On the high moorland road that climbs from Newport over Carn Ingli Common and drops down into Cwm Gwaun stands a single pillar of stone called Bedd Morris, Morris's grave. It is probably a Bronze Age standing stone, and it was later used as a boundary marker between parishes, but local people have always explained it with the story of a man named Morris.
The romantic version says that Morris was a young man from Newport who fell in love with a girl from Pontfaen, over the hill. Her father would not have him, and favoured another suitor. The two young men agreed to settle it themselves and met at the highest point of the road over the common. Morris was killed, and the stone marks where he fell. The girl who loved him died soon afterwards of a broken heart.
The other version is harder. Morris was a robber who lived in a cave near the pass with a little white dog, and he waylaid travellers crossing the lonely road. At last the people of the district banded together, caught him and his dog, and hanged him beside the road, raising the stone as a warning to others. The National Park tells both tales without choosing between them, and there is no record of any real Morris behind either.
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