Tywyn (; ), formerly spelled Towyn,The local branch of the Royal Air Forces Association still employs the name "Towyn and Aberdovey". is a town, community, and seaside resort on the Cardigan Bay coast of southern Gwynedd, Wales. It was previously in the historic county of Merionethshire. It is famous as the location of the Cadfan Stone, a stone cross with the earliest known example of written Welsh, and the home of the Talyllyn Railway. It has a population of 3264.
History of the name The name derives from the Welsh tywyn ('beach, seashore, sand-dune'). The place-name element tywyn is found in many other parts of Wales, most notably Towyn near AbergeleThe two places now use different spellings, partly for reasons of differentiation. Confusion between the two still occurs, however: Sat-nav mix up leaves pupils in Towyn not Tywyn, BBC News, 19 April 2013. and Porth Tywyn (Burry Port).
In Middle Welsh, the spelling was generally Tywyn. In the Early Modern period, however, the spelling Towyn was common in Welsh in order to reflect a slight variation in pronunciation. That also came to be the usual spelling in English up to the latter part of the twentieth century.
With the standardisation of the orthography of the Welsh language in the first part of the 20th century, the spelling Tywyn became increasingly common in all contexts. In 1967, members of Towyn Urban Council voted to request that the town be officially called Tywyn and in July 1967 this was accepted by Merionethshire County Council. Opponents of the change, however, campaigned against it and held an unofficial plebiscite in Tywyn on 25 May 1968. This plebiscite was not administered by an official body but was organised and financed by tradespeople and the campaign to revert to the spelling Towyn. Those who took part in the vote were asked to decide between Tywyn or Towyn – a large majority of those who voted favoured Towyn. As a result, Tywyn Urban Council (as it had become) requested that the decision to use Tywyn be revisited. In June 1969, this request was declined by Merionethshire County Council and thus the name has remained as Tywyn.
The spelling Tywyn better reflects the name's history and the standard orthography of modern Welsh. Writing in 1967, Melville Richards, the noted toponymist and professor of Welsh at the University College of North Wales, Bangor stated that 'in modern Welsh the form should be uniformly "yw" and therefore, Tywyn is the most acceptable spelling for this name which means a strand or seashore'. In 1974, he further commented: 'Mae'r holl ymrafael ynglŷn â sillebu'r enw wedi codi am fod cryn ansicrwydd ac amrywio yn Gymraeg gynt rhwng y seiniau ow ac yw. Ond yn ddiddadl, Tywyn yw'r ffurf gywir' ('All of the disagreement about spelling the name arises from the historic uncertainty and variation in Welsh between the sounds ow and yw. But, without doubt, Tywyn is the correct form').
In Welsh, the town is sometimes referred to as Tywyn Meirionnydd. In origin, this usage probably refers to the cantref of Meirionnydd, but is now generally understood as referring to the historical county of the same name. In English, during the late nineteenth century and until the middle of the twentieth century, the town was sometimes called Towyn-on-Sea.
History Tywyn was the location of the first religious community administered by the Breton saint Cadfan upon his arrival in Gwynedd in the early 6th century, prior to his departure he founded a monastery on Bardsey Island off the Llŷn Peninsula. The church contains some early material (see below).
Location
The town's historic centre lies about a kilometre from the beach, around St Cadfan's Church. In the second half of the nineteenth century the town expanded considerably, mainly towards the sea.
To the north of the town lie the reclaimed salt marshes of Morfa Tywyn and Morfa Gwyllt, beyond which lie the Broad Water lagoon and the mouth of the Afon Dysynni. To the north-east lie the rich farmland of Bro Dysynni and the village of Bryncrug, and to the east the hills of Craig y Barcud and Craig Fach Goch. To the south towards Aberdyfi is the mouth of the Afon Dyffryn Gwyn and Morfa Penllyn.
The Tywyn coastal defence scheme, officially unveiled on 24 March 2011 by Jane Davidson (then Welsh Assembly Government Minister for Environment, Sustainability and Housing), provides a rock breakwater above the low-tide level, rock groynes, and rock revetment to protect 80 sea-front properties.BBC Online, £10m north Wales tidal flood defences open. The costs of this civil engineering project was £7.62M, shared between the Welsh Assembly Government (£4.135M) and the European Union's Regional Development Fund (£3.485M).Coastal Schemes with Multiple Funders and Objectives FD2635: Case Study Report 13 Tywyn Coastal Defence Scheme (2011).
Language and demography
Until the middle of the twentieth century, Welsh was the main language of Tywyn. The local dialect is of a northern type with some features that are shared with southern dialects. This combinations of features led one Victorian observer to state that three languages were spoken in the town: English, Welsh and 'Tywynaeg'.D. S. Thomas, 'Yr Ail Draethawd', in P. H. Hughes et al. (ed.), Ystyron Enwau ... ym Mhlwyfi Towyn, Llangelynin, Llanfihangel y Pennant, Talyllyn, a Phennal (Caernarfon, 1907), p. 122.
