I'm never happier than when I'm on an archaeological site and given time to explore and then to sit and imagine what motivated the people who constructed it - and this site is a beauty.
It is
Tre'r Ceiri, an Iron Age hill fort on the
Llŷn peninsula
in Gwynedd, north Wales. The name, meaning 'town of the giants', is appropriate: it was built on a huge scale.
Within its massive walls lie some 150 stone buildings, all with thick walls of stone. They would have had roofs of either turf or thatch supported on wooden beams.
The earliest remains are of a Bronze Age cairn but during the Iron Age
Tre'r Ceiri became a fort housing about 100 people in round houses. In Roman times it was expanded to become a large fortified village with some 400 inhabitants. Over time the style of building changed, from round to rectangular houses, some of which were subdivided into rooms. The site was abandoned towards the end of the Roman occupation of Britain, around 400AD.
Many thanks to Rachael and Ben for taking me to see
Tre'r Ceiri, and for organising a day of very un-Welsh weather.
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