Mold Cope



In 1736, landowner Nehemiah Griffiths, who lived near Mold, built an obelisk in one of his fields, near the so-called "Goblin's Well". The stone monument he erected included a Latin inscription and was built to commemorate one of the strangest battles having been recorded as taking place in Wales. Legends of the battle dated back centuries and local stories also told of a gold-clad warrior who took part in it and haunted a nearby mound, the so-called "Goblin's Hill". In 1833 the mound was excavated and revealed a golden cope or cloak of fantastic workmanship. While the cope dates from prehistoric times, its story can be explored with a starting point in the last years of Roman Britain and the early years of what would be known as the Dark Ages. That provides the basis of an analysis as to whether the story of the "golden warrior" and the "golden cape" are in fact in any way related. It is perhaps worth noting that some local guidebooks on the subject are particularly ill-informed. One written in 1978 and apparently revised in 2010 states that the "cloak" is "of Etruscan design and probably dated from the Roman-British period". In fact, the cope dates from about 1900-1600 BC and is almost certainly of British origin.

The Collapse of Rome
The collapse of Rome was brought about by a combination of factors. One of these was that the Germanic tribes to the northwest of Europe had undergone massive technological, social, and economic changes after four centuries of border contact with the Roman Empire. From the first to fourth centuries, Germanic populations, economic production, and tribal confederations grew, and their ability to conduct warfare increased to the point of challenging Rome. The Goths, one of the Germanic tribes, had invaded the Roman empire on and off since 238, but in the late 4th century, the Huns began to invade the lands of the Germanic tribes, and pushed many of them into the Roman Empire.

The Roman Empire could no longer defend itself against either internal rebellion or the external threats. In 383, the usurper Magnus Maximus withdrew troops from northern and western Britain, posibly at that stage leaving local warlords in charge. As explained in the article on Elen of the Hosts his story was converted into the confused Welsh legend of Macsen Wledig. Maximus's ambitions led him to invade Italy, resulting in his defeat by Theodosius I at the Battle of the Save in 388. He was then executed by Theodosius. In the view of some historians, his death marked the end of direct imperial presence in Northern Gaul and Britain. However, coins dated later than 383 have been excavated along Hadrian's Wall, suggesting that troops were not all stripped from it my Maximus.

Britain was by this time suffering raids by the Scoti, Saxons, and Picts and, sometime between 396 and 398, Stilicho allegedly ordered a campaign against the Picts, likely a naval campaign intended to end their seaborne raids on the east coast of Britain. He may also have ordered campaigns against the Scoti and Saxons at the same time, but either way this would be the last Roman campaign in Britain of which there is any record. By around the year 400 the provinces of Britain were effectively isolated, lacking support from the failing Roman Empire, and the local military forces set-up and pulled-down a series of emperors as the soldiers supported each in turn. One of these, Constantine III, was a British common soldier who was declared Western Emperor and invaded Gaul in 407, eventually occupying Arles, but in the process probably drained Britain of the last of it's Roman legions. Constantine gained the upper hand after several battles with the forces of the Western Roman Emperor Honorius. As a result, Honorius recognised Constantine as co-emperor in 409. The activities of the invading tribes, raids by Saxons on the near-defenseless Britain and desertions by some of his top commanders led to a collapse of support for Constantine III. After further military setbacks he abdicated in 411. He was either assassinated or captured and executed shortly afterwards. An appeal for help by the British communities was, according to Zosimus, rejected by the Emperor Honorius in 410 AD. In the text called the "Rescript of Honorius" of 411, the Western Emperor Honorius told the British "civitates" to look to their own defence as his regime was still fighting usurpers in the south of Gaul and trying to deal with the Visigoths who were in the very south of Italy.

Chester had been a major Roman base, with outposts stretching along the coast of North Wales to a fort at Holyhead. In addition to material remains the Romans left behind not only the basis for local legends, but evidently some genetic influence around Abergele where DNA evidence shows that people of Balkan origin had probably been settled there in Roman times. As the Romans drew many of their auxiliary troops from the Balkans, this has been taken as evidence that the Romans not only established communities along the North wales coast, but also left many of those communities behind when their administration left. The invaders were to be the Saxons from the east, the Picts from the north and various seaborne peoples from the "Celtic Fringe" of the empire. Wales was to be one of the places where the Roman or post-Roman forces and their church held out longest. In part this was simply due to distance from the sources of the invaders but another important factor was the local topography as this would favour a defender over an invader.

