Mysterious Britain & Ireland

Country and County: Snowdonia

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Llyn Du’r Arddu

In ‘Celtic Folklore Welsh And Manx’ (1901) John Rhys describes the following tale he was told concerning a fairy bride in the summer of 1881. ‘An old woman, called Siân Dafydd, lived at Helfa Fawr, in the dingle called Cwm. Brwynog, along the left side of which you ascend as you go to the top of Snowdon, from the village of lower Llanberis, or Coed y Ddol, as it is there called.

Apparitions / Hauntings

Lady Anne Prendergast

In Haunted Wales (2011), Richard Holland quotes an old account of an experience with the reputed phantom of Lady Prendergast. It was the experience of a farmer named Morus Roberts from Croesor Bach who came across the ghost at Gwernydd in Beddgelert parish.

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Llyn Irddyn

There is an old local tradition about Llyn Irddyn, that it is unwise to walk too close the shore or the water’s edge because it is inhabited by mischievous fairies. However, they cannot harm you if you walk on the grass.

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Tylwyth Teg of Cwm Llan

In this valley below the south eastern side of Yr Wyddfa (Mount Snowdon), it is said that the Tylwyth Teg (Fairy Folk) live. It is said that one day, a shepherd heard a wailing sound, and he moved a rock where the sound was coming from. When he did this he rescued a Tylwyth Teg who has trapped there. Later, he encountered two old men who thanked him, and gave him a staff.

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Fairy Gold Of Cwmglas Hollow

According to John Rhys in his ‘Celtic Folklore Welsh And Manx’ [1901] ‘The following is a later tale, which Mr. Thomas Davies heard from his mother, who died in 1832:–‘When she was a girl, living at Yr Hafod, Llanberis, there was a girl of her age being brought up at Cwmglas in the same parish.

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Fairies of Llyn Dwythwch

Children were often warned in the past about the dangers of fairies and John Rhys in his ‘Celtic Folklore Welsh And Manx’ (1901) vouched for an account from a lady who grew up in Cwm Brwynog thirty to forty years earlier.

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

Tylwyth Teg of Llyn Cwellyn

In ‘Celtic Folklore Welsh And Manx’ (1901) John Rhys mentioned a story concerning fairies that had been passed to him by two brothers who had in turn heard it from Mari Domos Siôn, who died around 1850. ‘A shepherd had once lost his way in the mist on the mountain on the land of Caeau Gwynion, towards Cwellyn Lake, and got into a ring where the Tylwyth Teg* were dancing: it was only af

Fairies / Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Fairies / Welsh Folktales

A Visit to Fairyland

The following fairy folk tale takes place around Llyn Cwellyn, a 215 acre, 120 feet deep glacial lake which has now been dammed to create a reservoir. The tale is taken ‘Bedd Gelert: Its Facts, Fairies, and Folk-Lore (1899) by D E Jenkins.

Devil / Other Mysteries / Simulacra

Capel Salem

Built in 1850, this Baptist Chapel was made famous by the Devon artist Sydney Curnow Vosper (29 October 1866 – 10 July 1942) in 1908, when he painted a member of the congregation in traditional Welsh costume.

Hauntings / Legends

Hollow Demon Oak

A tree known as Derwen Ceubren yr Ellyl (hollow tree of the demons/spirits) used to stand in Nannau Park and it had a reputation of being haunted and evil, for this is the tree in which Owain Glyndwr was, according to legend, supposed to have hidden the body of his cousin Hywel Sele, 8th Lord of Nannau after he had killed him in 1404.