Barry Island () is a district, peninsula and seaside resort, forming part of the town of Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales. It is named after the 6th century Saint Baruc. Barry's stretch of coast, on the Bristol Channel, has the world's second highest tidal range of , second only to the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, Atlantic Canada.
The peninsula was an island until the 1880s when it was linked to the mainland as the town of Barry expanded. This was partly due to the opening of Barry Docks by the Barry Railway Company. Established by David Davies, the docks now link up the gap which used to isolate Barry Island.
Although Barry Island used to be home to a Butlins Holiday Camp, it is now known more for its beach and Barry Island Pleasure Park. It was used as a setting of the BBC TV shows Gavin & Stacey and Being Human.
History
Prehistoric origins
The area around Barry Island shows extensive evidence of human occupation. Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age microlith flint tools have been found at Friars Point on Barry Island and near Wenvoe, and Neolithic or New Stone Age polished stone axe-heads were discovered in St. Andrews Major. As the area was heavily wooded and movement would have been restricted, it is likely that people also came to what was to become Wales by boat, apparently from the Iberian Peninsula. They cleared the forests to establish pasture and to cultivate the land.
These neolithic colonists, who integrated with the indigenous people, gradually changed from being hunter-gatherers to settled farmers. They built the long barrows at St Lythans and Tinkinswood, which date to around 6,000 BP, only and to the north of Barry Island, respectively.
In common with the people living all over Great Britain, over the following centuries the local population assimilated immigrants and exchanged ideas of the Bronze Age and Iron Age Celtic cultures. Together with much of South Wales, Barry Island was settled by a Celtic British tribe called the Silures. There have been five Bronze Age burial mounds, or cairns, recorded on Friars Point.
Roman and medieval eras
Although the Roman occupation saw significant Romano-British settlements at both Barry and Llandough, there is little physical evidence of Roman activity on Barry Island itself. However, the island would flourish as a religious community, following the end of Roman rule.
In the Post-Roman era, the Glamorgan coast became an important centre of early Celtic Christianity. Indeed, the Book of Llandaff defined the ancient diocese of Llandaff as stretching "as far as the island Terthi" (with Terthi being an earlier name for Barry island).
The island is said to have got its current name in the 6th century when Cattwg Ddoeth (Saint Cadoc, an important tutor of many Welsh saints including Illtud) spent seven years living as a hermit on the nearby Ynys Echni (Flat Holm). Upon arrival at Ynys Echni, it was discovered that one of Cattwg's disciples had not brought all the texts that Cattwg required for his stay. Cattwg requested that this disciple travel back to the mainland to fetch them. The disciple, Barrwg drowned on this return journey, and was buried on the island that would become known as Ynys y Barri.
The Vikings launched raids in the area and Barry Island was known to be a raider base in 1087.
Gerallt Gymro
The Norman/Welsh chronicler Father Gerallt Gymro (c.1146 – c.1223) described the origin of his family name in his The Itinerary of Archbishop Baldwin through Wales (also known as The Journey through Wales). Gerallt Gymro, also known in , and Gerald of Wales, wrote "Not far from Caerdyf (sic) is a small island situated near the shore of the Severn, called Barri, from St. Baroc, who formerly lived there, and whose remains are deposited in a chapel overgrown with ivy, having been transferred to a coffin. From hence a noble family, of the maritime parts of South Wales, who owned this island and the adjoining estates, received the name of de Barri." Going on to describe the island's well, he wrote: "It is remarkable that, in a rock near the entrance of the island, there is a small cavity, to which, if the ear is applied, a noise is heard like that of smiths at work, the blowing of bellows, strokes of hammers, grinding of tools, and roaring of furnaces ; and it might easily be imagined that such noises, which are continued at the ebb and flow of the tides, were occasioned by the influx of the sea under the cavities of the rocks.