The River Alyn
This particular story centers on Mold, which lies on the River Alyn (Welsh: Afon Alun) a tributary of the River Dee. The Alyn rises at the southern end of the Clwydian hills and the Alyn Valley forms part of the Clwydian Range. The River Alyn crosses the carboniferous limestone from Halkyn Mountain and goes north through the Loggerheads area before heading southeast, passing through Mold before reaching its confluence with the River Dee to the northeast of Wrexham. Between Loggerheads and Rhydymwyn it runs through the Alyn Gorge, (parts of which are also known as the "Devil's Gorge") which is the site of the caves Ogof Hesp Alyn ("Dry Alyn Cave"), Ogof Hen Ffynhonnau ("Poacher's Cave") and Ogof Nadolig ("Christmas Cave"). The river mainly runs across a limestone surface, creating potholes and underwater caves, into which the river flows through some of the summer, when water levels have decreased significantly. For parts of this stretch the river bed is dry for most of the year. Flows in the River Alyn are also significantly affected by mining, particularly the Milwr mine drainage tunnel which diverts a sizeable amount (23 million gallons of water per day) of the River Alyn out of its catchment and into the estuary of the River Dee at Bagillt. The numerous sinks and springs have influenced the development of local legends and the complex sub-surface flows feed St Winefride's spring at Holywell.

It would appear that several elements of local legend are linked to the "Arthur cycle" of legends. St Winefrides well is one of the few locations mentioned by name in the anonymous medieval alliterative poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Various legends have Arthur slaying Hueil mab Caw at Mold or more commonly at Maen Huail in Ruthin.

The Legend of St German


Help for the British came from an unlikely source. St German of Auxerre - who came to britain in 429 and (according to tradition) defeated the Saxons and Picts at a place known as "Maes Garmon" (which is traditionally located near Mold) in the "Battle of the Hallelujahs". The principal source for the events of his life is the Vita Germani, a hagiography written by Constantius of Lyon around 480, and a brief passage added onto the end of the Passio Albani, which may possibly have been written or commissioned by Germanus. Constantius was a friend of Bishop Lupus of Troyes, who accompanied Germanus to Britain, which provided him with a link to Germanus.

Pelagius
Defeating the Saxons and Picts does not seem to have been the main reason why St German (c. 378 – c. 442-448 AD) was in Britain. He had been seent to Britain to refute the heresy of "Pelagianism" in or around 429 AD. Pelagius (c. 355 – c. 420 CE) was a British monk. Put simply, Pelagianism is a heterodox Christian theological position which holds that the original sin did not taint human nature and that humans have the free will to achieve human perfection without divine grace. Pelagius taught that God could not command believers to do the impossible, and therefore it must be possible to satisfy all divine commandments. He also taught that it was unjust to punish one person for the sins of another; therefore, infants are born blameless. The obvious problem which this "heresy" presented for the church was that without "original sin" the good did not need "saving", which usually involved paying money to the church. Pelagianism was decisively condemned at the 418 Council of Carthage and is still regarded as heretical by the Catholic Church.

Around 429, a Gaulish assembly of bishops chose Germanus and Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, to visit the island. It was alleged that Pelagianism was rife among the British clergy, led by a British bishop's son named Agricola. Germanus went to combat the threat and satisfy the Pope that the British church would not break away from the church of Rome. According to the official version Germanus and Lupus confronted the British clergy at a public meeting before a huge crowd in Britain. The Pelagians were described as being "conspicuous for riches, brilliant in dress and surrounded by a fawning multitude". The bishops debated and, despite having no popular support, Germanus was able to defeat the Pelagians using his superior rhetorical skills. It is probably worth noting that this description of Germanus "victory" was written by his own side.

