In the footsteps of the builders of Stonehenge Pt 3 Pentre Ifan

So stop or not? Tired and hungry and rather reaching the stage when we'd seen enough stones for the day the decision swung back and forth until we concluded that if we didn't we'd only regret it so we did!

It was rather further than the signs indicted but we got there at last. Plenty of parking and the site  is not visible form the road but clearly signed by the ever helpful Cadw.

This is a very popular site but as it was now late afternoon the last of the visitors were leaving and we soon had the place to  ourselves - other than a pair of young lambs who had found a way through the fence,

Dating from around 3500 BCE this is another dolmen type burial tomb although no trace of burial has been found.  It has an unusual N-S orientation and the location is just beautiful. A wonderful place to be interred.

There  are plenty of local legends associated with the site- the Twylwth Teg are apparently to be found here although despite it being an auspicious time of day and close to the equinox we  didn't meet any...

W.Y. Evans Wentz, 1911 had this to say in his book written in 1911 The Fairy Faith in Celtic countries

"The region, the little valley on whose side stands the Pentre Ifan cromlech, the finest in Britain, is believed to have been a favourite place with the ancient Drulds. And in the oak groves (Ty Canol Wood) that still exist there, tradition says there was once a flourishing school for neophytes, and that the cromlech instead of being a place for internments or sacrifices was in those days completely enclosed, forming like other cromlechs a darkened chamber in which novices when initiated were placed for a certain number of days....the interior (of Pentre Ifan) being called the womb or court of Ceridwen".