Region
Black Mountains
Y Mynyddoedd Duon
Long parallel ridges, deep dry valleys, and a border that has moved so often nobody is entirely sure where the culture line runs.
Four long ridges running north-west to south-east, separated by valleys that are strikingly dry for Wales. The Black Mountains sit across the Powys–Monmouthshire boundary and press up against Herefordshire on the east, which means the border here is not a line but a zone perhaps ten miles wide.
Talgarth and Hay-on-Wye anchor the northern edge. Crickhowell sits at the south-western corner.
What to look for
Long houses. The vernacular tradition here is stone, cruck-framed, with the house and byre under one roof, and enough survive in the valleys to make the pattern obvious once you have seen two or three.
The language line. Radnorshire to the north lost Welsh almost entirely; the valleys south and west held it much longer. The Black Mountains sit right across the transition, and place-names change character noticeably from one valley to the next.
Llangorse Lake on the north-western flank, which holds the only crannog in Wales and the dated royal site of the kingdom of Brycheiniog.
Sources
- Heneb — the Trust for Welsh Archaeology, Historic Landscape Character Assessments covering the Black Mountains.
- Coflein (RCAHMW), the national monuments record for sites within the region.
- Cadw, Cof Cymru designation records for listed buildings and scheduled monuments.
- British Geological Survey, 1:50,000 mapping and memoirs for mid Wales.
- Brycheiniog, journal of the Brecknock Society and Museum Friends.