Footbridge across Afon Roe in Rowen - geograph

Rowen is a village on the western slopes of the Conwy valley in the parish of

Caerhun Caerhun ( cy, Caerhûn) is a scattered rural community, and former civil parish, on the west bank of the River Conwy. It lies to the south of Henryd and the north of Dolgarrog, in Conwy County Borough, Wales, and includes several small villages ...

and the former County of Caernarfonshire in Wales. It lies off the

B5106 road B roads are numbered routes in Great Britain of lesser importance than A roads. See the article Great Britain road numbering scheme The Great Britain road numbering scheme is a numbering scheme used to classify and identify all roads in G ...

, between Tal y Bont and the Groes Inn. ''Buildings of Gwynedd'' 2009 refers to the River Roe probably following the Roman route from

to Abergwyngregyn. Rowen has won tidiest village awards several times. In recent times the name of the village has been variously spelled as "Y Wy-Wen" (white river), "Rowen", "Ro-wen" "Roe Wen" and "Roewen". Although the Religious Census of 1851 records the name "Ro-wen", most early 20th-century maps simply use the name "Y Ro",

Welsh Welsh may refer to: Related to Wales * Welsh, referring or related to Wales * Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales * Welsh people People * Welsh (surname) * Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...

for "gravel" or "

pebble A pebble is a clast of rock with a particle size of based on the Udden-Wentworth scale of sedimentology. Pebbles are generally considered larger than granules ( in diameter) and smaller than cobbles ( in diameter). A rock made predominant ...

s". ''Wen'' means "white", or could mean "holy". The Afon Roe, a tributary of the River Conwy, flows through the village. A tributary of Afon Roe is Afon Tafolog, which drains the eastern slopes of

Drum The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a she ...

, a mountain in the Carneddau mountains. In the book ''Crwydro Arfon'' (1959, by Alun Llewelyn-Williams), Rowen is described as "...one of the loveliest villages in Wales" (p. 77). The following poem, called "Llais Afon, Ro" ("Voice of Afon Ro"), was written by G. Gerallt Davies in 1945: And, in 1941 he published "Y Ffynnon": The village has a hotel, Tir y Coed; a pub, Y Tŷ Gwyn; and a memorial hall, but the small primary school closed in 2011. There is a youth hostel on the slope a mile to the west of the village. Social housing came to the village in the 1960s - Llanerch Estate. In the past, the village had a greater significance; it had three mills, and several ale houses and inns. It also had a ''pandy'' or

fulling mill Fulling, also known as felting, tucking or walking ( Scots: ''waukin'', hence often spelled waulking in Scottish English), is a step in woollen clothmaking which involves the cleansing of woven or knitted cloth (particularly wool) to elimin ...

, so woollen cloth must have been made nearby. The village is identified in the Caerhun common enclosure award maps. The award map refers to the creation of the White Hart Road on the mountain above Fotty Gwyn and the Roman bridge, possibly related to the old royal mail coaching days. There are past associations with cattle droving and fairs. Bulkley Mill (completed 1684) is one of the notable old mills of the village. One historic source refers to a mountain cloudburst happening above the village, with properties being lost (probably in the mid-1800s). Nearby is the

Roman road Roman roads ( la, viae Romanae ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, and were built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Re ...

route through Bwlch-y-Ddeufaen, with its cromlech ''Maen-y-Bardd''. Part of the ''

A Family at War ''A Family At War'' is a British drama Television program, series that aired on ITV (TV network), ITV from 1970 to 1972. It was created by John Finch and made by ITV Granada, Granada Television for ITV. The original producer was Richard Doubled ...

'' series (Granada TV) was filmed here.

Interesting local buildings

* Ty Pandy - the original woollen or fulling mill c.1800 and modified in Victorian times; still has a mill race and mill pond fed by the river * Pen-y-Bont 'By the Bridge' - c.16th century, river stone cottage; possibly the oldest building in the village * Seion Methodist Chapel and Vestry - 1841 * Former Seion Chapel - 1819 * Llannerch y Felin - Elizabethan Snowdonia-type house * Bodafon and Fronfa - houses adjacent to the former post office with old Georgian style porches since removed; stables/store below * Llais Afon - large village terrace house (formerly two houses) with original sash windows and a former carpenter's workshop to the side; * Coed Mawr Hall - probably mid-19th-century * Rock House - large house above Coed Mawr Hall * Tan yr Onnen cottage with dated gate stoneFrancis Frith site - post card view from the 1960s
/ref> * Glyn Isa - 17th-century country house * Gilfach - with lovely gardens * Y Swan - old village inn, now a house * The old cobbler's shop facing the road (near Ty Gwyn) * Pandy - the manor (historically, Pandy was Lord of the Manorial ) * Bulkeley Mill - old mill property

Local connections

* G. Gerallt Davies - poet and writer; Pengwern *

Huw T. Edwards Huw Thomas Edwards (19 November 1892 – 8 November 1970) was a Welsh trade union leader and politician. Early life Edwards was born in Rowen near the top of Tal-y-fan Mountain, North Wales. He was the youngest of seven children, all of whom ...

- politician, poet and writer; Tros fy Tresi; see village plaque * Edward Nefydd Evans - gardener, nurseryman and plantsman; born in Rowen in the 1930s; left in spring 2015, after 85 years * Harriet and Jack Evans - from Llannefydd/Llansannan in the 1930s * Isoline Gee - Gilfach * Arthur Tysilio Johnson - plantsman and garden writer; 1930s; ''A Woodland Garden in Wales'' *

Margaret Lacey Margaret Brackenbury Lacey (26 October 1911 – 4 October 1988) was a British character actress and ballet teacher. She appeared in over 30 films between 1957 and 1985, usually playing a sweet old lady or motherly figure in minor roles. Early ...

- actress, ballet teacher and film star in the 1960s - 70s; ''I'm All Right Jack'' * Kyffin Roberts - Wern; Tyddyn Robin, Llanbedr *

Wyn Roberts, Baron Roberts of Conwy Ieuan Wyn Pritchard Roberts, Baron Roberts of Conwy, PC (10 July 1930 – 13 December 2013) was a Welsh Conservative politician. His father was a Minister in a chapel in Llansadwrn, Anglesey, and they lived in the schoolhouse. He was Member of ...

* H. G. Williams - writer * Scriven Williams.

References

External links

www.geograph.co.uk: photos of Rowen and surrounding areaRowen village community website
{{authority control Caerhun Villages in Conwy County Borough Villages in Snowdonia