St Ellyw's Church is an Anglican parish church built in the medieval period, possibly in the 15th century. The church was a parish church in medieval times, being first mentioned in eleventh century documents. In the thirteenth century the living was in the gift of the Lord of Kidwelly, Patrick de Chatworth, but with his death the patronage passed to the Crown. In the late fourteenth century John of Gaunt was entitled to receive the tithes at the collegiate church of St Mary, Leicester. There were four subordinate chapels in the parish before the Protestant Reformation.
The church dates back to the medieval period, possibly the fifteenth century. The west tower is the oldest part of the building, the rest having been added by George Frederick Bodley of London in 1905–06. The church is built of rock-faced rubble stone with decorative red sandstone dressings, stone-coped gables, green slate roofs and terracotta ridge tiles. There is an octagonal chimney between the chancel roof and the nave roof, and there is a large porch at the south end. The tower has a corbelled parapet, a clock halfway up the south side and a square stairwell on the north side.
References:The Jan Hus Memorial stands at one end of Old Town Square. The huge monument depicts victorious Hussite warriors and Protestants who were forced into exile 200 years after Hus, and a young mother who symbolises national rebirth. The monument was so large that the sculptor designed and built his own villa and studio where the work could be carried out. It was unveiled in 1915 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Jan Hus' martyrdom. The memorial was designed by Ladislav Šaloun and paid for solely by public donations.
Born in 1369, Hus became an influential religious thinker, philosopher, and reformer in Prague. He was a key predecessor to the Protestant movement of the sixteenth century. In his works he criticized religious moral decay of the Catholic Church. Accordingly, the Czech patriot Hus believed that mass should be given in the vernacular, or local language, rather than in Latin. He was inspired by the teachings of John Wycliffe.