Gwyddfarch

Gwyddfarch was a hermit and founder of a Celtic abbey at Meifod in Wales.^[1]

He was a son of Amalarus^[2] and disciple of Saint Llywelyn at Welshpool. About 550 AD he founded a monastery^[3] at Meifod. This establishment became the mother church of several other monasteries and was a centre of the order for over one thousand years, and within a generation the monastery had become a centre of pilgrimage.

Gwyddfarch taught Tysilio,^[4] who replaced him as abbot.^[5][6]

Legend holds that near the end of his life Tysilio talked the aging abbot out of a pilgrimage to Rome.^[7] He died about the year 610.^[8]

He is commemorated on 3 November.^[9]