The Battle
The site, now marked by an obelisk, lies at the western end of the easiest valley route (and classic ambush point) through the Clwydian hills. The "Life of St Garmon" describes the events as follows:


 * Meanwhile the enemy had learned of the practices and appearance of the camp. They promised themselves an easy victory over practically disarmed troops and pressed on in haste. But their approach was discovered by scouts and, when the Easter solemnities had been celebrated, the army--the greater part of it fresh from the font--began to take up their weapons and prepare for battle and Germanus announced that he would be their general (dux proelii, "leader for this battle"). He chose some light-armed troops and made a tour of the outworks. In the direction from which the enemy were expected he saw a valley enclosed by steep mountains. Here he stationed an army on a new model, under his own command.

Other Christian missionaries of the period include Patrick who (at least according to legend) landed in the Wirral. A Chester legend (recorded by Phillip Jones) holds that a certain "Gormundus", a "Roman Cap’tayne", had built fortifications at Heronbridge, a former Roman site just upriver from Chester and defeated the “Saxons” in a major battle. It has been suggested that "Gormundus" is a corruption of "Garmonus", and it is noteworthy that St German had been a soldier (some say a lawyer) before he became a man of the cloth, however the legend seems to be a confusion between St German's battle at Maes Garmon and the later Battle of Chester (616).

The text on the Maes Garmon obelisk reads as follows:


 * "In the year 420 the Saxons and Picts having joined their forces made war upon the Britons and engaged them on this plain which bears to this day the name of Maes Garmon. As the British leaders Germanus and Lupus were about to commence the battle Christ himself fought in the camp. Thrice the British army exclaim Alleluia. The hostile troops are confounded with dismay and the Britons triumph over their enemy without bloodshed. Thus it was faith and not force that obtained the victory. In memory of the Victoria Alleluiatica Nehemiah Griffith has erected this monument AD 1736."

A well nearby called Ffynnon Gwaed or the Bloody Well seems also to have derived its name from this battle, so it might not have been quite so bloodless. Yet another famous well the Goblins' Well also once lay nearby having since fallen victim to a road widening scheme. There is certainly little or no evidence that the battle, recorded by Bede amongst others took place at this spot.

The Aftermath
The final appeal for help to the Roman commander in Europe took the form of the "Groans of the Britons". Dated to c. 446, the message is recorded by Gildas in his De Excidio Britanniae (the "Ruin of Britain"), and later by Bede. Gildas records it in his usual style:


 * igitur rursum miserae mittentes epistolas reliquiae ad agitium romanae potestatis uirum, hoc modo loquentes: ‘agitio ter consuli gemitus britannorum;’ et post pauca querentes: ‘repellunt barbari ad mare, repellit mare ad barbaros; inter haec duo genera funerum aut iugulamur aut mergimur;’ nec pro eis quicquam adiutorii habent. interea famis dira ac famosissima uagis ac nutantdibus haeret, quae multos eorum cruentis compulit praedonibus sine dilatione uictus dare manus, ut pauxillum ad refocillandam animam cibi caperent, alios uero nusquam: quin potius de ipsis montibus, speluncis ac saltibus, dumis consertis continue rebellabant. (Again, therefore, the wretched remnant, sending to Aetius, a powerful Roman citizen, address him as follow:— "To Aetius, now consul for the third time: the groans of the Britons." And again a little further, thus:— "The barbarians drive us to the sea; the sea throws us back on the barbarians: thus two modes of death await us, we are either slain or drowned." The Romans, however, could not assist them, and in the meantime the discomfited people, wandering in the woods, began to feel the effects of a severe famine, which compelled many of them without delay to yield themselves up to their cruel persecutors, to obtain subsistence: others of them, however, lying hid in mountains, caves and woods, continually sallied out from thence to renew the war.)

Flavius Aetius or simply Aëtius, (c. 396–454), dux et patricius, was a Roman general of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was an able military commander and the most influential man of the Western Roman Empire for two decades (433-454). He managed the attacks of the barbarian peoples pressing on the Empire. He gathered a large and mostly barbarian army to win the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, ending the invasion of Attila the Hun in 451. Given these other concerns no military aid was forthcoming from Flavius, although it may be that this was the cause of the second visit of St German of Auxerre who returned to Britain in c. AD 446-7.

