BY T.J. GUILE

Ancient Pilgrimage Tradition

There are many holy places in Wales today which have ancient links to ancient British Christian tradition. Bardsey Island off the coast of north Wales, Holywell in north Wales, Pen Rhys in south Wales, and many more. Today, with the increasing popularity of long- or short-distance hiking trails and the revival of pilgrimage, these places are once again becoming the centre of a revived spiritual tradition.

Holywell, North Wales 

Winefride (or Gwenffrewi in Welsh), was a seventh-century Welsh martyr associated with Gwytherin, and is remembered at Holywell, Flintshire. She was said to have been the daughter of a local chief and niece of St. Bueno. Her family connections mean she is sometimes called a princess. Winefride was supposedly pursued by a suitor named Caradoc, but then she told him she had decided to become a nun rather than give in to his advances, or so the story goes. Caradoc was said to have become angry and frustrated and decided to cut off Winefride’s head with his sword.

Versions of the story differ, but one popular version is that her head rolled down the hill, and where it came to rest, a spring gushed forth from the ground. Some pilgrims thought this spring and the well that later developed around it had healing powers. Fortunately, according to one version of the legend, Winefride’s uncle, Bueno, was passing, and managed to heal her and restore her to health.  He then called on the almighty to punish her assailant, Caradoc, who was promptly struck dead on the spot, and the ground conveniently opened up to swallow him. Bueno then sat upon a stone and vowed that if anyone should stand or sit on that spot and three times ask God for help in Winefride’s name, that help would be granted. The stone upon which he made this vow is called Bueno’s Stone and lies in the outer pool of the holy well.

As for Winefride, she carried out her wish to become a nun at Gwytherin in Denbighshire and later rose to be abbess of that convent. She died around 660 AD and was buried at her abbey. From the time of her death Winefride was venerated, and the holy well became a place of pilgrimage.

In 1138, her bones were carried with great ceremony to Shrewsbury Abbey, where her shrine became an extremely popular destination for pilgrims throughout the Middle Ages. It is thought that St. Winefride’s Well has been a destination for pilgrims for over a thousand years, longer than most other Christian sites in the British Isles. The well is contained within a beautiful early sixteenth-century gothic building. This beautiful structure has a bathing pool within a star-shaped inner chamber, joined to a more modern rectangular bathing pool for pilgrims. In the inner pool is St. Bueno’s Stone, taken from the nearby streambed. The spectacular vaulted canopy over the pool was constructed on the orders of Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, and carries elaborate carvings of Tudor family symbols. There are carvings representing St. Winifred in several places and one large carving is set on the ceiling, showing the saint with a staff and a crown upon her head.

Pilgrimages must have begun soon after her death, but the earliest written records of pilgrimages date to the twelfth century, when pilgrims claimed healing from illness after bathing in the waters of the well. Among the treasures on display in the museum are wooden crutches thrown aside by pilgrims after healing. Most visitors focus on the holy well and shrine, but here is also a late fifteenth-century chapel. Thomas Pennant (1726-98) the multitalented naturalist, antiquity, traveller and writer, wrote about the holy well in 1776.

The holy well is still very much a place of pilgrimage with the local sign informing visitors that it is the Lourdes of Wales. St. Winefride’s Day is today celebrated on the third of November. A second festival is celebrated at Holywell on June 22nd which commemorates the day on which her head was said to have been removed and replaced.

Modern Pilgrim Ways in Wales

The medieval pilgrimage route between Cardiff and Penrhys in south Wales was revived in the twentieth century. In 1953, the Catholic Archdiocese of Cardiff erected a new statue of Our Lady, carved from Portland stone, on the site of the medieval Cistercian chapel dedicated to her. It has become once again, a site of pilgrimage associated with Our Lady of Penrhys and a place of great importance to many Welsh Catholics.

The Penrhys Pilgrimage Way is now established as a popular hiking or pilgrimage trail starting from the Welsh capital. The trail is a twenty-one-mile walking route that recreates the historic pilgrimage route between Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff and Penrhys. Today, hikers and pilgrims still walk the paths to the Llyn Peninsula and Bardsey is sometimes a destination for pilgrims. There is now a route called the Pilgrims Way which has been waymarked there from Holywell, the ancient Welsh pool in Flintshire, The route goes via ancient churches, thousand year-old stone crosses, sacred springs and waterfalls. It passes through woodlands and across great rivers, up mountains and along coast paths, along ancient roadways, through wilderness and human settlements. Tiny stone churches nestled into the hills provide shelter and rest along the Way, much as they would have done in the past. The pilgrims must undergo a tricky crossing to Bardsey Island in a simple boat, like so many pilgrims long ago.

Pilgrimages will no doubt continue to attract hikers and pilgrims in the future. Those who love the physical landscape and the beauty of nature are undoubtedly drawn to parts of Wales. Recent waymarked path still links ancient churches and wells dedicated to the saints of the early and later medieval period whose gentle faith and witness combined with the beauty and wonder of nature, still echoes with us today.