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Medieval settlement and landscape change on Anglesey
In 1283 the Welsh kingdom of Gwynedd was conquered by Edward I of England and the royal lands of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd passed into the control of the English Crown. This case study will examine aspects of the bond settlements at two Anglesey maerdrefi (royal estate centres) in the two south-western commotes of Malltraeth and Menai. It will attempt to determine more closely their location and character and to chart the transformation of the landscape from the Age of the Princes, through the sale of Crown land in the seventeenth century, to the present day.
Recent studies have drawn attention to the potential for locating the llysoedd of the Welsh princes of Gwynedd during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, at the core of their royal estates, through the use of documentary evidence and targeted fieldwork (Johnstone 1997). The work of Glanville Jones has considered the organisation of the maerdref in general and maerdref Aberffraw in particular (for example, Jones 1979). However, less attention has been paid, in detail, to the settlements of the bond tenants of the Prince, which it is argued, are likely to have been concentrated in nucleated villages (Carr 1982, p. 31), or to the ancillary components of the estates which constitute the immediate landscape.
The components of medieval settlement on Anglesey are described in the context of the administrative and tenurial framework. These provide background to the study of settlement and landscape change on lands formerly held by the Princes of Gwynedd. The pattern is one of increasing consolidation of holdings and the amalgamation of individual small tenancies, with large properties in the hands of a small number of landowners. By the sixteenth century the enclosure of the open field with banks had begun. The dispersed arable quillets of an earlier landscape can be seen to have been increasingly brought together in parcels and closes. By the early nineteenth century, the superimposition of large fields, characterised by ruler-straight boundaries where once ran sinuous strips in open field, has obscured and all but obliterated the pattern of the medieval landscape.
Medieval settlement and landscape change on Anglesey
In 1283 the Welsh kingdom of Gwynedd was conquered by Edward I of England and the royal lands of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd passed into the control of the English Crown. This case study will examine aspects of the bond settlements at two Anglesey maerdrefi (royal estate centres) in the two south-western commotes of Malltraeth and Menai. It will attempt to determine more closely their location and character and to chart the transformation of the landscape from the Age of the Princes, through the sale of Crown land in the seventeenth century, to the present day.
Recent studies have drawn attention to the potential for locating the llysoedd of the Welsh princes of Gwynedd during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, at the core of their royal estates, through the use of documentary evidence and targeted fieldwork (Johnstone 1997). The work of Glanville Jones has considered the organisation of the maerdref in general and maerdref Aberffraw in particular (for example, Jones 1979). However, less attention has been paid, in detail, to the settlements of the bond tenants of the Prince, which it is argued, are likely to have been concentrated in nucleated villages (Carr 1982, p. 31), or to the ancillary components of the estates which constitute the immediate landscape.
The components of medieval settlement on Anglesey are described in the context of the administrative and tenurial framework. These provide background to the study of settlement and landscape change on lands formerly held by the Princes of Gwynedd. The pattern is one of increasing consolidation of holdings and the amalgamation of individual small tenancies, with large properties in the hands of a small number of landowners. By the sixteenth century the enclosure of the open field with banks had begun. The dispersed arable quillets of an earlier landscape can be seen to have been increasingly brought together in parcels and closes. By the early nineteenth century, the superimposition of large fields, characterised by ruler-straight boundaries where once ran sinuous strips in open field, has obscured and all but obliterated the pattern of the medieval landscape.
Medieval settlement and landscape change on Anglesey
Longley, David (author)
Landscape History ; 23 ; 39-59
2001-01-01
21 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
English
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