St Tydfil, Llysworney

Sub Wardens

Mrs Nicky Massie

Mr Jeremy Rawlings


Sunday Service

2nd & 4th Sundays of the Month

9.15 am Eucharist

Download the latest Pews News for details of services this week.

Dedicated to a legendary female Celtic saint and martyr, the building comprises nave, chancel, massive central tower with a single bell, and south porch. Unusually, the nave, central tower and chancel arch are out of alignment, with the view of the sanctuary from the nave thereby severely restricted.

The early origin of this church is suggested by its ‘eccentric’ interior alignment and by the crudely carved stone set in the exteriorsouth wall of the church. Ornamentation on the stone has been variously described as ‘Xs in boxes and what might be scrolled staffs’ and ‘chevron and dog tooth’.

Few internal features survived the C19th restoration of the church.

The altar rails with heavy balusters and egg shaped finials date from the late C17th.

In 1774, during the incumbencyof the Revd John Carne, two of the three bells in the tower were taken down and broken-up to provide money for the repair of the church and tower and for the reseating of the church. The one pre-Reformation bell which survives bears the inscription ‘St Peter pray for us’ [S. Petrus ora pro nobis] and was probably cast by the Bristol bell founder John Gosselin, c.1450.

In 1774 the old pews were described as ‘in a decayed ruinous condition, unfit for parishioners to sit, stand and kneel in to hear divine service’. A century later these now ‘old fashioned’ box pews were removed.

On the inner wall of the chancel arch there is a distinctive memorial to Wenllian William who died in 1732 aged 100. Carved into the stone is an hour glass and other representations of mortality.

On the north wall of the nave are several memorial tablets to the Carne family of Nash Manor. One, a large marble tablet dated 1846, commemorates generations of the Carne family, the long inscription surmounted by a carving of the Carne arms depicting a pelican in her piety. Other memorial tablets and stained glass windows commemorate later members of the Carne and Nicholl Carne family whose arms are incorporated into the stained glass of the east window.

The west window in the nave is a memorial to men of the parish killed in the Great War. The two light stained glass window set low in the north wall of the nave depicts Christ the King and Christ the Good Shepherd. It was designed by Frank Roper of Penarth.

The church was heavily restored in 1893/4 when the vestry on the north side of the chancelwas added.