Banwen is a small village in

Neath Port Talbot Neath Port Talbot ( cy, Castell-nedd Port Talbot) is a Local government in Wales#Principal areas, county borough in the South West Wales, south-west of Wales. Its principal towns are Neath, Port Talbot, Briton Ferry and Pontardawe. The county bor ...

county borough County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control, similar to the unitary authorities created since the 1990s. An equivalent ter ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

. Banwen is part of the community of Onllwyn along with the village of

Onllwyn Onllwyn () is a small village and community in Neath Port Talbot, Wales, near Seven Sisters. History First developed by the Romans, the local village Banwen is confined to the Roman Road of Sarn Helen. There are two Roman forts and the remai ...

itself and the adjacent

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one or m ...

Dyffryn Cellwen Dyffryn Cellwen is a village in the County Borough of Neath Port Talbot, South Wales. It is situated in the upper Dulais Valley near the junction of the A4109 and A4221 roads, northwest of the smaller settlement of Banwen. It is part of the comm ...

. Banwen is in the Upper Dulais Valley, with views over the southern slopes of the

Brecon Beacons The Brecon Beacons ( cy, Bannau Brycheiniog, ) are a mountain range in South Wales. In a narrow sense, the name refers to the range of Old Red Sandstone peaks which lie to the south of Brecon. Sometimes referred to as "the central Beacons" t ...

. Banwen consists of a single street named Roman Road.

Toponymy

The name ''Banwen'' derives from ''Ban'' (meaning "height" or "summit") and ''Wen'' (meaning "blessed" or "white"). The name occurs frequently throughout the area. (as the name of a class of fields in Brynlloi, an open common

Brynamman Brynamman ( cy, Brynaman) is a village on the south side of the Black Mountain (''Y Mynydd Du''), part of the Brecon Beacons National Park (''Parc Cenedlaethol Bannau Brycheiniog''). The village is split into Upper Brynamman and Lower Brynamman ...

and a farm Cwmgrenig) suggesting an ancient continuity.

History

Copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the fo ...

and

tin Tin is a chemical element with the symbol Sn (from la, stannum) and atomic number 50. Tin is a silvery-coloured metal. Tin is soft enough to be cut with little force and a bar of tin can be bent by hand with little effort. When bent, t ...

were all mined from ancient times, and the settlement became an important station on the Neath-Brecon section of the

Sarn Helen Sarn Helen refers to several stretches of Roman road in Wales. The route, which follows a meandering course through central Wales, connects Aberconwy in the north with Carmarthen in the west. Despite its length, academic debate continues as t ...

Roman road along the Pyrddin valley. During the Roman occupation, a fort named Ricus was established on the valley floor along with a very large Roman marching camp nearby.

Saint Patrick

The village is notable for the tradition that it was the birthplace of

Saint Patrick Saint Patrick ( la, Patricius; ga, Pádraig ; cy, Padrig) was a fifth-century Romano-British Christian missionary and bishop in Ireland. Known as the "Apostle of Ireland", he is the primary patron saint of Ireland, the other patron saints be ...

. This is supported by the writings most widely attributed to him, ''The Confession of St, Patrick'', in which the saint gives his birthplace as ''Banavem Taburniae'' or ''Banna Venta Berniae'' on the west coast of Britain. Both names are possible

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

cognates for the

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language * Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Fo ...

name ''Banwen''.

Eoin MacNeill Eoin MacNeill ( ga, Eoin Mac Néill; born John McNeill; 15 May 1867 – 15 October 1945) was an Irish scholar, Irish language enthusiast, Gaelic revivalist, nationalist and politician who served as Minister for Education from 1922 to 1925, Ce ...

argued that this was more likely than other purported birth places in Northern Britannia, as "The western coasts of southern Scotland and northern England held little to interest a (Irish) raider seeking quick access to booty and numerous slaves, while the southern coast of Wales offered both. In addition, the region was home to

Uí Liatháin The Uí Liatháin (IPA: �iːˈlʲiəhaːnʲ were an early kingdom of Munster in southern Ireland. They belonged the same kindred as the Uí Fidgenti, and the two are considered together in the earliest sources, for example ''The Expulsion of th ...

and possibly also

Déisi The ''Déisi'' were a socially powerful class of peoples from Ireland that settled in Wales and western England between the ancient and early medieval period. The various peoples listed under the heading ''déis'' shared the same status in Gaeli ...

settlers during this time". MacNeill also stated the etymology of the village made it the prime contender, but acknowledged the possibility of a transcription error. Banwen was also stated to be Patrick's probable place of birth in ''Life of St. Patrick and His Place in History'' by Professor J. B. Bury. The tradition is often given with another tradition that Patrick studied at

Llantwit Major Llantwit Major ( cy, Llanilltud Fawr) is a town and community in Wales on the Bristol Channel coast. It is one of four towns in the Vale of Glamorgan, with the third largest population (13,366 in 2001) after Barry and Penarth, and ahead of Cowb ...

before the eponymous

St Illtud Saint Illtud (also spelled Illtyd, Eltut, and, in Latin, Hildutus), also known as Illtud Farchog or Illtud the Knight, is venerated as the abbot teacher of the divinity school, Bangor Illtyd, located in Llanilltud Fawr (Llantwit Major) in Gla ...

established his college. An annual service is held on the Saint's day at the Maen Padrig Sant (St Patrick's Stone), a memorial stone raised in 2004 alongside the Sarn Helen.

Sport and leisure

Banwen is home to

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

club

Banwen RFC Banwen Rugby Football Club is a rugby union team from the village of Banwen, South Wales. Originally known as Banwen and District they formed in 1947. The club presently play in the Welsh Rugby Union Division Five South Central League and is a fee ...

formed in 1947. Stages of the Wales

Rally GB Wales Rally GB was the most recent iteration of the United Kingdom's premier international motor rally, which ran under various names since the first event held in 1932. It was consistently a round of the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC) calen ...

are held at Walters Arena. The Banwen Miners Hunt was founded in the village in 1962 following the demise of the West Glamorgan hunt. In the early days of the Hunt, the

Duchess of Beaufort {{unreferenced, date=June 2017 Duchess of Beaufort is a title held by the wife of the Duke of Beaufort in the Peerage of England. In 1657 Henry Somerset, 3rd Marquess of Worcester married Mary Capell and in 1682 the dukedom was created by Charle ...

rode amongst the Banwen Miners.

Media

Roman Road in Banwen is featured prominently as a location in ''

The Strike ''The Strike'' (also known as ''Strike!'', although this is more properly the title of the fictitious Hollywood movie featured in the episode) is one of the short comedy films – written by Peter Richardson and Pete Richens, and directed by Ric ...

'', filmed in 1987 for the

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

series '' The Comic Strip Presents...'' and broadcast in January 1988. In 2014 the film ''Pride'' was set and filmed in Banwen and neighbouring Onllwyn. On 30 August 2020, Banwen was in the news after reports of an illegal rave which attracted 3,000 people took place during the COVID-19 pandemic.

External links

Cwmdulais Historical Societywww.geograph.co.uk : photos of Banwen and surrounding area

References

{{authority control Villages in Neath Port Talbot Dulais Valley