Full Project Title: 'Religion, community and tenancy: Kinship structures in Ysbyty Ifan, 1851–1921'
Doctoral Researcher: Lucinda Owen
Supervised by: Dr Marc Collinson and Dr Lowri Ann Rees
The aim of the research project is to map the kinship relationships of the village with the church/chapel during the period 1851–1921. Utilizing census data, parish records/gravestone inscriptions, Welsh newspapers online articles, archival material and questionnaires from the local community, as a body of research, it will seek to explore the relationship that the villagers had with the Church of St John and Capel Seion. The study will examine if there were partisan lines between the villagers dependent on where they worshiped, and if this impacted inter familial connections. There will also be consideration of the inhabitant's relationship with the landlord of numerous households in Ysbyty Ifan, Lord Penrhyn.
The research project has evolved from the recent purchase of St Johns by the villagers of Ysbyty Ifan, in the hope that there will be a visitor's centre, a multi faith worship space and to preserve the buildings for future communities in the area. The mapping exercise will identify the movements, kinship structures and changing circumstances of the village in a period of Welsh history that saw major innovations in agricultural practices, local politics and the losses of the First World War. I will be working alongside other ISWE researchers mapping other Denbighshire villages.
Recent activity:
- A well-attended history-walk around Ysbyty Ifan with local historian Edmund Rees.
- Regular attendance at Hafan Ifan sub committees.
- Attended the Parish Records seminar at Warwick University (online).
