Gweirca ferch Owain facts for kids

Gweirca ferch Owain was a Welsh noblewoman who lived a long time ago, during the Middle Ages. She was the granddaughter of a powerful Welsh leader named Madog ap Gruffydd Maelor. Her father was Owain ap Gruffydd ap Madog.

Gweirca's Life and Burial

Gweirca passed away in the year 1290. She was buried at a special place called Valle Crucis Abbey. This abbey is near a town called Llangollen in Wales. Her grandfather, Madog ap Gruffydd Maelor, had actually started this abbey.

Her Special Grave Slab

Gweirca's grave has a very old stone slab on top of it. This stone is important because it's the oldest dated grave slab found in north Wales. Even though the stone is old and broken, we can still see some cool details.

The slab has an inscription written inside a border. Around the inscription, there's a narrow band of decoration. You can see the top parts of two animals. Their heads are facing away from each other, and their tails are twisted together in a fancy way with two circles. The bottom part of the stone has more twisted patterns.

The words on the stone are in Latin, an ancient language. They say:

HIC IACET GWEIRCA FILIA OWENI ... PPICIETVR... AME...E ADO MCC LXXXX

This means:

Here lies Gweirca, daughter of Owain... (may God) have mercy... on her soul... AD 1290

A historian named Peter Lord says that Gweirca's grave slab is the "earliest-dated Welsh memorial of any kind." This means it's the oldest dated monument in Wales that remembers someone.