The Nanteos Cup - Cwapan Nanteo - by Jennie Hart

The Nanteos Cup    credit The National Library of Wales

A framed photo of the beleaguered Nanteos Cup in the elegant entrance hall of the country house called Nanteos, made me curious to learn of its history. Less than half of the vessel has survived but that precious fragment is now stored at the National Library of Wales

Nanteos, once the home of the Jones’s and the Powell’s, stands in the beautiful Plaith Valley in Ceredigion. With its high stuccoed ceilings, tall Georgian windows and exquisite fireplaces, it speaks of wealth and privilege, but our brief stay was justified by the chance to unravel the tale of the religious relic, the Nanteos Cup. The room names themselves hold mystery, especially to a Yorkshire lass! Our room was Ystwyth, the name of the Welsh river that has given its name to Aberystwyth. A room nearby was Ynyslas, Welsh for The Blue Island or possibly, The Island of Las.

The gardens are no longer carefully tended, but a few roses twine and tangle in the dense shrubbery. There’s a crumbling bothy and a derelict walled garden which would once have grown fine delicacies for the plates of the aristocrats. Do seeds long buried, still germinate in spring till strangled by nettles and brambles?

It is a compelling story that at the time of Henry the eighth, and the destruction of the monasteries, Henry’s servants came into Wales and heard of the ancient Strata Florida Abbey in Ceredigion, where seven old monks guarded an ancient religious relic. The abbey, now a ruin, was once a place of great learning where manuscripts were written and summits held by Welsh princes.

The servants were ordered to seize the treasured relic, but the monks fled, making a dangerous journey for such old men, to the safety of Nanteos. The mansion sits above the site of another older building, Neuadd Llawdden and it is in this earlier house that the monks would have sought refuge. Flagstones worn by footsteps over centuries, remain in the cellar below. Did these men make their journey on foot? Did they survive on wild berries? Did they carry mead and honey in sacks on their mules? Or in pockets in their robes?  Did they kill a deer and roast it? Were they in too much fear to linger?

There is further romance in the belief that these monks are buried by beech trees in the grounds, and the last monk at the point of death, entrusted the treasure to the owner.

The intriguing treasure is a sacred chalice, an ancient wooden drinking bowl claimed to be the true Holy Grail that Jesus Christ may have drunk from at the Last Supper.

The quest for the Holy Grail is the search for a vessel with miraculous healing powers that provides happiness and eternal youth Those who knew of it would come to the mansion to sip from its precious lip. It became known as The Nanteos Cup.

Ystwyth: winding river

Ynys: island