Literary Passion · Llanfechain, Powys (Montgomeryshire) — NOT North Wales
Gwerful Mechain — Wales's Bawdiest Poet (context / cross-boundary)
The only medieval Welshwoman with a surviving body of verse — and she used it to write 'Ode to the Vagina', scolding male poets for praising everything but 'the best bit'.
Evidence note. Genuine, citable medieval author; 13 manuscript copies of 'Cywydd y Cedor' survive (Bangor, British Library, Cardiff Central Library, National Library of Wales). Flagged as out-of-region.
Sources
- Wikipedia
- Dictionary of Welsh Biography (context)
- Literary Hub (interview with translator Katie Gramich)
Nearby on the map
Two upper-class Irish women who eloped in 1778 to set up home together, scandalising and enthralling Georgian society; their Gothic cottage drew Wordsworth, Byron, Wellington and Walter Scott, and Queen Charlotte won them a royal pension. A cornerstone of British queer heritage — Anne Lister herself visited.
Documented historyHot spotQueer HeritageThe Ladies of Llangollen's TombLlangollen, Denbighshire · WalesTwo runaway Irish gentlewomen who slept in one bed for fifty years, and the diarist 'Gentleman Jack' who came to see whether it was 'platonic'.
Documented historyHot spotNotable LandmarksSt Winefride's WellHolywell, Flintshire · WalesThe 'Lourdes of Wales' — a holy well whose origin legend is a tale of thwarted lust; pilgrims still bathe in the star-shaped basin for healing and intercession.
Documented historySpotted an error, or hold a better source? Write to marquis@marquisdemayfair.com — corrections are made, never defended. Our methodology.