confirmed that they know this hill as being a part of the Long Mountain. The name is given as Cefn Digoll in the listing of Y Trichant - The 300m Hills of Wales as it is appropriate to list by the Welsh form of the name. Karen and Brian explained that they refer to a number of high fields on their farm by names, including the Mast Field, Behind the School, Top of the Gallop, The Patch and the Pond Field, with the high point of the hill being situated in the field they refer to as Behind the School. The school in this instance is occasionally used for schooling horses.
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| Karen and Brian Morris of Longmountain Farm |
Prior to visiting this hill I had studied 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.
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| The enclosed land where the summit of the hill is situated is given the number 69A on the Tithe map |
The enclosed land where the summit of this hill is
situated is given the number 69A on the Tithe map, with the field as it is
today having consisted of two parts at the time of the Tithe, with the other
part being given the number 69, these numbers 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 Enclosure with
the other part of the field named as Part
of Enclosure on the Tithe map; it
appears in the county named as Montgomery
and in the parish of Buttington. However, as the term Enclosure is generic it is inappropriate to use this word for the
name of a hill when listing.
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| When cross referenced in the apportionments the enclosed land is given a generic term of Inclosure |
Before thanking Karen and Brian for their time, they
suggested that I visit Keith Davies who still occasionally farms and now
lives lower on the hill next to the Hope Lane.
Keith grew up on the western side of the hill which his father farmed,
with The Mill and Cletterwood farms being mentioned. Keith confirmed that he had never heard a
separate name being given to this hill and knows it as the Long Mountain (the
whole of Cefn Digoll [Long Mountain
in English] takes in the 408.3m summit at SJ 264 058 as well as the
381.6m summit at SJ 275 084.
As I talked with Keith he pointed through his
living room window to a slightly raised point and told me that it is known as
the Cap of Trewern, this is situated
at approximately SJ 26663 08675 and looked as if it consists of rougher ground
with an occasional gorse bush on it as opposed to the manicured green grazing
fields adjoined to it. He also told me that
the land leading up to the forest boundary is known as The Pinnacle, this land
is placed at approximately SJ 264 078.
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| Keith Davies with the northern lands of Cefn Digoll in the background |
We then concentrated on the land that takes in the
hill adjoined to the Longmountain Farm, and Keith explained that until 1920 the
upper part of this land was a holding adjoined to Buttington Old Hall, (this
holding takes in the land between SJ 28528 08667, SJ 28088 09012, SJ 26883
08067 and SJ 27813 07794) with this land being added to the holdings of the
Hall at a later date compared to their other lands, and it was known as the Bytak.
The meaning of the word Bytak is given below and my thanks to Aled Williams for supplying
the following details:
beitac, beutac
[bnth. S. taf. by-tack]
Tyddyn neu fferm lle nad yw’r tenant yn byw, a
gymerir yn ychwanegol at fferm fwy:
By-tack (smallholding or farm where the tenant does
not live, taken in addition to a larger farm.
1953 I. Ff. Elis: CC 64, Yr oedd
Tyddyn Argain yn llawer rhy werthfawr fel beitac i bori
bustych tewion.
Ar lafar, ‘Beutac y gelwir tyddyn neu
fferm a gymerir at un arall’, B i. 194 (sir Drefn.); ‘Beutac’
‘a by-take, fferm delir ei thir gan amaethwr fferm arall’, Cymruli.
52 (dwyrain sir Drefn.)
Cf. 1873 Mont Coll 245,
Bytak, a small farm, generally held with a larger one by the same tenant. The
bytak usually consists of a few acres of ground with a hovel thereon. The word is common in Welsh-speaking
counties.
The Elis reference says that Beutac is used in
eastern Montgomeryshire. The word is a borrowing
from English - so both spellings of the word would be applicable to Cefn
Digoll.
As the land known as the Bytak has been adjoined to Longmountain Farm since 1920, it is no
longer referred to by this name as this term applied to the land prior to this
date and not to the land at the present date.
Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in
the Y Trichant - The 300m Hills of Wales is Cefn Digoll, as it forms a part of the extended hill known as the
Long Mountain, with the protocol of the Welsh name taking precedence for
listing purposes, and with the caveat that the current farmers know the field where
the summit of the hill is situated as Behind
the School, and that the land taking in the whole of the summit area of
this hill was known up until 1920 as the Bytak.
The full details for the hill are:
Group: Stiperstones
Name: Cefn Digoll
Previously Listed Name:
Oak Plantation Top
OS 1:50,000 map: 126
Summit Height: 381.6m
(LIDAR)
Summit Grid Reference:
SJ 27538 08462 & SJ 27541 08460 & SJ 27543 08461 (LIDAR)
Bwlch Height: 343.1m (converted to OSGM15, Trimble GeoXH 6000)
Bwlch Grid Reference: SJ 27824 07953 (Trimble GeoXH 6000)
Drop: 38.5m (LIDAR summit and Trimble GeoXH 6000 bwlch)
Myrddyn Phillips (April 2017)
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