Mapping Mountains – Significant Name Changes – Y Trichant

Seven Valleys (SH 874 151)

There has been a Significant Name Change to a hill that is listed in the Y Trichant, with the summit height and drop being confirmed by a Trimble GeoXH 6000 survey which took place on the 21^st May 2018.

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

Y Trichant – Welsh hills at or above 300m and below 400m in height that have 30m minimum drop.  The list is authored by Myrddyn Phillips and the Introduction to the list and the re-naming and publication history of it was published on Mapping Mountains on the 13^th May 2017.

The hill is adjoined to the Y Berwyn range of hills which are situated in the south-eastern part of North Wales (Region A, Sub-Region A4), and it is positioned between the stream valleys of the Afon Dyfi (River Dovey) to its north and the Nant Cwm Cewydd to its south-east, and has the small town of Dinas Mawddwy to the west. 

Seven Valleys (SH 874 151)

The hill appeared in the 300m P30 list on Geoff Crowder’s v-g.me website under the name of Cytir, which is a name that appears close to this hill’s summit on contemporary Ordnance Survey maps.  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. 

Cytir

341m

SH874152

124/125

23

When visiting this hill I was fortunate to speak with two local farmers, and the first to give me the name of Seven Valleys was Ieuan Davies who was in his tractor turning the ground in preparation for seeding the field adjacent to where the summit of Cefn Coch (SH 868 142) is positioned.  Ieuan is now aged 81 and is a Welsh speaker and farms from Llwyn-y-grug (SH 841 159).  Ieuan explained that Cytir is the common land further along on the left hand side and that it was good for nothing and full of bracken, this is the open access land shown on contemporary Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 maps with its high point not taking in the summit of this hill.

Ieuan Davies

Descending from Cefn Coch I then met Carwyn Pugh at the old ruin of Bwlch Cwm Cewydd (SH 870 146), he had gathered sheep from the hill this article details and was penning them, Carwyn is aged 26 and a Welsh speaker and farms from near Llanymawddwy.  Carwyn gave me the name of Cefn Coch for the hill I had just visited and told me that the hill I was heading to is known as Seven Valleys.  We talked about this name at length and Carwyn said that you can’t see the seven valleys from the summit any longer because of the thin strip of conifer plantation just to the south of the summit, which he thought was put there about 20 years ago.  I said it was unusual that an English name was used for the hill considering it’s in a Welsh speaking area and he surmised that it was probably given by an English speaker and that the name had stuck in the local community.

Carwyn Pugh penning the sheep

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in the Y Trichant is Seven Valleys, and this was derived from local enquiry.

 

The Trimble GeoXH 6000 gathering data from the summit of Seven Valleys

The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Y Berwyn

Name:  Seven Valleys

Previously Listed Name:  Cytir

Summit Height:  340.5m (converted to OSGM15)

OS 1:50,000 map:  124, 125

Summit Grid Reference:  SH 87419 15168

Drop:  52.7m (converted to OSGM15)

For details on the survey of Seven Valleys

Myrddyn Phillips (August 2018)

Mapping Mountains – Trimble Surveys – Y Berwyn

21.05.18  Cefn Coch (SH 868 142) and Seven Valleys (SH 874 151)

Seven Valleys (SH 874 151)

Extending southward on the western side of Cwm Cewydd is a small ridge whose two hills I’d looked at on many an occasion when studying Ordnance Survey maps, and until today they had passed me by.  This ridge is a delight, it is a quiet place, and today in the early morning bathed in the first rays of sunshine under a blue sky with gentle bird song echoing across the land and the call of a cuckoo flirting across the cwm, there could be few better places to be.

I’d never driven up this valley but had looked across it from higher hills to the east, the road is narrow and there are occasional houses, with the paved section ending high up the cwm where there is sufficient parking for two or three cars and a track that continues to the hill ridge.

My route to the hills was down the road I had just driven up to a lane that headed steeply up toward the bwlch between the two hills I planned on visiting.  Across the Nant Cwm Cewydd blues merged with greens as the delicate bluebell cast its spell with fields aglow and coloured a wistful blue.

Beautiful Bluebells

Seasonal change is one of the delights of living in these wonderful isles of ours and the month of May is one of the best, as it is time for new growth after winter’s harsh climes, and today the unfurling of ferns brightened by early sun sprinkled themselves against the Welsh Poppy, and all had a backdrop of woods pungent with the scent of a myriad of bluebells, scattered as a carpet of blue and dashed up the hillside.

