In 1880 the antiquary T. H. Thomas called the Mamhilad yew the Queen of the local yews, if the Llanthewy tree be the King. By then it had been measured for eighty years, and the record has kept going. William Coxe gave it 25 feet round in 1799. Loudon recorded 29 feet 4 inches about 1840, Lees 30 feet 7 inches in 1851, the Reverend Cook 30 feet 9 inches in 1895. Tim Hills of the Ancient Yew Group found 31 feet 3 inches at the ground in 1999 and again in 2014, which is 9.53 metres, and Peter Norton 31 feet 7 inches in 2017. The tapes went round at different heights, so the early figures are rough, but they span more than two centuries. The tree has split into several trunks from a low bole, and a separate stem grows up inside the hollow. Loudon put that inner tree at 6 feet round; Allen Meredith found 10 feet in 1981. By 1880 someone had built a stone seat against the old trunk. The Walk Wheel Cycle Trust, which sends canal cyclists here, says the yew is over 2,000 years old, and a 2008 photo caption says 2,500. The Ancient Yew Group gives no age and nobody has measured one, so treat both as claims. It stands by the south porch of St Illtyd's, in a churchyard of eleven yews, several more of them ancient or veteran.
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Getting there
St Illtyd's churchyard, Mamhilad, near Pontypool, Monmouthshire NP4 8QY
You can recognise it by the hulk split into several trunks with a smaller tree growing up inside the opening, best seen from the side away from the porch. It stands right by the south porch of St Illtyd's.
Walkable from the Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal towpath (National Cycle Network Route 49) by a short detour along Folly Lane; about 2 miles north-east of Pontypool. Check Traveline Cymru for buses.
In fruit
The line is our estimate of how much there is to see, not a measurement. Typical for this species where this tree stands; exact weeks shift with the year.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from. The story was written with AI from these sources, and readers who know the tree correct it.