The three books on the history, heritage and ecology of the hill are all called ‘Clifái’ rather than the anglicised spelling ‘Kilvey’. This isd because spending some time in meetings with people from New Zealand and England who are part of the Skyline proposals, I shuddered at the mangling of the name by people unfamiliar with Swansea or our local culture or heritage. I also wondered about the significant risk that the hill would be renamed ‘Skyline Hill’ in official documents.
I decided to revert back to the Welsh spelling of the name. ‘Kilvey’ as a placename is not old. It is part of the general anglicisation of Welsh place names that ocurred in the nineteenth century as part of the Ordnance Survey mapping of the land. The name went through several spelling changes as the Ordnance survey tried to create an english name that sounded close to the original Welsh.
It looks and sounds far better in Welsh and it gives back its identity as one of Swansea’s oldest places.
Nigel Robins 