BARDSEY-ISLE, an island (small) in St. George's channel, near Cardigan bay, an extra-parochial district, locally in the parish of Aberdaron, in the hundred of DINLLAEN, county of CARNARVON, NORTH WALES, lying off the promontory of Lleyn, from which it is separated by Bardsey Race, three miles in breadth, containing 84 inhabitants. This island, from the remotest known period of antiquity, appears to have been the resort of devotees, who, retiring from the cares of the world, sought an asylum here, where they passed the remainder of their lives and were buried., St. Dubricius, Bishop of Caerleon, resigning his see to St. David, retired to this solitary spot, where, dying about the year 612, he was interred; but his remains were afterwards removed to Llandaf. After the slaughter of the monks of Bangor, not only the brethren who survived, but numerous other Britons, who had embraced the Christian doctrines, took refuge in the island. Prior to the time of St. Dubricius, this was probably a retreat of the Culdees, the first religious recluses in Britain, for whose secret worship of the Almighty its retired situation was peculiarly auspicious. Before the death of St. Dubricius, a monastery was founded in the island, probably by the monks who joined him after the massacre at Bangor, and dedicated to St. Mary, which subsequently became more eminent for its sanctity than for the extent of its endowments. In the reign of Edward II., a petition was, according to the Sebright manuscripts, presented to that monarch by the abbot, complaining of exaction on the part of the sheriff of Carnarvon, which procured redress. The monastery continued to flourish till the dissolution, at which time its revenue amounted to £58. 6. 2. There are only some small portions of the abbey remaining: the site was granted by Edward VI. to Sir Thomas Seymour, and afterwards to the Earl of Warwick. The island, now the property of Lord Newborough, is two miles and a half in length, and one and a half in breadth. From the violence of the current which runs through the sound, it obtained the British name Ynys Enlli, or the island in the current, and by the Saxons it was, from its being a favourite retreat of the bards, named Bardsey, or the island of the bards. The shores and sand-banks in this part of the channel render the navigation exceedingly dangerous, and numerous vessels have been lost: to prevent the recurrence of similar disasters, a lighthouse, with a flashing light, was erected on the island, in 1821, and lighted for the first time on the 24th of December in that year. The tower is a substantial and handsome square structure, seventy-four feet high, surmounted by a lantern ten feet high; and, being built on an elevation sixty-two feet above the level of the sea, the light is one hundred and forty-six feet above high water mark at spring tides. The south side of the island being the first headland that appears in navigating the channel, the erection of this lighthouse became an object of the greatest importance, and its completion has been attended with the utmost benefit to the numerous vessels connected with the port of Liverpool.