GYRN, SHEEPFOLD

Site Description On the watershed between the Afon Ffrydlas and the Afon Gam, 3 kilometres north-east of Bethesda and at the junction of many old paths, lies the Gyrn multicellular sheepfold. The sheepfold measures 86m NW-SE by 42m overall, and is set immediately beneath the Gyrn,. It is depicted on the OS County series mapping (Caernarvon. XII NE 1891). One of a number of similar local folds, there is no clear record of when these complicated structures originated. Its size and complexity attest to construction and continuing maintenance by generations of farmers from at least the eighteenth century. Sheep belonging to many farms and sharing a common sheepwalk would be gathered in through the funnelled entrance and sorted, on occasions such as shearing, into the small cells belonging to particular farms. Described in the RCAHMW Caernarfonshire Inventory (1960).


T. Driver, RCAHMW 2012.