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

Cae Uchaf (SS 575 943)

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, drop and status of the hill being confirmed by LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips.

LIDAR image of Cae Uchaf

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.

The hill is adjoined to the Gŵyr group of hills, which are situated in the western part of South Wales (Region C, Sub-Region C1), and it is positioned with the B 4296 road to its east, and has the small community of Y Crwys (Three Crosses) at its base to the west south-west.

The hill originally appeared in the 100m P30 list on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website under the invented name of Three Crosses Hill with an accompanying note stating; Name from town to the West. 

Three Crosses Hill

144m

SS576944

159

164

Name from town 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 a name of a village and add the word Hill to the name.  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

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 1424 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 Cae ucha in the apportionments, with the details on the Tithe map appearing in the parish of Llanrhidian and in the county named as Glamorgan.

Extract from the apportionments

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in the 100m Twmpau is Cae Uchaf, and this was derived from the Tithe map.

The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Gŵyr

Name:  Cae Uchaf

Previously Listed Name:  Three Crosses Hill 

  

OS 1:50,000 map:  159

Summit Height:  144.4m (LIDAR)

Summit Grid Reference:  SS 57511 94397 (LIDAR)

Bwlch Height:  73.4m (LIDAR, natural bwlch remains)

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SS 50983 90868 (LIDAR)

 

Drop:  71.0m (LIDAR)

Dominance:  49.19% (LIDAR)

Myrddyn Phillips (November 2018)