Ghost islands
A murky humid afternoon walk on the coast musing on the Cantre'r Gwaelod "Bottom Hundred", the lands lost to the sea, according to Welsh mythology, off Cardigan Bay. Legends ascribe the failure to close a vital sluicegate to drunken carousing on the part of the one responsible...
Fragmentary causeways and submerged church bells play their part in the mythology but now a 13th century map appears to confirm the existence of two genuine islands off the Welsh coast that have disappeared, according to a couple of academics.
It is of course not a little ironic that the ancient tale, whether myth or reality, is being repeated as the sea level rises in response to the climate crisis. The small coastal community of Fairbourne in North Wales is set to be the first in the UK to be abandoned owing to predicted inundation rendering the village uninhabitable by 2054.
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