Eglwys Gadeiriol St Gwynllyw, Casnewydd, (St Woolos Church) dates from the thirteenth to fifteenth centuries, incorporating some Norman work, and is probably on the site of a fifth to sixth century chapel. It was restored in the nineteenth century and had twentieth century additions and alterations. The unusual plan consists of a west tower connected to the nave by the Chapel of St Mary. There is a south porch, chancel, vestries, and hall. It is of red-brown stone construction with pale ashlar dressings and tiled roofs. The church incorporates a mix of styles including Perpendicular windows in the tower and nave, and a large chancel in twentieth century Gothic style. The church achieved cathedral status in 1949.

The pre-Reformation roofs have been tree-ring dated by RCAHMW as part of the National Dendrochronological Project, and the results reported in Vernacular Architecture 42 (2011):

x. NEWPORT, St Wool(l)os Cathedral (ST 3090 8760)
(a) Nave roof Felling date range: 1402-32
(b) North Aisle roof Felling date range: 1475-1505
(c) South Aisle roof Felling date range: 1487-1517

The church was probably badly damaged during Owain Glyndwr's revolt which laid waste the lordship of Newport in 1402/3. The nave and aisles have a complete set of late-medieval wagon roofs, but the roofs are not identical and are the result of several campaigns of renewal. The rather plain `open' wagon roof of the nave (a) (probably boarded over the rood loft) proved to be the earliest and its date range 1402-32 coincides with the recovery of the town, marked by the renewal of its charter by Humphrey, Earl of Stafford, in 1427. The finer, moulded, aisle roofs (with evidence for boarding in the N aisle) belong to a late-medieval phase or phases of improvement marked by the reconstruction (widening and heightening) of the aisles and the building of the tower, the latter attributed to Jasper Tudor, lord of Newport 1485-95. The S aisle roof (c) dated 1487-1517 probably belongs to the period when Edward, Duke of Buckingham, was lord of Newport 1498-1521. His Stafford badges were formerly in the perp. windows of the S aisle. The N. aisle roof (b) with a date range of 1475-1505 is probably earlier. Four samples from two timbers taken from the original chancel roof now on the nave side of the chancel arch failed to date. Description in John Newman, The Buildings of Wales: Gwent/Monmouthshire (2000), pp. 422-28. Dating commissioned by RCAHMW.

Source:
Richard Suggett, Painted Temples: Wallpaintings and Rood-screens in Welsh Churches, 1200–1800, (RCAHMW 2021), pp. 33.

RCAHMW 2022