NationMaster - Encyclopedia: Welsh Marches

The Welsh Marches (Welsh: Y Mers) is an area along the border of England and Wales in the island of Great Britain. In European history, marches are border regions between centres of power. Welsh redirects here, and this article describes the Welsh language. ... For other uses, see England (disambiguation). ... This article is about the country. ... Mark or march (or various plural forms of these words) are derived from the Frankish word marka (boundary) and refer to a border region, e. ...

See also the Category:Towns of the Welsh Marches and Category:Counties of the Welsh Marches.

1 Location
2 History
3 See also
4 External links
5 Source

Location

Discounting modern administrative boundaries, the Welsh Marches are sometimes deemed to be the area that lies between the mountains of Wales itself and the river valleys of England. But today the Welsh Marches is a term commonly used to describe those parts of the English counties which lie along the border with Wales, mainly on the English side of the border, though it is not an official term. Principally, the counties belonging to the Welsh Marches are Cheshire, Shropshire, Herefordshire (English counties). Also occasionally, and after the 14th century, Monmouthshire and Powys (now Welsh counties). The western half of Gloucestershire (England), as well as Pembrokeshire, Flintshire and Wrexham (Wales) are also sometimes included, depending on the speaker and the era in which the terms was used. For other uses, see Cheshire (disambiguation). ... Shropshire (pronounced /, -/), alternatively known as Salop[6] or abbreviated Shrops[7], is a county in the West Midlands of England. ... Herefordshire is a historic and ceremonial county and unitary district (known as County of Herefordshire) in the West Midlands region of England. ... Monmouthshire (Welsh: ) is both a historic county and principal area in south-east Wales. ... Powys is a local government principal area and a preserved county in Wales. ... Gloucestershire (pronounced ; GLOSS-ter-sher) is a county in South West England. ... Pembrokeshire (Welsh: ) is a county in the southwest of Wales in the United Kingdom. ... Flintshire (Welsh: ) is a principal area and county in north-east Wales. ... Wrexham is a county borough in northern Wales. ...

History

In English history, the Welsh Marches refers to the borderlands between England and Wales, specifically those areas controlled by lords having the rights and privileges of Lords Marcher, among whom one often bore the title Earl of March. The term was first used during the medieval period when the English Norman Kingdom of England expanded further into traditional Welsh territory and the Marcher lordships were established. This article is about the English as an ethnic group and nation. ... The title Earl of March has been created several times in the Peerage of Scotland and the Peerage of England. ... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times. ... This article is about the English as an ethnic group and nation. ... Norman conquests in red. ... Motto Dieu et mon droit(French) God and my right Territory of the Kingdom of England Capital Winchester; London from 11th century Language(s) Old English (de facto, until 1066) Anglo-Norman language (de jure, 1066 - 15th century) English (de facto, gradually replaced French from late 13th century) Government Monarchy... The Welsh are, according to Hastings (1997), an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language, which is a Celtic language. ... A Marcher Lord is the English equivalent of a margrave (in the Holy Roman empire) In this context the word march means a border region or frontier, and is cognate with the verb to march, both ultimately derived from Proto-Indo-European *mereg-, edge or boundary. ...

Romans

The nature of the region, being used as a buffer or border zone between zones of power, dates back to Roman times, if not to the Bronze Age. The Romans established forts at Chester (castra), Gloucester and Caerleon. , For the larger local government district, see Chester (district). ... This article is about the city of Gloucester in England; for other uses see Gloucester (disambiguation). ... , Caerleon (Welsh: ) is a suburban village and community, situated on the River Usk in the northern outskirts of the city of Newport (of which it is also a electoral ward) in south-east Wales. ...

Mercia

The region was militarily important during the Dark Ages after the decline and fall of Rome, as can be seen in huge defensive earthworks such as Wat's Dyke. The early Mercians under Penda established strong alliances with the Welsh tribes, and Penda's successor Wulfhere later expanded Mercia to absorb the northern end of the Marches area around Chester. Wulfhere’s successor established good alliances with the Welsh tribes, and very little is heard in the records of raids from Wales into Mercia. The Kingdom of Mercia at its greatest extent (7th to 9th centuries) is shown in green, with the original core area (6th century) given a darker tint. ...

