Gwyddfarch Explained

Gwyddfarch was a hermit and founder of a Celtic abbey at Meifod in Wales.^[1] He was a son of Amalarius and disciple of St. Llywelyn at Welshpool. About 550 AD he founded a monastery^[2] at Meifod. This establishment became the mother church of several other monasteries and was a centre of the order for over one thousand years, and within a generation the monastery had become a centre of pilgrimage. Gwyddfarch taught Tysilio,^[3] who replaced him as abbot.^{[4] [5]}

Legend holds that near the end of his life Tysilio talked the aging abbot out of a pilgrimage to Rome.^[6] He is commemorated on 3 November.^[7]

Notes and References

1. http://celticsaints.org/2008/1103h.html St. Gwyddfarch, Hermit of Moel yr Ancr, Wales
2. http://www.living-stones.info/downloads/guides/11_St_Tysilio_Marys_web.pdf Saint Tysilio and St marys Church
3. Elizabeth Rees, Celtic Sites and Their Saints: A Guidebook (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2003), p. 121.
4. http://www.anglesey-history.co.uk/places/churches_and_chapels/Llandysilio/index.html Llandysilio - St. Tysilio's Church
5. Web site: Parish Church of St Tysilio and St Mary, Meifod. British Listed Buildings.
6. Sabine Baring-Gould, A Book of North Wales(Library of Alexandria, 2016).
7. http://celticsaints.org/2008/1103h.html St. Gwyddfarch, Hermit of Moel yr Ancr, Wales