The afanc is the Welsh water monster, sometimes pictured as a giant beaver, sometimes as a crocodile or a dwarfish demon, and several lakes claim to have held one. In the Aberdyfi district the story went that King Arthur and his horse rid the country of the afanc of Llyn Barfog, leaving a hoofprint on a rock as proof.
According to the version now told around Cadair Idris, Arthur did not kill the creature. He lassoed it and dragged it overland from its lair near Aberdyfi, all the way up the slopes of the mountain, and locked it in Llyn Cau, where the cliffs would keep it from escaping. The lake is said to be bottomless, and anyone who sinks into it will never be found. The afanc, the story adds, has not lost its taste for people, and swimmers who go out too far into the black water are warned to keep an eye on what is beneath them.
There are no recorded modern sightings attached to the story. It survives as a warning about a cold, deep and genuinely dangerous mountain lake.
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