As the power of Mercia grew, a string of garrisoned market-towns defined the borderlands as much as Offa's Dyke, the official boundary erected by order of King Offa of Mercia at the end of the 8th century. The immense Dyke still exists, and the best place to see Offa's Dyke is at Knighton, which borders England and Wales in the respective counties of Shropshire and Powys. Rough cross-section of Offas Dyke, showing how it was designed to protect Mercia against attacks/raids from Powys. ... Offa (died July 26/29, 796) was the King of Mercia from 757 until his death. ... (7th century — 8th century — 9th century — other centuries) Events The Iberian peninsula is taken by Arab and Berber Muslims, thus ending the Visigothic rule, and starting almost 8 centuries of Muslim presence there. ... Rough cross-section of Offas Dyke, showing how it was designed to protect Mercia against attacks/raids from Powys. ... Places in the United Kingdom: A town: Knighton, Wales A suburb: Knighton, Leicestershire, England A village: Knighton, Staffordshire England This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... For other uses, see England (disambiguation). ... This article is about the country. ... Shropshire (pronounced /, -/), alternatively known as Salop[6] or abbreviated Shrops[7], is a county in the West Midlands of England. ... Powys is a local government principal area and a preserved county in Wales. ...

The Normans Enter Wales

The Welsh Marches contain Britain's densest concentration of motte-and-bailey castles. A motte-and-bailey is a form of castle. ... For other uses, see Castle (disambiguation). ...

After the Norman Conquest, William the Norman (William I of England, also known as William the Conqueror or William the Bastard) set out to subdue the Welsh, a process that took a century and was never permanently effective. During those generations the Marches were a frontier society in every sense, and a stamp was set on the region that lasted into the time of the Industrial Revolution. Amid violence and dangers, a chronic lack of manpower afforded opportunities for the intrepid, and the Marcher Lords encouraged immigration from all the Norman-Angevin realms, and encouraged trade from their "fair haven" ports like Cardiff. At the top of this culturally diverse, intensely feudalised and local society, the Marcher barons combined the authority of feudal lord and vassal of the King among their Normans, and of supplanting the traditional tywysog among their conquered Welsh (Nelson 1966, ch. 8). Bayeux Tapestry depicting events leading to the Battle of Hastings The Norman Conquest of England was the conquest of the Kingdom of England by William the Conqueror (Duke of Normandy), in 1066 at the Battle of Hastings and the subsequent Norman control of England. ... William I ( 1027 â€“ September 9, 1087), was King of England from 1066 to 1087. ... The Welsh are, according to Hastings (1997), an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language, which is a Celtic language. ... This article is about the capital city of Wales. ...

Marcher Powers

The Anglo-Norman lordships in this area were distinct in several ways: they were geographically compact and jurisdictionally separate one from another, and they had special privileges which separated them from the usual English lordships. Royal writ did not obtain in the Marches: Marcher lords ruled their lands by their own law—sicut regale ("like unto a king") as Gilbert, Earl of Gloucester, stated (Nelson 1966), whereas in England fief-holders were directly accountable to the king. Marcher lords could build castles, a jealously guarded and easily-revoked Royal privilege in England. Marcher lords administered laws, waged war, established markets in towns, and maintained their own chanceries that kept their records, which have been completely lost. They had their own deputies, or sheriffs. Sitting in their own courts they had jurisdiction over all cases at law save high treason. "They could establish forests and forest laws declare and wage war, establish boroughs, and grant extensive charters of liberties. They could confiscate the estates of traitors and felons, and regrant these at will. They could establish and preside over their own petty parliaments and county courts. Finally, they could claim any and every feudal due, aid, grant, and relief" (Nelson 1966, ch. 8), although they did not mint coins. Their one insecurity, if they did not take up arms against the king, was of dying without a legitimate heir, whereupon the title reverted to the Crown in escheat. Welsh law was frequently used in the Marches in preference to English law, and there would sometimes be a dispute as to which code should be used to decide a particular case. Look up Sheriff in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Escheat is an obstruction of the course of descent and the consequent reversion of property to the original grantor. ... Codified by Hywel Dda (Hywell the Good) in the early 10th century, the laws of the Welsh Princes were significantly more complex than would be found in other ares of Western Europe for centuries. ...