Victorian Tywyn was overwhelmingly Welsh-speaking with English being for most a language learnt in school rather than in the home or on the street. Indeed, in the town's British School in the 1860s, a 'Welsh stick' (a version of the Welsh Not) was used to punish children who were caught speaking Welsh in school.Meirionnydd Archives, Gwynedd Archives Service, Towyn British School Log Book, Merionethshire, 1863–76 , Gathering the Jewels: The website for Welsh heritage and culture According to the 1901 and 1911 censuses, the percentages of Welsh speakers in the Towyn Urban District (as it then was) were 86.5% and 83.5% respectively, with 22.4% and 13.8% recorded as speaking only Welsh.
Welsh remained the dominant language in Tywyn until the middle of the twentieth century. In his book Railway Adventure, L. T. C. Rolt recounts walking up the track of the Talyllyn Railway during the Second World War – on stopping to speak to two elderly railway workers a couple of miles from the town, he found that they didn't understand English. Increased tourism, however, and the impact of the military camps on the outskirts of the town had a significant impact on language use and English came to predominate.
At the time of the 2001 census, 40.5% of the population were recorded as Welsh speakers. By the 2011 census this had decreased to 37.5%. In 2016, an Estyn inspection report of Ysgol Penybyryn, the town's primary school, noted that about 22% of the children at the school came from Welsh-speaking homes.
Tywyn is now a significantly anglicised town, with the majority of its population (52.8%) having been born in England according to the 2011 census. Likewise, slightly more respondents claimed an English-only identity (35.0%) than a Welsh-only identity (33.7%).Census statistics for Tywyn are available at Office for National Statistics, Neighbourhood Statistics: Tywyn Ward.
Transport and tourism
Improved transport links during the 19th century increased Tywyn's appeal as a tourist destination. In the early decades of that century, a creek of the river Dysynni allowed ships to approach the town's northern fringes, where there was a shipbuilding yard. The draining of the salt marsh and the channelling of the river brought this industry to an end,George Smith, (Gwynedd Archaeological Trust Report No.555, 2004), p. 6 and fig. 3. but during the early part of that century the town was made more accessible by building new roads along the coast to Aberdyfi and Llwyngwril.
The railway arrived in the mid-1860s (first as the Aberystwith and Welsh Coast Railway, then as Cambrian Railways), and had a significant effect on the town. Tywyn railway station opened in 1863. The station is still open, and is served by the Cambrian Line.
Bus services are run by Lloyds Coaches. Services run to surrounding towns and villages.
Slate-quarrying in the Abergynolwyn area led to the building in 1865 of the Talyllyn Railway, a narrow-gauge line designed to carry slates to Tywyn. Two stations were opened in the town. Tywyn Wharf railway station was originally opened to enable slates to be unloaded onto a wharf adjacent to the main railway line. It is now the Talyllyn's western terminus and principal station. Pendre railway station was originally the passenger station, and now houses the locomotive and carriage sheds and works.
Notable visitors who stayed at Tywyn in the 19th century include: Thomas Love Peacock (1811, at Botalog)Madden, Mary and Lionel. 1986. 'Edward Scott, Bodtalog, and his literary circle: Thomas Love Peacock, James and John Stuart Mill and William Owen Pughe'. National Library of Wales Journal, 24.3, pp. 352–57. Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe (1818) Ignatius Spencer (1818)Rev. Father Pius a Spiritu Sancto. 1866. The life of Father Ignatius of St. Paul, Passionist (The Hon. & Rev. George Spencer). London 1866, pp. 45–47. Charles Darwin (1819, at Plas Edwards)Lucas, Peter. 2001. 'Three weeks which now appear like three months: Charles Darwin at Plas Edwards'. National Library of Wales Journal, 32.2, pp. 123–46. William Morris (1875)Henderson, Philip. 1950. ed. The Letters of William Morris to his Family and Friends. London: Longmans, p. 69. Elizabeth Blackwell (exact date uncertain, at Brynarfor)Elizabeth Blackwell Letters, c. 1850–1884. Sir Rupert Kettle (who built Glan-y-don as a holiday home in 1866)
The beach and its extensive promenade have long been key attractions. In 1877, a pier was authorised by the and built towards the northern end of the beach, but the structure only lasted a few months.Wilkinson, Jeremy. 1984. Tywyn Pier. Journal of the Merioneth Historical and Record Society, 9.4, pp. 457–71. The street called 'Pier Road', which leads from the town to the beach, offers a suggestion as to its location. The promenade was completed in 1889 at the cost of some £30,000, paid for by John Corbett (1817–1901) of Ynysymaengwyn.
There has been extensive bungalow and caravan development in the vicinity.Simon Jenkins, 2008, Wales: churches, houses, castles, Allen Lane, London, p. 244
Other industries Apart from tourism, agriculture has long been the most important industry in the area. Lead and copper used to be mined in the town's hinterland.
The Marconi Company built a Long Wave receiver station in Tywyn in 1914, working in duplex with the high-power transmitter station near Waunfawr. In 1921 the Tywyn and Waunfawr stations initiated a transatlantic wireless telegraph service with a similar RCA wireless transmitting station in New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA and RCA's receiver station in Belmar, New Jersey. This new transatlantic service replaced Marconi's obsolete transatlantic telegraph station in Clifden, Ireland following its 1922 destruction during the Irish Civil War.Williams, Harri. 1999. Marconi and his wireless stations in Wales. Llanrwst: Gwasg Carreg Gwalch. ; Hogan Jr, John L. A New Marconi Transatlantic Wireless Service. Electrical World, 29 August 1914.