West Wales
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
West Wales (Welsh: Gorllewin Cymru) is the western area of Wales bordered by South Wales to the east and Mid Wales to the north. It is a region of Wales and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and NI and has several thosand square miles of land.
The area is loosely-defined, but is generally considered to include Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion.
Swansea and Neath Port Talbot are included in the former Welsh Development Agency and ELWa West Wales regions[1], although they are generally considered to be in South Wales.
Many people consider the true beginning of West Wales to be the Loughor bridge and the border of Swansea and Carmarthenshire when travelling west towards Carmarthenshire. At this point, road signs change from English before Welsh to Welsh before English. This is due to the vastly increased use of the Welsh language in the West Wales area.
The area includes the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park.
Towns of the region include Llanelli, Carmarthen, Tenby, Pembroke, Fishguard, Milford Haven, Cardigan and Haverfordwest.
The name West Wales was also applied to the Kingdom of Cornwall before the conquest by the Anglo-Saxons during the period of the Heptarchy. This is due to misunderstanding. The Anglo-saxon word Waleas means foreigners<>, which gave its name to Wales - foreigners/foreign. This was also applied to Cornwall as "West wales" meaning West foreigners , although, this is misunderstood as that Cornwall was part of Wales. In fact, Cornwall never belonged to Wales. It was part of the same people, the Brythons, but was never ruled by them.
For many purposes Wales can be divided into only three regions, North Wales , South Wales and West Wales. In this scenario the boundary between West Wales and North Wales is marked by the Ceredigion - Powys border. Powys itself is divided, Brecknock being included in South Wales with Montgomeryshire included in North Wales.
