First published on Thu 29 Apr 2021 05.37 EDT
Most of the hundreds of thousands of visitors who hike to the top of Wales’s highest mountain each year know it as Snowdon. But a task group is to examine whether this English moniker should be ditched and only its Welsh name – Yr Wyddfa – used.
A motion was brought by the county councillor John Pughe Roberts calling for the Snowdonia National Park Authority to refer to the mountain only by its Welsh name and also to drop “Snowdonia” in favour of the Welsh Eryri.
Roberts told the Guardian on Thursday he felt it was important that old Welsh placenames were not lost, and the park authority needed to set an example. “If you lose the old names, you lose the heritage, you lose all the things that lie behind that name. If you lose the name, you lose an important part of the history of the area.”
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A campaign is underway to call Snowdon by its original Welsh name, ‘Yr Wyddfa’
29 April 2021 • 1:18pm
View of Snowdon, or ‘Yr Wyddfa’, its original Welsh name
Credit: iStock/Getty
“Get your coats, kids, we’re heading to Yr Wyddfa.”
“Er, wheredfa?”
To English speakers, ‘Yr Wyddfa’ doesn’t have quite the same ring to it as ‘Snowdon’, with all its icy, windswept evocations. But a campaign is underway to reclaim the name of Wales’s highest peak, so we ought to get used to it.
A representative for the Gwynedd county council has urged Snowdonia National Park Authority to ditch its English name in favour of its Welsh origins. (Not for the first time, as this Telegraph article dated from 2003 attests.)
BBC News
Published
image copyrightGetty Images
image captionSnowdon - or Yr Wyddfa - is the highest mountain in Wales at 3,560ft (1,085m)
Wales highest mountain could only be called by its Welsh name under plans being considered by park authorities.
It follows a motion brought by a Gwynedd county councillor that Snowdonia National Park authorities be asked to only refer to the mountain as Yr Wyddfa, and Snowdonia as Eryri.
The mountain in Snowdonia National Park stands at 3,560ft (1,085m) and attracts about 400,000 walkers a year.
But the park authority said a task group would consider the proposal.
Snowdonia National Park Authority (SNPA) said the motion was not discussed at a meeting on Wednesday as it would be considered by its task group, set up to adapt guidelines on the use of Welsh place names.
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Share The same should apply to Yr Wyddfa - never to use the name Snowdon for it again.
Councillor John Pughe Roberts, 58, who represents Corris and Mawddwy as an independent on Gwynedd county council, is set to bring the motion forward
Yesterday the farmer, who said he had never belonged to a political party or Welsh language campaign group, explained his thinking as being all down to respect.
He said: Members of the authority complain about people coming here and changing house names to English ones. I say we should lead by example. I m proud of being a Welshman and it s my first language so I say we should respect it.