Bryneglwys 'Dinas'

Description

Vanished castle mentioned 1331 as ' a site for a fortification'. (King 1983 - Map reference given is the possible site suggested in the RCAHMW Inventory record)

A small unoccupied farmhouse standing on high ground, and looking northwards over a wide stretch of country. There is no signs of fortifications or defences in the immediate neighbourhood. It is known locally as 'Castell Furi,' or 'Fury,' a name for which no better explanation than the Roman 'Furius' has been suggested.
Note. – Castell is not named by Edward Lhuyd amongst the notable houses of the parish at the end of the 17th century, but in a version of Brut y Tywysogion is the entry: "in this year {A.D. 1331} was first set out the site of a dinas in Bryn Eglwys in Yale" (Hist. MSS. Com.: Cat of Welsh MSS., i, 346; Peniarth 20, fo. 301) (RCAHMW 1914)

The Clwyd Powys Archaeological Trust record catagories this as a Iron Age Hill fort site.

Comments

Dinas could mean any number of things and the suggestion it refers to a fortification seems weak.
The farmhouse is on a minor ridgeway track between two summits either of which could be the site of a small hill fort, although there is no physical evidence for that, and the suggestion seems to be made just to explain the castell place-name. The routeway itself may have been more important in the medieval period, possibly as a drover route, in which case one wonders if the castell name just refers to a safe place for drovers to rest overnight.
The dinas is, in the opinion of Gatehouse unlikely to ever have refered to a fortification for which there can have been no real need at this location in peaceful C14 Wales. There is a suggestion the parish church of Bryneglwys was in an enclosure (although in the context of possible early origins) (see (Clwyd Powys Archaeological Trust HER 105947) but Gatehouse wonders if this dinas was a failed attempt to establish a borough here.