St Athan, Glamorgan Beggars Bush ?

A local website says “Driving west to Cowbridge, you pass through Beggars Pound before leaving the village. Its name on the 1885 village map is Beggars Bound. The name as also been recorded in the past as Beggars Pond, Beggars Bond, Beggars Well, Beggars Bush and Beggars Field. Within Beggars Pound are St John’s Well, and nearby Howell’s well.  These Wells are believed to be of mediaeval origin, possibly earlier.  The Wells are where travellers watered their horses and villagers got their daily drinking and washing water.“

The name is fluid and I have not been able to date the Beggars Bush or the other variants. The site is now shown on the OS Map as Beggars Pound and being a dip in the road. OS maps show it as Beggars Bound from 1878 until 1921. Beggars Pound first appears on an OS map in 1943.

Richard Morgan informs me:

“This is recorded in a 19th century triban: ‘Fi wela East ‘Berddawan, / A’r Britwn wrtho’i hunan, / Fi wela fferm fawr Castledown / A Beggars’ Pound Sain Tathan’ late 19cent Tribannau Morgannwg, ed. Tegwyn Jones (Llandysul 1976)no.560, p.178. This is rendered as ‘Fi wela i Ist Berddawan / A Brithwn wrtho i hunan / Fi wela fferm fawr Castletown / A begars pownd Sain Tathan’ <kimkat.org, no.102>. I translate this as ‘I see East Aberthaw, and Burton beside it. I see the great farm of Castleton and St Athan’s Beggars Pound’. Quite what a beggars pound was is difficult to say. I have not looked at the area but I wonder if it was a ‘small animals-pound’ (‘beggarly in size, insignificant’) or ‘miserable pound’.”

There is another Beggars Bush nearby in Cowbridge.

The Oath at Beggars Bush shows the use of the phrase in Glamorgan in the seventeenth century.

Source

St Athan Village website

Thanks

Richard Morgan

Posted: October 9th, 2011 | Filed under: Places | Tags: Glamorgan, The Oath | No Comments »