Gwynedd?

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Gwynedd principal area

Image:WalesGwynedd.png
Geography
Area - Total - % Water	Ranked 2nd 2,548 km² ? %
Admin HQ	Caernarfon
ISO 3166-2	GB-GWN
ONS code	00NC
Demographics
Population - Total (April 29, 2001) - Density	Ranked 13th 116,843 46 / km²
Ethnicity	99.0% White
Welsh language - Any skills	Ranked 1st 76.1%
Politics
Gwynedd Council http://www.gwynedd.gov.uk/
Control	Plaid Cymru
MPs	Elfyn Llwyd Betty Williams Hywel Williams
AMs	Dafydd Elis-Thomas Denise Idris Jones Alun Ffred Jones (Constituency) North Wales (Part), Mid and West Wales (Part) (Regional)
MEPs	Wales

Gwynedd is a principal area in Wales, named after the old Kingdom of Gwynedd. It was created in 1974 as one of the eight new administrative counties of Wales. Although one of the biggest in terms of geographical area, it was also one of the most sparsely populated. A large proportion of the population being Welsh-speaking, it became once again a centre of nationalism, with Plaid Cymru gaining a toehold which helped the party on to greater successes.

In the latest round of local government reorganisation, on April 1, 1996, it was reconstituted to cover a different area, losing Anglesey to became an independent unitary, and Aberconwy to the new Conwy county borough.

As the new Gwynedd covers most of the traditional counties of Caernarfonshire (less the part in the borough of Conwy) and Merionethshire, the reconstituted area was originally named Caernarfonshire and Merionethshire. As one of its first actions, the Council renamed it Gwynedd on April 2.

The pre-1996 boundaries were retained as a ceremonial preserved county - in 2003 the boundary with Clwyd was adjusted to match the modern local government boundary, so that the preserved county now covers the modern Gwynedd along with Anglesey.

The original administrative county contained several districts, these were Aberconwy, Arfon, Dwyfor, Meirionnydd and Anglesey. As a unitary authority the modern entity no longer has any districts, but Arfon, Dwyfor and Meirionnydd remain in use as areas for area committees.

It is the home of the University of Wales, Bangor.

See the list of places in Gwynedd for all villages, towns and cities in Gwynedd.

Gwynedd as an administrative county from 1974 to 1996