St Llwchaiarn's Church

St Llwchaiarn's Church at Llanllwchaiarn stands on rising ground overlooking the River Severn, just to the north-east of the town of Newtown, in the historic county of Montgomeryshire in Powys, mid-Wales. Though the present building is a Georgian church of the early nineteenth century, it stands on a site of great antiquity, within an almost circular churchyard shaded by ancient yews — the hallmark of a church founded in the very earliest age of Welsh Christianity. Dedicated to an obscure Celtic saint and now home to a fine medieval screen rescued from another church, St Llwchaiarn's gathers fourteen centuries of Welsh history into one building above the Severn.

The church is dedicated to St Llwchaiarn, a saint of the sixth century who was also the patron of the neighbouring parish of Llanmerewig and of two parishes in Ceredigion. Little certain is known of his life, but the sixteenth-century Welsh poet Siôn Ceri recorded the feats and miracles attributed to him — including the slaying of a dragon and the causing of a hind to leap into a pool of water — the kind of legends that gathered around the early Welsh saints. The strongest evidence for the church's great antiquity, however, lies in its setting: the original churchyard is a raised, almost circular enclosure, full of ancient yew trees, and the combination of such a churchyard with an early saint's dedication strongly suggests that a church was founded here in the sixth or seventh century, in the age of the saints.

The church first appears in the written record in the thirteenth century, listed in the great church valuation of 1254 as the church of Llanllwchaiarn, valued at a little over a pound; in 1263 part of it was appropriated to the Cistercian nunnery at Llanllugan, and by 1291 its value had risen. For many centuries a medieval church stood on the site, and we have a rare glimpse of its appearance thanks to the antiquary Thomas Pennant, who in 1795 commissioned the artist John Ingleby to paint two watercolours of the old church for a revised edition of his Tour in Wales. These views — now in the National Library of Wales, and apparently the only images of the old church in existence — show a medieval building with an internally supported bell-tower, before it was swept away.

The present church was built on the old site in 1815, at a cost of £1,200 — a simple and dignified Georgian brick church with a square tower, in the plain classical manner of its age. In 1864 a chancel and vestry were added, and in more recent times the church has acquired a treasure from elsewhere: in 2011 the fine carved medieval rood screen from the old St Mary's Church in Newtown — the former parish church of the town, now a ruin — was re-positioned in St Llwchaiarn's, bringing a piece of late-medieval Welsh craftsmanship into the Georgian church and saving it for future generations.

Today St Llwchaiarn's continues as an active church of the Church in Wales, serving its parish within the community of Newtown with Llanllwchaiarn. Its ancient circular churchyard, its Georgian church and its medieval screen make it a place of real interest, and its position above the Severn gives it fine views over the valley and the town.

The church stands above the River Severn near Newtown, the largest town in Montgomeryshire and a place of great historical importance. Newtown was the birthplace of Robert Owen, the pioneering social reformer, factory owner and father of the cooperative movement, who is commemorated in the town's Robert Owen Museum; it grew prosperous on the Welsh flannel and textile trade, and its riverside setting in the broad valley of the Severn is one of the most attractive in mid-Wales. The Montgomeryshire countryside, the Severn valley, the historic house of Gregynog, and the wider Welsh Marches are all within easy reach.

From a church founded by the Celtic St Llwchaiarn in the sixth or seventh century, through its medieval life and the watercolours that preserve its old appearance, to the Georgian rebuilding of 1815 and the medieval screen rescued and re-set within it, St Llwchaiarn's Church gathers fourteen centuries of Welsh history into one building above the Severn. A church of ancient origin in its circular churchyard, it remains the living parish church of Llanllwchaiarn — a quiet and venerable survival on the rising ground above Newtown.