Perhaps Flavius could have saved Britain, but on September 21, 454, when at court in Ravenna delivering a financial account, Flavius Aëtius was slain by the last Western (and barking mad) Emperor Valentinian III's own hand. Edward Gibbon credits Sidonius Apollinaris with the famous observation:


 * "I am ignorant, sir, of your motives or provocations; I only know that you have acted like a man who has cut off his right hand with his left."

The "Groans of the British" would now be forever unanswered. Drained of troops by civil wars elsewhere in a troubled empire ruled by madmen, the Romano-British were left to their own devices. Between 383 and 446, in less than a lifetime, Roman rule in Britain had collapsed.

The Ghostly Warrior
Sightings of a ghostly warrior (or in some versions boy), clad in gold, a glittering apparition in the moonlight, had apparently been reported frequently enough for travellers to avoid the "hill" of Bryn yr Ellyllon (literally "Hill of elves" - although in some translations "ellyllon" means wraith or spirit.) after dark. That is, at least, the version as given by modern writers. There is however some slight evidence that such accounts are based on actual tales.

One such account came in 1819 from a woman called Nancy who’d was herding her cows down the lane in moonlight when she saw the "Golden Ghost" cross the track in front of her as it walked down the "Goblin’s Hill" a quarter of a mile outside the town boundary. Nancy gave her account to the local landowner, one Mr. Langford, who mentioned it to the local vicar the Reverend Gough, who in return noted it to the Diocese. It was the same Mr. Langford who many years later, in the autumn of 1833, ordered the burial mound to be levelled.

An alternative version is given by a reverend Clough who is supposed to have written the following:


 * "Connected with this subject, it is certainly a strange circumstance that an elderly woman, who had been to Mold to lead her husband home late at night from a public house, should have seen or fancied, a spectre to have crossed the road before her to the identical mound of grave, "of unusual size, and clothed in a coat of gold, which shone like the sun," and that she should tell the story in the next morning many years ago, amongst others to the very person, Mr John Langford, whose workmen drew the treasure out of its prison-house. Her having related this story is an undoubted fact. I cannot, however, learn that the there was any tradition of such an internment having taken place; though possibly this old woman might have heard of something of the kind in her youth, which still dwelt upon her memory, and associated with the common appellation of the Bank ‘Bryn-yr Ellyllon’, (the Fairies’ or Goblins’ Hill) and a very general idea that the place was haunted, presented the gold effigy to imagination."

In yet another version of the tale it is said that soon after the excavation, a man who had personally witnessed the discovery wrote:


 * "I certainly heard it rumoured a year or two before 1833 that Bryn yr Ellyllon and Cae'r Yspryd (Field of the Ghost) were haunted as well as the adjacent main road by an apparition -- 'A Headless Warrior riding a grey horse.' You may imagine the excitement which arose when something was found."

The Obelisk
The diary of Nehemiah Griffith of Rhual, 1715, was published by the Chester Archaeological Society in 1909. Rhual was built in 1634 by Evan Edwards, secretary to Richard Sackville, Earl of Dorset, a Baron of the Exchequer of Chester, and M.P. for Camelford. He was a member of an old-established Flintshire family which traced its descent from Hywel Dda. He was pre-deceased by his son, Thomas, and on his death in 1670 the estate passed first to his grandson, Thomas, and subsequently to Thomas's sister, Mary, who in 1688 had married Walter Griffith of Llanfyllin, Montgomeryshire. Mary’s brother, Thomas Edwards of Rhualwas a prominent Dissenter who had played a national role in the 1690s Crisp controversy over Richard Baxter’s views on Calvinism and salvation, in which Edwards had vigorously asserted a hyper-Calvinist position against Baxter and his followers.. Their eldest son, Nehemiah Griffith (1691-1738), a country squire of literary tendencies and an active Flintshire J.P. As an adult, Nehemiah Griffith continued the family’s dissenting ways. He rebuilt Llanfyllin chapel in 1717, two years after it was wrecked in Tory-Jacobite rioting. On inheriting lands from his Harwood relatives in the 1720s he frequently resided at Broad Marston; when there he regularly worshipped at a dissenting meeting house at Chipping Camden. Perhaps guided by the example of the exclusion of his Edwards uncle from public affairs, Nehemiah also occasionally conformed to the established church, and was buried in Mold parish churchyard.

