Din-Gonwy, cantref of Rhôs, North Wales, 835 AD
Din-Gonwy, cantref of Rhôs, North Wales, 835 ADIolyn ap Celyn sat close to his hearth, warming his old bones against the chill of the estuary’s damp air. The snowy-white hair tied back in a knot contrasted with his lively dark eyes. He had once been lauded as a fierce warrior and later, using the spoils of victory, as a breeder of Welsh Black cows. At its peak, he boasted a herd of 120 cattle. After the bovine plague of 810, his family fortune changed. The herd, if he could call it that now, consisted of seven cows. These were hard times, but while his son, Drystan, whose name meant sorrow because Iolyn’s wife had died in childbirth, scraped a living as a fisherman, and the elderly housebound man, for some while, had brooded on more challeng
