Cymraeg

Historic Landscape Characterisation

Mawddach - Area 2 Dinas Oleu rocky heights(PRN 18332)

 

 

Historic background

The four and a half acres of wild headland known as Dinas Oleu was gifted to the National Trust (the Trust's first property, in fact) in 1895 by Mrs Fanny Talbot, a Barmouth resident and great benefactor. Mothers would take children with whooping cough up on to Dinas Oleu to benefit from the sea air. There is reputed to be a late prehistoric defended enclosure here (hence the name), but traces of it are very difficult to make out.

Key historic landscape characteristics

Rocky headland, National Trust property

This character area corresponds almost exactly with a SSSI (CCW ref. SSSI Barmouth hillside' 31WMP), first designated in 1953 and since revised, which extends to 66ha. It is a nationally important geological site which exposes an almost continuous rocky section from the upper part of the Rhinog Grits, through the Hafotty Formation, Barmouth Grits and into the Gamlan formation, all of which are rocks which belong to the Harlech Grits Groups and which date from the lower-middle Cambrian period.

The locality is of particular interest for its clear demonstration of the above, thick clastic sequence, while approximately a third of the area is covered by woodland, including an area of sessile oak on the western seaboard.

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