Griffith’s two surviving diaries, for 1715 and 1726, reveal a social round of drinking, dining, play-going (he saw a version of Amphitryon, probably John Dryden’s, in Chester in February 1715), race meetings, and cock fights. In 1727 he was admitted to a dining club at the Red Lion in Mold which had been started by his younger brother Thomas. In 1715 he noted the solar eclipse of 22 April, discussed a star in the constellation Cygnus which grew brighter and then faded (possibly the luminous blue variable P Cygni), and bought a telescope; the inventory of his goods on his death listed a large telescope, perhaps the same one. He comes across as a typical early eighteenth-century squire, his conviviality perhaps emphasised by his life-long bachelordom. He had been unlucky in love, his efforts to wed Eliza Lloyd were thwarted when she contracted blood poisoning from a thorn which scratched her face while she was riding with him and died.

As part of his wider improvements to his house and gardens at Rhual, in 1736 Griffith erected an obelisk, visible from the house, commemorating the ‘Alleluia Victory’ of the early fifth century in which the British Christian army of St Germanus defeated the pagan Saxons and Picts. By Griffith’s reading (and here he was dependent on a noted history of the early British church by Archbishop James Ussher published a century earlier), the battlefield lay on his estate. Rather than holding the battle up as a British (or Welsh) triumph over the Saxons (or English), it seems more likely that Griffith was commemorating what he saw as the triumph of the true church over false religion, for Germanus had been sent to Britain to combat the Pelagian heresy, and hence the victory could be seen as an analogue of the Protestant triumph over Roman Catholicism and a further reminder of the defeat of the Jacobites.

The Mold Cope
A tumulus or round barrow at Bryn yr Ellyllon, Pentre, Mold, is the findspot of the Mold Cape, one of Britain's most famous prehistoric artefacts. Workmen from a local workhouse dug into the mound in 1833 whilst digging for stone. They uncovered a stone lined burial chamber, within which were fragments of the crushed gold cape. This was shared out between the finders. Also in the grave were hundreds of amber beads, fragments of a second gold cape, a bronze knife and the fragile remains of woven textile. The discovery was brought to the attention of the wider antiquarian community largely through the efforts of the local vicar. Most of these other artifacts have long since disappeared including pieces of the cape, and only one of the amber beads survives in the British Museum.

Mr Langford, the tenant of the land containing the find, kept the largest part of the cape and sold this to the British Museum in 1836. Long considered to be a corselet, breastplate or even a decorative breast piece for a pony, it was Professor Terence Powell of the University of Liverpool who, in 1954, concluded that the item was infact a cape. The gold cape would always have been a flimsy item and may only have been worn for special ocassions. The entire cape was found crushed and broken and was repaired using reinvented technology to replace the missing 15% of the metal by Conservator Ian Macintrye. While the original Cape resides in the British Museum, a replica can be seen in the Mold Museum situated above Mold library.

The cape is one of the finest examples of prehistoric sheet-gold working and is quite unique in form and design. It was laboriously beaten out of a single ingot of gold, and then embellished with intense decoration of ribs and bosses to mimic multiple strings of beads amid folds of cloth. Perforations along the upper and lower edges indicate that it was once attached to a lining, perhaps of leather, which has decayed. The bronze strips founded with the cape may have served to strengthen the adornment further. We know that it was not just made and used as a burial offering as it showed signs of repair.

The site of the barrow is presently occupied by a house in the eastern suburbs of Mold, but the find is commerated by a plaque set into the wall. The original cape was exhibited at Wrexham in 2005. The Mold Gold Cape was featured as one of the top ten treasures in the 100 objects in A History of the World in partnership with the BBC.

Sources and Links

 * Nehemiah Griffith: genial Anglo-Welsh squire;
 * "The Diary of Nehemiah Griffith, Esq., of Rhual, Mold, for the Year 1715": Journal of the Chester and North Wales Architectural, Archaeological and Historic Society, 15 (1909);
 * History of the World in 100 objects: the Mold Cope;
 * A further dig at Bryn-yr-Ellyllon: from 2013 (also reported by the BBC);
 * An AchaeoDeath blog
 * "The Ghost of Goblin Hill": another blog;