Manafon

Manafon is a small rural community located in the hills of Montgomeryshire, the Northern part of the Welsh county of Powys. The Parish focuses on the valley of the River Rhiew that runs west to east into the River Severn". The community of Manafon consists of "two main villages within about a mile of one another, Manafon and New Mills. The remainder of the population lives in scattered farms and dwellings and in the small rural settlement of The Green." The village is 8 miles (13 km) from Welshpool, 78.4 miles (126.2 km) from Cardiff, and 155.3 miles (249.9 km) from London. In 2011 the population of Manafon was 301 with 18.4% of them able to speak Welsh. Between 1841 and 1901 the population declined from 795 to 501. The name was recorded in 1254 as Manauon with Mannavon in 1338, and "the modern spelling first appears early in the reign of Elizabeth, c.1566." Experts now suggest that it means "the ‘plain associated with Anafon’, where the first element is Welsh ma meaning ‘plain, field or place’ and the second a personal name", rather than afon meaning ‘river’, as in Stratford-upon-Avon, which was the earlier view.