Massacre of the Druids – as told in place names.

In AD60 the Roman general Paullinus stood on the banks of the Menai with a Legion of the XIV Gemina. On the opposite bank were thousands of Celts including many Druids, for this was the island of Anglesey as it is now called. Mona as it was then known, was the home of the Druids, the centre of Druidic teaching.

The story of the battle that took place is told elsewhere, but suffice it to say that the Romans successfully crossed the Menai and defeated the opposition.  Then the massacres began. The names of various places on the Island bear mute remembrance to the slaughter that took place, despite the passage of more than two thousand years.

Place names such as Bryn-y-Beddau, the Hill of Graves, Plas Goch, the Red Place, and most graphically,  the two fields still known as the Field of the Long Battle and the Field of Bitter Lamentation. The power and teachings of the Druids were never to recover from the disaster that occurred on Mona, though Ireland, unconquered by the Romans, was to remain a haven for the Druids until the spread of Christianity.