Esgair Gorlan

Nearest town:
Aberystwyth (15km WSW)
OS reference:
SN72848261
OS sheet:
135
Latitude:
52° 25' 34.53 N
Longitude:
3° 52' 13.29 W
Added to TMA by

Images

Image of Esgair Gorlan (Round Cairn) by GLADMAN

So, definitely a cairn, then. Remnants of internal structure are also evident. Esgair Nant-y-Moch, featuring a possible further monument, rises beyond

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Dec 24, 2023
Image of Esgair Gorlan (Round Cairn) by GLADMAN

Anywhere else this was not ideal weather... but for Pumlumon, absolutely fine.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Dec 24, 2023
Image of Esgair Gorlan (Round Cairn) by GLADMAN

Looking across what was in fact a substantial monument. The enigmatic Disgwylfa Fawr – the ‘Watching Place’ – rises to the approx Northeast.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Dec 24, 2023

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Miscellaneous

Esgair Gorlan
Round Cairn
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Dec 24, 2023

The elevated ridges of Esgair Gorlan and Esgair Nant-y-Moch stand to the (approx) south of the enigmatic Pumlumon outlier Disgwylfa Fawr (the ‘Watching Place’) and, as such, are well worth a wander in their own right when events/weather/downright exhaustion conspire against a more challenging outing. Although nothing is indicated upon current OS mapping, prehistoric upland cairns are to be found here. Well, this is Pumlumon, after all. What else did you expect?

I parked up beside the ford overlooked by the cairn namechecking the Nant Geifaes, following the stony byway heading southwest into the hinterland.

Coflein reckons the following:

“Located on a summit on the eastern side of Esgair Gorlan is a robbed round cairn. It is a turf-covered stony mound measuring 9.5m in diameter and 0.5m high but higher on the south-west where spoil from a central hollow has been piled up. The hollow measures 4m long (NW-SE) by 1.5m across and 0.4m deep. It was presumably the site of a cist, or at least thought to be, though its stony base may point to a cist cut into the old land surface.” [D.K.Leighton, RCAHMW & R.S. Jones, Cambrian Archaeological Projects, 29 May 2015]

Note that there is – unbeknown to me at the time of my visit – another cairn surmounting the western summit of Esgair Gorlan at SN7241082620. Another time, perhaps?

Sites within 20km of Esgair Gorlan

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