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Llyn y Dywarchen

Llyn Y Dywarchen; ‘The lake of the Turf Island, is a lake steeped in myth and legends. It’s a small lake, located above the village of Drws y Coed, in Dyffryn Nantlle, which sits between Y Garn and Mynydd Mawr which rises sharply at either end of the shores.

As mentioned in the ‘Llyn Bwlch y Moch‘ post, in the 19th century the lake was extended by building a wall on the South side of the lake, and also, the direction of the river flowing out of the lake has been changed, from flowing down the River Llyfni into Dyffryn Nantlle, to now, flowing into the Afon Gwyrfai, and into Llyn y Gadair – just behind Rhyd Ddu.

It’s the lake that Gerallt Gymro (Geraldus Cambrensis – an early historian) described when he wrote about a floating island on a lake, as he and his party passed the lake on the way to Caernarfon, while they were enlisting men for Third Crusade in 1188AD. The floating island was either made of turf, or a slab of peat that broke away from the mainland, or detached itself from the bottom of the lake and floated to the surface, and was being kept afloat by the gasses, such as methane  that came out of the marshlands. He noted that farm animals would often be seen marooned on the island, as they would walk on the island while it was resting on the shore, and it would suddenly drift off.  The scientist Edmond Halley (of the comet fame) confirmed that the island was indeed floating, as surrounded by on-lookers, he swam out to the lake, and started rowing – to which the lake floated along! But, unfortunately, the Island we see in the lake today, isn’t the famous floating Island.

There are many legends surrounding the shores of Llyn y Dywarchen. This is the land of the ‘Tylwyth Teg or the little people. As the Legend goes, a young man was returning home to Drws y Coed from Beddgelert, on a bright moonlit night, and came across a number of ladies known as the Tylwyth Teg, who were going about their nightly tradition of dancing and frolicking. Charmed by the beauty of the Ladies, he fell in love with one, and leaped out into their circle, and stole one of the Tylwyth Teg and wanted her to be his wife. She refused, but became his maid instead, but if he found out her name, she would marry him. He heard the other ‘fairies’ talking about her one evening using her name, so she married her with a warning not to touch her with iron. Unfortunately, while attending to his horse one day, an Iron buckle from the saddle touched the Tylwyth Teg, which in a blink of an eye, caused his beloved to disappear for ever.

Another short legend from the lake, is about another man who spotted the Tylwyth Teg one evening, going about their nightly frolics, and invited the man to join them. They danced away, resulting in the man being transported away to a beautiful country, from which it took 7 years to return.

I don’t know much about the old building which once stood where the car park to the lake is now, as I can’t seem to find any information about it online.

Tags: 1188AD, Afon Gwyrfai, Afon Llyfni, Chwedlau, Cymru, Drws y Coed, Dyffryn Nantlle, Eryri, Geraldus Cambrensis, Gerallt Gymro, Hanes Llyn y Dywarchen, Legend, Legend Llyn y Dywarchen, Llyn, Llyn Bwlch y Moch, Llyn Dywarchen, Llyn y Dywarchen, Llyn Y Dywarchen History, Llyn y Gadair, Mynydd Mawr, North Wales, River Llyfni, Snowdonia, Third Crusade, Tylwyth Teg, Welsh Legend, Y Garn

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 19th, 2011 at 19:24 and is filed under Retro. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.