Qualla: Aberarth

Aberarth: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit William M. Connolley (talk)., Public domain. There is, in the parish church of Llanddewi Aberarth, on a hillside half a mile south of the village, a single stone of irregular shape secured to the wall inside the front door. It is the only Viking hogsback stone ever found in Wales. There is no plaque to tell you. There is no fanfare. You can walk past it without realising what it is. Hogsbacks are Scandinavian grave-markers of the tenth and eleventh centuries, found mostly in northern England and the Hebrides. They mark places where Scandinavian-influenced Christianity put down roots. Why one is bolted to a wall here, on the Welsh coast, no one quite knows. Aberarth keeps several such quiet riddles.

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Image: William M. Connolley (talk). | Public domain

Aberarth: Bath Stone for Strata Florida

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sjemms, Public domain. The village sits at the mouth of the River Arth, between Aberystwyth and Cardigan, on the southern end of Cardigan Bay. It was founded around the time of the Norman invasion, and the Normans soon built Dinerth Castle a little way up the river valley to keep an eye on the local lo...

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Image: Sjemms | Public domain

Aberarth: A Church on a Ninth-Century Foundation

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Bjenks, CC BY-SA 3.0. Llanddewi Aberarth Church stands on what tradition holds to be a ninth-century site. The present church has a Norman tower; the rest was rebuilt in 1860, during the great Victorian wave of Welsh church restoration. Inside the front door, the Viking hogsback waits. Outside, the ch...

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Image: Bjenks | CC BY-SA 3.0

Aberarth: Shipbuilding, Lost

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Bob Jones, CC BY-SA 2.0. Aberarth was a working ship-building village before 1850. Like dozens of small Cardiganshire harbours and creek-mouths, it produced wooden trading vessels in numbers that, summed across the whole bay, made Cardigan Bay the most productive Welsh region for shipbuilding outside the...

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Image: Bob Jones | CC BY-SA 2.0

Aberarth: Red Kites and a Newsreader's Father

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Man vyi, Public domain. What Aberarth has now is birds and quiet. Red kites, which were reduced to a handful of breeding pairs in mid-Wales in the 1930s, drift over the village in numbers now; the long Welsh conservation effort has been remarkably successful, and the fork-tailed silhouette is a common s...

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Image: Man vyi | Public domain