Dinas Emrys
Coordinates: 53 ° 1 ′ 20 " N , 4 ° 4 ′ 43" W.
Dinas Emrys ( Welsh for "fortress / town of Ambrose") is a rocky, wooded hill that forms a landmark on the valley floor at Beddgelert in north Wales .
Legends
It is of archaeological interest that it is an example of a ring wall , the fortifications of which date from post-Roman times, but which is also related to the legends of King Arthur . It is about the area of the famous exchange between the local ruler Vortigern and the young Ambrosius Aurelianus , which is reported in the Historia Brittonum . Vortigern, following the advice of his advisers, wanted to kill the boy in order to appease the supernatural forces that prevented him from building a fortress here; Ambrose laughed at this advice, and explained that the ring wall could not endure due to a hidden pool containing two vermes - a word that can be translated both as dragon and badger (see the legend Cyfranc Lludd a Llefelys , "The story of Lludd and Llefelys").
Excavations by Savory
It has long been known that there is a pond inside the fort. When the archaeologist HN Savory excavated the mound between 1954 and 1956, however, he was surprised to discover not only that the fortifications actually date from the time of Vortigern or Ambrosius, but also that - as described in the Historia Brittonum - there is a platform above the pool. He found that the platform dated from a later time than assumed in the narrative, so it is not truthful on this point. The question of the extent to which the existence of this platform influenced the narrative or the platform was only built based on the narrative cannot be decided.
Savory described the fortifications as a stone wall between 2.5 and 3 meters thick, taking advantage of every bump in the rocky summit and enclosing an irregular area of about an acre. The original access was a path on a steep slope on the west side of the hill, while the current entrance from the north is a later addition.
Undocumented castle
The most mysterious object on the hill, the base of a rectangular tower, is part of an undocumented 12th century Welsh castle.