Qualla: Ysbyty Ifan

Ysbyty Ifan: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit N Chadwick, CC BY-SA 2.0. The name is itself the story. Ysbyty Ifan means John's Hospital, after Saint John the Baptist, patron of the Knights Hospitaller who ran a refuge here from sometime in the late medieval period until the order was suppressed in 1540. The pilgrims they cared for were walking the long Welsh routes - between Bangor-on-Dee and Holyhead, between Bardsey Island and St Davids, between the Cistercian abbeys of Aberconwy and Cymer. Today, the village holds 196 people and a single stone bridge across the upper Afon Conwy. The traffic has gone elsewhere. The name remains.

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Image: N Chadwick | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ysbyty Ifan: The Hospitallers' Refuge

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit N Chadwick, CC BY-SA 2.0. The Knights Hospitaller, formally the Order of Saint John, were a military religious order originating in Jerusalem in the 11th century. They built a network of hospitals and hostels across Europe to care for pilgrims and the sick. Their Welsh house at Ysbyty Ifan sat at a crucia...

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Image: N Chadwick | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ysbyty Ifan: The Man Who Carried the Standard at Bosworth

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jeremy Bolwell, CC BY-SA 2.0. Rhys Fawr ap Maredudd - Rhys the Great, son of Maredudd - was a local nobleman who became a kingmaker by accident of geography. In 1485 he served Henry Tudor at the Battle of Bosworth, where Richard III was killed and the Wars of the Roses effectively ended. Tradition holds that ...

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Image: Jeremy Bolwell | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ysbyty Ifan: Lincoln's Roots

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Richard Law, CC BY-SA 2.0. There is a derelict farmhouse called Bryn Gwyn on the edge of the village. Once, in the 17th century, it was the home of a man called John Morris. His daughter joined a group of Quakers and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Several generations later, her descendant Abraham Lincoln, son ...

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Image: Richard Law | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ysbyty Ifan: The National Trust's Largest Estate

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Richard Law, CC BY-SA 2.0. The land around the village is now the Ysbyty Ifan Estate, the largest single estate managed by the National Trust. Its 8,000 hectares cover moorland, river valleys, hill farms, and the Migneint - an area of upland blanket bog designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest. ...

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Image: Richard Law | CC BY-SA 2.0

Ysbyty Ifan: Two Hundred People and a Village Eternal

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit David Medcalf, CC BY-SA 2.0. Almost 80% of the village's residents speak Welsh, according to the 2011 census. The primary school has two classrooms. The rugby pitch sits next to the playground. Tomos Prys, a 17th-century buccaneer who wrote poetry between voyages, lies buried in the churchyard. Siôn Dafydd B...

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Image: David Medcalf | CC BY-SA 2.0