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Glascoed Meifod

Nearest town: Welshpool

Site type: garden

Access: Private

Church name:

Diocese:

County: Powys

Country: Wales

Grid ref: SJ1433112303

Lost yew site: No

Date visited: 12/5/2009

Recorded by: Allen Meredith

Protection & responsibility: Owner

Yews recorded at this site: Notable

Notes: Now a private garden. There are yews visible from the main road, growing close to what appears to be a black and white timbered house. But it seems that this site might have been known about for centuries. Pugh's 1816 Cambria Depicta (Tour through north Wales) is reported to contain the following:"About 2 miles off Meifod I crossed some meadows to see a yew-tree which, from the road, appeared very formidable, and so indeed it proved on a nearer examination. Not being able to reach the medium thickness, I measured the smaller circumference, which I found to be twenty-one feet. A traditional story among the country people, says, that in early times there was an attempt to build a church on the very spot where the tree now stands; that they had commenced, but that the workman's labour of the day, it became the devil's amusement to undo; and that his sable majesty persisted in carrying the stones placed in the building to the spot where now stands the church at Meifod, and that at length a voice was heard to pronounce, "Ymma myna ei fod" - "Here shall it be."