• Born: South Rheged, Wales

  Research Notes:

Next to nothing is known about Meirchion, although his epithet means the Lean. He appears in the Middle Welsh genealogical text Bonedd Gwyr y Gogledd as the son of the equally obscure Gwrwst Lledlwm, a grandson of Coel Hen, and grandfather of renowned Urien Rheged. He is assumed, like Urien, to have ruled Rheged, including Catterick. ¹

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Gwrast map Ceneu died in 490, and his eldest son, Meirchion, took the throne of central Rheged (Salway & Llwyfenydd), while his younger son, Masgwid, became the first king of a newly independent Elmet. Rheged was now a vastly reduced kingdom, and the southern districts in the Ribble and Mærsea valleys had become ungovernable. ²