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

 

Top Field (SJ 070 055) 

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 and a subsequent Trimble GeoXH 6000 survey conducted by Myrddyn Phillips. 

Top Field (SJ 070 055)

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 13^th May 2017. 

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

The hill is adjoined to the Carnedd Wen group of hills which are situated in the south-eastern part of North Wales (Region A, Sub-Region A4), and it is encircled by minor roads, with the A458 road further to its north and the B4389 road further to its east, and has the small town of Llanfair Caereinion towards the east north-east. 

The hill appeared in the original Welsh 300m P30 list published on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website, under the invented and transposed name of Bryn Rhiw-hiriaeth-uchaf, with an accompanying note stating; Name from buildings to the East.

Bryn Rhiw-hiriaeth-uchaf

335m

SJ071055

125

215

Name from buildings to the East

 

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 and as in this instance transpose the name of a farm and add the word Bryn.  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

This was one of a number of hills visited in the company of Alex Cameron during a day’s hill bagging.  After visiting the summit we headed back to my car where Alex put a brew on and whilst enjoying this and assorted accompaniments a tractor appeared chugging up the lane, once it safely negotiated the narrow gap between the paved section of road and my car I flagged it down.  The person driving the tractor was the local farmer; Owen Evans and he told me that unsurprisingly the hill has no individual name, but the field where the summit of the hill is situated is known as Top Field. 

Owen Evans

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in the Y Trichant – The 300m Hills of Wales is Top Field, and this was derived from local enquiry. 

 

The full details for the hill are: 

Group:  Carnedd Wen 

Name:  Top Field 

Previously Listed Name:  Bryn Rhiw-hiriaeth-uchaf 

OS 1:50,000 map:  125

Summit Height:  333.3m (converted to OSGM15, Trimble GeoXH 6000)                                                           

Summit Grid Reference:  SJ 07082 05572 (Trimble GeoXH 6000) 

Bwlch Height:  301.1m (LIDAR) 

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SJ 06237 05273 (LIDAR) 

Drop:  32.2m (Trimble GeoXH 6000 summit and LIDAR bwlch) 

 

Myrddyn Phillips (March 2021)