Old Gwernyfed, a medieval manor house extensively rebuilt in the early seventeenth century (nprn 25947), is located to the south-east of Aberllynfi/Three Cocks village, about 3.5km north-east of Talgarth (see 700401).

The house is situated on the south-east edge of a former deer park, later the landscape park to Gwernyfed Park (25575; 86067), which extends north and west from the house. Associated with it are the unusually extensive earthwork and architectural remains of an early seventeenth-century (Elizabethan-Jacobean) formal, terraced garden laid out to the north-west of the house, with walled enclosures to the south and south-east, and three fishponds to the south-west. The gardens were laid out from about 1604.
The present drive approaches the south-east front of the house along a short, formal, tree-lined drive off the Felindre road, through an outer court (25950) and a towered forecourt with a gravelled carriage turn set in grass; the towers (possibly Tudor) once functioned partly as dovecotes (31242 & 405973).

In all, the gardens cover about four acres. The entrance drive runs between two enclosures, the southernmost being a meadow in which a line of limes borders each side of the drive. The other one is the forecourt (405974). To the west there are two more enclosures bounded by walls and hedges, each of about one acre. The first is next to the burnt-out south-west wing of the house, a rectangular area of lawn with cross paths between flower borders and ornamented with trees. The second enclosure, on the south-east, is grassed, the ground sloping up to the south-eastern boundary wall which runs alongside the road. In the east corner is the site of an embanked Victorian duck pond, now overgrown and surrounded by trees.

The layout of the terraces along the north-west front of the house are outlined as low earthworks. The eastern edge of this area falls steeply away to the east, connecting with a series of steep terraces descending the ground slope (25948). To the south-west, the terrace on the north-west front of the house (25949) continues and passes above a series of three fish ponds which descend from south-west to north-east, with a fall of about 6m; they may have originated as pre-existing fishponds (24384). All are rectangular, about 8m by 15m in size and contain water, though the upper pond is overgrown, and are separated by earth dams. The second and third ponds are partly enclosed on their southern sides by what appears to be a relict hedge line. A small, raised platform near the north-west corner of the first pond could have been the site of a summer house or another garden building.

Some of the features were fed by a buried culvert bringing water from Gwernyfed Commons. Extensive parchmarks of the walled elements and drains of the gardens were revealed during Royal Commission aerial reconnaissance in the 2018 drought, and were recorded in July 2018. The information revealed an important addition to the upstanding earthwork evidence.

Sources:
Cadw 1999: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Powys, 112-6 (ref: PGW(Po)5(POW)).
C.S.Briggs & N.Lloyd 2006: Gerddi vol.4, 7-37.
Ordnance Survey six-inch map sheet: Brecknockshire XXIII.NW (editions of 1888 & 1905).
RCAHMW air photos, ref: refs: 2018_5523-5532 (T.G.Driver 19.07.2018).

RCAHMW, 25 August 2022

Cofnod Safle

Old Gwernyfed Formal Gardens, Aberllynfi