Cylchgronau Cymru

254 RHIWAEDOG, YNYS MAEN GWYN, into the interior. There he will find the decorations, like the architectural design outside, Jacobsean; the walls and ceilings of the rooms frescoed with armorial bearings; and the sleeping arrangements in the highest story, under a roof supported by enormous tie-beams, not a little resembling those described in the poem of Iolo Goch on Glendower's mansion at Sycharth, for the repose of bards when his guests. The name of this venerable mansion is Dolau Gwyn, a term that may be Englished as "the bright meadows". From the subjoined document we learn that it was built shortly before 1620, when it is described as " The New House"; and we know from other sources that it was long the abode of a junior branch of the family of Ynys Maengvvyn, and by that connection, as well as by intermarriage with other illustrious houses, held high consideration in the county. Lewis Gwyn, the principal subject of the subjoined document, was a cadet of the ancient stock of Ynys Maengwyn, descended from the renowned Osborn Fitz¬ gerald, or Osbwrn Wyddel (" Osborn the Irishman", as the Welsh called him), albeit a son of an Earl of Decies and Desmond,1 and a scion of the noble stock of the Geraldines, descended from Gerald Fitz-Walter de Windsor, Constable of Pembroke Castle, living in 1108, whose son Maurice, by his wife Nesta, daughter of Rhys ab Tudor, Prince of South Wales, laid the founda¬ tion of the greatness of his house in Ireland by his prowess in the expedition of Richard Strongbow for the conquest of that country, from South Wales, under Henry II. In his own country Osborn had met with a mishap; that is to say, he had slain, in a personal encounter, another Irish Earl,2 and finding for once " discretion to be the better part of valour", had sought refuge in Wales until the storm raised by this escapade should have blown over. 1 John Fitz-Thomas, grantee of Decies and Desmond in 1229, according to Sir William Betham. 2 "Of Clovargin". Tai Croesion MS.