Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
FIG
94.
Populations of razorbills are recovering after a decline in numbers. (Harold Grenfell)
BURRY HOLMS
Burry Holms, the name derived from the Old Scandinavian word for an island,
holm
, is also rich in wild
flowers and seabirds (Fig. 95). Like Worms Head the island is cut off by the sea at around half-flood. On
the Llangennith Tithe Map, dating from the 1840s, it is marked as 'Holmes Island', and it was also men-
tioned as an island in a charter of 1195. At their highest point on the western side the cliffs reach a height
of some 30 metres.
There is an important early Mesolithic site on the island, which has been excavated over a number of
years as part of a research project by the National Museum. The excavations are producing a rich variety
of flints, and a later prehistoric roundhouse has also been found. An investigation of a small Bronze Age
barrow on the summit many years ago produced a bronze pin. There are also ruins of a monastic settle-
ment and an Iron Age promontory fort, consisting of a single bank and ditch, bisects the island (Fig. 96).
Excavations have shown that the earliest structure below the medieval ruins was a timber church situated
within a small stone-walled enclosure resembling an Irish 'cashel'. Two similar structures exist nearby,
but have not been excavated. The sixth-century saint, St Cenydd, has strong associations with this area
and there are several fourteenth- and fifteenth-century references to hermits using the chapel of 'Kenyth
at Holmes'. The medieval ruins may represent a centre of pilgrimage connected with his memory (Fig.
97). Once there was an automatic lighthouse on the island, but this was decommissioned and removed in
1966.
