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Prehistory and the Romans
Let me bring it alive for you!
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| One cannot visit Wales without experiencing a real sense of
history. Millenniums of people have left their marks on the timeless
landscape. The geographic position of Wales on the western fringe of Britain
was of paramount importance to our cultural development. Contact
with the outer world lay predominantly from the sea. Also, time and
time again the mountain massifs of Snowdonia proved the final
retreat of early settlers. Because of this and the relative lack of
later urban and agricultural development the area yields rich
pickings for the prehistorian . |
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 Neolithic - Burial Chambers
In the stone age the windswept coasts of Wales were probably some of the few open patches of
 ground that a people with only a stone axe or antler pick could colonize when the rest of the land was covered with unbroken forests.So here we find fine examples of chambered
tombs/passage graves -modern ancestors of the family vault.
Sites: Capel Garmon, Bryn Celli Ddu, Barclodiad y Gawres, Dyffryn Ardudwy |
Bronze age - Stone circles and standing stones
Along with round barrows and cup marks, stone circles are associated with the bronze age though no-one knows for certain
what went on in them, speculation is great fun and they are invariable situated in places with magnificent views and atmosphere.
Come and explore them with me.
Sites: Druids circle - Penmaenmawr, Bwlch y Ddeufaen, Pen yr Orsedd
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Iron Age - Hut circles and hill forts
Traditionally known as a time of upheaval with climate changes and immigrants arriving, people were driven up the slopes and
North  Wales abounds in many examples from scattered hamlets of hut circles to
large well-defended hill forts.
Sites: Pen y Gaer, Tre'r Ceiri, Din Llugwy, Llyn Pensinsula, Anglesey
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Romans - Fortresses and marching camps
In the AD70s the Romans arrived in Wales and established frontier forts from their base in Chester. Civilian Roman life in North Wales
 was limited outside of these forts apart from an interest in mining for copper, gold and lead but, thanks to excavations, quite of lot
of remains from barracks to baths can be visited
Sites: Segontium, Tomen y Mur, walls at Caergybi, Caerun, |
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