Gwyddfarch

Venerable Gwyddfarch was a hermit and the founder of the monastery at Meifod in Montgomeryshire. He was the son of Amalarus, called "prince of the Pwyl" (perhaps Apulia), and a disciple of Saint Llywelyn at Welshpool. About the year 550 he founded the monastery at Meifod, which remained a centre of monastic life and pilgrimage for more than a thousand years. He taught Saint Tysilio, who succeeded him as abbot and, according to legend, talked the aging abbot out of a pilgrimage to Rome. Local tradition says he had a rock bed, Gwely Gwyddfarch, on the hill Gallt yr Ancr, where he also died, around 610; his voice, heard at night after his death, showed the spot for the church of Meifod.

His commemoration is on 3 November.