Garth Hill (usually called The Garth, or Garth Mountain, ''Mynydd y Garth'' in Welsh) is a

hill A hill is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain. It often has a distinct summit. Terminology The distinction between a hill and a mountain is unclear and largely subjective, but a hill is universally considered to be not a ...

located in between the communities of

Llantwit Fardre Llantwit Fardre ( cy, Llanilltud Faerdref) is a large village and community (and electoral ward) situated on the A473, Pontypridd to Bridgend, road near the Welsh towns of Pontypridd and Llantrisant. Llantwit Fardre is also the name of the ol ...

and

Pentyrch Pentyrch ( cy, Pen-tyrch) is a village and community located on the western outskirts of Cardiff, the capital city of Wales. The village gives its name to a Cardiff local authority electoral ward, Pentyrch, which covers the village and immediat ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

. The Garth can be seen from nearly the whole of the city of

Cardiff Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...

and the Taff Valley, and on a sunny, clear day as far as

Weston-super-Mare Weston-super-Mare, also known simply as Weston, is a seaside town in North Somerset, England. It lies by the Bristol Channel south-west of Bristol between Worlebury Hill and Bleadon Hill. It includes the suburbs of Mead Vale, Milton, Oldmix ...

across the Bristol Channel in southwest England. It lies adjacent to the Taff Vale with the village of

on one side and looks down onto the small villages of

Gwaelod-y-Garth Gwaelod-y-garth ( Welsh for ''Foot of the Garth'') is a village in the community of Pentyrch, Cardiff in Wales. Location Gwaelod-y-garth is located in Taff Valley at the foot of Garth Hill, north of central Cardiff and south of Pontypridd ...

and

Taff's Well Taff's Well () is a semi-rural village, community and electoral ward located at the south easterly tip of Rhondda Cynon Taf, to the north of Cardiff, the capital city of Wales. Known locally as the 'Gates to the Valleys', it is separated from Gwa ...

. The Garth has a number of

tumuli A tumulus (plural tumuli) is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds or ''kurgans'', and may be found throughout much of the world. A cairn, which is a mound of stones built ...

on its top. These are burial sites dating from the early to middle

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...

. Fine views of Cardiff and the Taff valley are obtained from the prominent crag. The Garth has a sister hill, the Lesser Garth. The Lesser Garth is of

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

, which is extensively quarried with much of the hill removed; it was also formerly mined for iron ore. The valley between the two is eroded in softer

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

measures, shales in the main, while the Garth is formed of the resistant

Pennant sandstone The Pennant Measures is the traditional name for a sequence of sedimentary rocks of the South Wales Coalfield. They were also referred to as the Upper Coal Measures and assigned to the Westphalian 'C' and Westphalian 'D' stages of the Carbonife ...

formation. Until the 19th century, the valley and the lower slopes of the Garth facing Taff's Well were full of small

coal mine Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

s which fed the ironworks below in the

River Taff The River Taff ( cy, Afon Taf) is a river in Wales. It rises as two rivers in the Brecon Beacons; the Taf Fechan (''little Taff'') and the Taf Fawr (''great Taff'') before becoming one just north of Merthyr Tydfil. Its confluence with th ...

valley, opposite

. There is now little trace of these although ''Y Lan Colliery'' has recently had its portal partly restored as a memorial to an explosion in 1875. A cleared path now leads to this, near the primary school. The access road to Pentyrch village, Heol Goch, runs between the main and lesser Garth.

Christopher Monger Christopher Monger (born 1950, in Taffs Well, Cardiff, Wales) is a Welsh screenwriter, director and editor, best known for writing and directing '' The Englishman who Went up a Hill but Came down a Mountain'' and writing the HBO biopic ''Temple ...

, a native of Taff's Well, wrote the novel ''

The Englishman who Went up a Hill but Came down a Mountain ''The Englishman who Went up a Hill but Came down a Mountain'' is a 1995 romantic comedy film with a story by Ifor David Monger and Ivor Monger, written and directed by Christopher Monger. It was entered into the 19th Moscow International Film F ...

''. The location of the fictional ''Ffynnon Garw'' above the writer's home

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...

suggests that it is the Garth and the mound on which the

trigonometrical point A triangulation station, also known as a trigonometrical point, and sometimes informally as a trig, is a fixed surveying station, used in geodetic surveying and other surveying projects in its vicinity. The nomenclature varies regionally: they ...

stands is a Bronze Age

burial mound Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

. Monger adapted the story for the 1995 film of the same title on which he was the

director Director may refer to: Literature * ''Director'' (magazine), a British magazine * ''The Director'' (novel), a 1971 novel by Henry Denker * ''The Director'' (play), a 2000 play by Nancy Hasty Music * Director (band), an Irish rock band * ''D ...

. The popularity of the film has resulted in a stream of visitors climbing to the summit of Garth Mountain to view the location.

References

External links

*{{commons-inline Mountains and hills of Cardiff Marilyns of Wales