New growth

The paved lane led to an earthen track and a gate giving access to the steep grazing field making up the summit of my first hill of the day; Cefn Coch.  On the way to its high point I grappled with a poor lamb that was stuck between a tree and wired fence with its head firmly lodged through one of the square openings of the fence and its rear legs and body curled against the tree, there was blood seeping out of its eye and the lower fence post was red, I managed to drag its head out of the wire fence and held its coat in my grasp dangling it in mid-air as I tugged the fence toward me, by doing so freeing its rear legs and body, I then pulled it upward and over the fence and stood it on the grass beside me, it sauntered off without a backward glance looking for its mother.

The way to the hill

As the lamb sauntered off I headed for the summit which was relatively easy to pinpoint, and as the Trimble gathered its allotted data I stood and listened to a tractor in the adjacent field turning the earth for seeding, and once five minutes of data were stored and the Trimble packed away I headed down to see if I could ask the person operating the tractor about the names of these hills.

The high Aran

Gathering data at the summit of Cefn Coch

Ieuan Davies stopped the tractor and smiled and I explained my interest in the hills and their names, one of the names that Ieuan gave me I thought a little unusual as it was English; this name is Seven Valleys and it related to one of these hills and was a reference to its view, the position of the hill in question was confirmed an hour or so later after I had surveyed the intervening bwlch.

Ieuan Davies

It was good to meet Ieuan and as with many of these chance meetings on the hill with locals who work the land, he was only too willing to impart his knowledge and do so in a friendly manner, I waved goodbye and headed back down the steep slope to the connecting bwlch which was on a narrow earthen track under the cover of trees, I had little hope that the Trimble would achieve its 0.1m accuracy level before data should be logged, but having waited ten minutes for it to do so the magic number of 0.1m appeared on its screen and I pressed ‘Log’ and headed down the track to allow it as good a coverage of orbiting satellites as possible.

Gathering data at the critical bwlch of Cefn Coch

During the wait at the bwlch I listened to the buzz of a quad bike rounding sheep up from the higher slopes of my next hill, as the earthen track was carved in to the hillside my eye was level with the lower part of a wired fence and as the distant beep emanated from the Trimble as each datum point was collected the call of the farmer on the quad bike echoed across the land.  The sheep were rounded up from the top of the near hill as farmer and sheep dog worked in unison, encouraging the sheep down the hill, with their bleating now cascading across the land.  I let the Trimble gather ten minutes of data and just stood and listened to the hub of countryside sound as quad bike and driven sheep merged down the hillside.

My view whilst waiting for the Trimble to gather its allotted data at the bwlch of Cefn Coch

By the time I packed the Trimble away the farmer and sheep dog had collected their prize and great swamps of sheep were being penned outside the ruin of Bwlch Cwm-cewydd.  I waited until all the sheep were safely penned and then chatted at length with Carwyn Pugh, he confirmed that the second hill on my walk is the one known locally as the Seven Valleys and that although he spoke Welsh, as did Ieuan, the hill is known locally by its English name.

Carwyn Pugh busy at work

Before Carwyn headed off on his quad bike he explained that the sheep had been gathered so the lambs could be marked, and as the quad bike whizzed back up the hill I spent a few minutes framing the multitude of sheep and took a series of photos, their coloured markings standing out against their white fluffed bodies.

Sheep

Penned

It was an easy stroll up to the next and last summit, this hill now has a thin strip of conifer plantation obstructing the view that it gets its name from, and however apt such a name as Seven Valleys is, it still sounds a little odd for an English name to be used by Welsh speakers for a hill situated in the heartland of Welsh speaking Wales.

Cefn Coch from the ascent of Seven Valleys

The summit of Seven Valleys is crowned by a steep grassy knoll which has two quartz rocks at its high point, and as the Trimble gathered data I tried my utmost to count the valleys and name each in turn.

Gathering data at the summit of Seven Valleys

It was only a short walk down to the connecting bwlch and again this was Trimbled, I then headed the short distance down the earthen track leading back to the end of the paved lane and my car.

Survey Result:

Cefn Coch

Summit Height:  313.0m (converted to OSGM15)

Summit Grid Reference:  SH 86836 14261

Bwlch Height:  252.8m (converted to OSGM15)

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SH 87054 14525

Drop:  60.2m

Dominance:  19.23%

Seven Valleys (significant name change)

Summit Height:  340.5m (converted to OSGM15)

Summit Grid Reference:  SH 87419 15168

Bwlch Height:  287.8m (converted to OSGM15)

Bwlch Grid Reference:  SH 87978 15488

Drop:  52.7m

Dominance:  15.48%

For further details please consult the Trimble Survey Spreadsheet