England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Llanfair ar y Bryn St Mary

The Parish

The parish of Llanfair ar y Bryn stands in the northeastern corner of Carmarthenshire forming boundaries with neighbouring Cardiganshire and with Breconshire at a 3-counties meet. The parish is an intensely rural area northeast of Llandovery but the parish church sits on the edge of that town outside the parish area, a most unusual arrangement. The parish is bisected by the A483 road which links Llandovery with Llanwrtyd Wells and holds several settlements within it, the largest being Cynghordy where the A483 crosses the Afon Bran. The parish, being so extensive, was divided administratively into regional subdivisions (Rhandir Abbot, Rhandir Canol, Rhandir Isaf, and Rhandir Uchaf) and for most of the period consisted of scattered upland farms holding sheep with more prosperous businesses in the valley bottoms for cattle, lead mining became fundamentally important to the parish, it was recorded as early as 1304 and may well have been in operation sporadically from Roman times. Mining became commercialised with the founding of Nantymwyn Lead Mine at Rhandirmwyn in the valley of the Afon Tywi expanding that settlement substantially as it rose to employ over 200 men and became the largest & most productive metalliferous mine in southern Wales. Llanfair ar y Bryn also played a major role in the regional droving of livestock, it served as a key staging point on the historic drovers' roads where farmers gathered cattle and sheep before ascending the rugged Mynydd Epynt toward English markets. Modern developments have come to the parish, the railway line from Llandovery to Llanwrtyd Wells climbing the valley of Afon Bran and granting Cynghordy a station. Today the parish has a thriving tourism trade popular with hikers, mountain bikers and fishermen as well as regular tourists seeking the quiet rural area, more modern business has been the creation of tracts of commercial forestry which now cover much of the higher ground in the parish. The twin rivers of Afon Tywi and Afon Bran drain the parish southwestwards with the former becoming the main stream beyond Llandovery, the Tywi continues southwest then west to Carmarthen before again turning now to the south to meet the outer Bristol Channel. The parish covers a vast breadth of height from around 70 metres above the sea at the two rivers to 487 metres on Cerrig Cedny close to the Cardiganshire border. Llanfair ar y Bryn parish was one the largest in Wales if not in the land covering an estimated acreage in excess of 23,400 acres which would have supported a population of close to 1,650 parishioners. Like most of Wales Llanfair ar y Bryn is not mentioned in Domesday Book which did not cover this area.

The Church

As already mentioned St Mary's church actually is sited in the neighbouring parish of Llandingat which includes the market town of Llandovery, it sits no more than a half mile northeast of the town of Llandovery and stands between the A83 and the little out-and-back lane that parallels it. The church certainly stands on an ancient site it being the site of the Roman fort of Alabum. The first recorded church here was a small Benedictine cell, a daughter cell founded from Great Malvern in c1126 which had dissolved by 1185. Today's church is largely a product of the 14th & 15th centuries, producing a massive church which features a continuous nave and chancel (8 bays) without structural division and a massive 3-storey western tower with a northeast stair-tower. Most of this work seems to have followed the disastrous impacts of the Owain Glyndwr's revolt during which the church suffered structural damage with all made good in the early 15th century. The style throughout is of the Perpendicular era. The usual series of repairs and restorations began in the 18th century when the southern porch was rebuilt, that early work was followed in the mid-19th century by the addition of the vestry, the addition of an organ chamber followed in 1880 and major structural repairs were done in 1913 to stabilise the church. A small parking area sits to the south of the site where a arched gateway grants access to the churchyard, sadly for the photographer the favoured southern aspects are lost to dense tree-cover but all other angles are readily available.