Clarach History
Clarach and its archaeology, antiquities and history. Is a village in Ceredigion, West Wales. Is a small village in Ceredigion, West Wales. Situated on the Cardigan Bay coastline, between Aberystwyth and Borth.
A Topographical Dictionary of Wales
Originally published by: Samuel Lewis, A Topographical Dictionary of Wales (London, Fourth edition, 1849)
CLARACH, a township, in that part of the parish of Llanbadarn-Vawr which is in the Upper division of the hundred of Geneu’r-Glyn, in the union of Aberystwith, county of Cardigan, South Wales, 3 miles (N. E.) from Aberystwith, below the road from that town to Machynlleth; containing 283 inhabitants. The river Clarach, which gives name to the township, flows along a pleasing vale here, and falls into the bay of Cardigan, where the shore expands into a fine sandy beach. From the northern part an extensive bank of sand, termed Sarn Cynvelyn, stretches in a south-western direction for several miles into the bay of Cardigan, terminated by sunken rocks, and with only two fathoms of water on its surface at ebb tide. The vale is celebrated for its early harvest, and more particularly for the superior quality of its barley crops; an advantage derived partly from its sheltered situation and genial soil, and partly from the facility of gathering the sea weed or wrack after storms, to be used as a manure. In the hamlet of Pont-Llangorwen, in the township, a church has lately been erected, a very beautiful structure in the early English style, consisting of a nave seventy-two feet long by thirty-three feet, and a chancel twenty-nine feet long by twenty-seven feet. It is built of the harder veins of the slatestone of the country; parts of the interior are of a superior kind of stone, and the whole of the woodwork is of Welsh oak or Spanish chestnut. The site for the building, as well as the burial-ground, was given by a friend of the Church, who also endowed the living with £1000, and contributed the greater part of the cost of erection, aided however by the liberal subscriptions of some of the neighbouring gentry, clergy, and parishioners. It was consecrated on the 16th December, 1841, by the Bishop of St. David’s, who performed the service of its dedication in the Welsh language. The living is a perpetual curacy, distinct from the mother church, with an ecclesiastical district annexed to it. There are two day and Sunday schools; one of them, the Clarach school, founded in 1795, and supported by an endowment of £11. 14. per annum, and by school-pence; the other, at Llangorwen, founded in 1843, and supported by subscription, with the aid of a few fees.
Since 1909 the Ceredigion Historical Society has had articles written about the archaeology, antiquities and history of Ceredigion, many of the articles are about Clarach history.
The aim of the Ceredigion Historical Society is to preserve, record and promote the study of the archaeology, antiquities and history of Ceredigion. That objective has remained the same since the foundation of the Society in 1909, though its name was changed from Ceredigion Antiquarian Society to the Ceredigion Historical Society in 2002.