Heart of Hiraethog

This evening’s post office meeting was my third this week. This time it was at Cerrigydrudion, where about 200 people turned out.

Cerrig is an important village, at the heart of Hiraethog and the crossroads of two important routes, one of which is the A5 London – Holyhead road. George Borrow, the eccentric author of Wild Wales, stayed there during his peregrination through the principality:

“The inn at Cerrig y Drudion was called the Lion — whether the white, black, red or green Lion, I do not know, though I am certain that it was a lion of some colour or other. It seemed as decent and respectable a hostelry as any traveller could wish, to refresh and repose himself in, after a walk of twenty miles.”

It was, in fact, and still is, the White Lion.

There is some dispute about the meaning of the name “Cerrigydrudion”. The standard translation is “The Druids’ Stones”, but my Welsh master, Gareth Hughes, who was a very erudite man, contended that it meant “The Stones of the Beloved Ones”, that is, the graves of the fallen knights.

Some credence is given to the latter interpretation by the name of a nearby Hiraethog village, Bryn Saith Marchog, or the Hill of the Seven Knights. Perhaps it was at Cerrig that they found their resting place.

In any event, their fighting spirit lives on; the meeting was, by any standards, a lively one. The descendants of the knights made a very good, very vocal case for keeping their post office open.