Feudal social structures, which were never fully established in England, took root in the Marches, which was not legally part of the realm of England. The traditional view has been that the Norman monarchy granted these outright. A revisionist view is that such rights were more common in the 11th century throughout the Conquest, but were largely suppressed in England, and survived in the Marches. Settlement was encouraged, as if the lands were desert: Knights were granted their own lands, which they held in feudal service to the Norman lords. Settlement was also encouraged in towns that were given market privileges, under the protection of a Norman keep. Peasants came to Wales in large numbers: Henry I encouraged Bretons, Flemings, Normans, and English settlers to move into the south of Wales. Feudalism comes from the Late Latin word feudum, itself borrowed from a Germanic root *fehu, a commonly used term in the Middle Ages which means fief, or land held under certain obligations by feodati. ... As a means of recording the passage of time, the 11th century was that century which lasted from 1001 to 1100. ... For other uses, see Keep (disambiguation). ... Henry I (c. ... Historical province of Brittany, showing the main areas with their name in Breton language The traditional flag of Brittany (the Gwenn-ha-du), formerly a Breton nationalist symbol but today used as a general civic flag in the region. ... Flemings (Dutch: Vlamingen) are inhabitants of Flanders in the widest sense of the term, i. ... Norman conquests in red. ...

The tendencies of innovations in the Plantagenet monarchy were towards a centralised bureaucracy and judiciary, with the gradual elimination of localisms. In the Marches of Wales these processes towards a "high mediæval" authority were staunchly resisted. Protests of the border lords surviving in the Royal records throw some light upon the nature and extent of the privileges whose normal operation has left no record.

On the local side, the able-bodied population was more directly essential to the local Lord and was able to extract from him carefully defined and highly local liberties. A point of friction was in the Lords' funded churches where they appointed churchmen to "livings" held tightly under hierarchic control in the manner that had developed in Normandy, where a highly organised church structure was well in the hands of the Duke. The Welsh church, on the Celtic plan, closely connected with clan loyalties, brooked little authoritarian influence. The Duchy of Normandy stems from the Viking invasions of France in the 8th century. ...

The Marcher Lords were progressively tied to the English kings by the grants of lands and lordships in England, where control was stricter, and where many marcher lords spent most of their time, and through the English kings' dynastic alliances with the great magnates. It was less easy to work in the opposite way, and establish a position among the hereditary marcher families, as Hugh Le Despenser discovered. He began by exchanging estates he held in England and by obtaining grants in the Welsh Marches from the King. He even obtained the Isle of Lundy. When the last male heir of the de Braose family died, Despenser was able to obtain the de Braose lands around Swansea. In 1321 the Marcher Lords threatened to start a civil war and it was agreed that a Parliament should be called to settle the matter. The execution of Hugh, the younger Despenser, from a manuscript of Froissart. ... This article is about the island of Lundy, which is part of England. ... Events Births September 29 - John of Artois, Count of Eu, French soldier (d. ...

King Edward I had officially conquered Wales by 1283. However in Henry VIII's time, more than 200 years later, the Marcher Lords still governed the two-thirds of Wales that was not part of the "Principality". When the marcher lordships were abolished under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, the centre of administration for Wales was established at Ludlow in Shropshire. Edward I; illustration from Cassells History of England circa 1902. ... For broader historical context, see 1280s and 13th century. ... Henry VIII redirects here. ... This article is about the historical state known as the Principality of Wales (1267-1542). ... The Laws in Wales Acts 1535â€“1542 were a series of parliamentary measures by which the legal system of Wales was annexed to England and the norms of English administration introduced in order to create a single state and a single legal jurisdiction, which is frequently referred to as England... This article is about the town in Shropshire, England. ...

External links

Richard Williams, "The Welsh Marches": a brief introduction
Local Web site for a Marches Town:

Source

Nelson, Lynn H., 1966. The Normans in South Wales, 1070–1171 (Austin and London: University of Texas Press).

Results from FactBites:

Marches - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (1754 words)
	The Earl of March is at least two distinct feudal titles: one, created 1328, held by the powerful border families of Mortimer (in the Peerage of England), in the west (Welsh marches) and one, Dunbar, in the northern marches (in the Peerage of Scotland).
	Marche was bounded on the north by Berry, on the east by Bourbonnais and Auvergne; on the south by Limousin itself and on the west by Poitou.
	In 1080 the Marca Anconitana was given in investiture to Robert Guiscard by pope Gregory VII, to whom the countess Matilda ceded the Marches of Camerino and of Fermo.

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