Programme: Autumn Term 2025
Critical Locality in the Early Medieval March: A Case Study in the Lower Wye Valley
This talk will present some preliminary research from the Leverhulme-funded Making the March project. We will outline the theoretical and methodological frameworks we have developed for approaching the early medieval frontier landscape and then present a case study focused on the lower Wye Valley, where we have recently undertaken excavations on a potential early medieval enclosure site close to Tintern Abbey.
Dr Andy Seaman
is Reader in Early Medieval Archaeology at Cardiff University. He is leading several research projects focused on Wales and western Britain, including excavations of an early medieval cemetery complex on the grounds of Fonmon Castle.
Wednesday 26th November, 7.30pm.
Philip Hume
Chair Dr Emma Cavell
Please follow this link to the programme ☛☛
‘Cherchez la Mère (“shulde Roger Mortimer, [d.1282] of right have been Prince of Wales?”)’
In his Cronica Walliae, completed in 1559, Humphrey Llwyd comments that Roger Mortimer (d.1282), lord of Wigmore, should of right have been Prince of Wales in 1246 (rather than Owain and Llywelyn ap Gruffudd), as he was the ‘righte enheritor’. Llwyd’s comment is based on an assumption that Roger’s mother, Gwladus Ddu, was the daughter of the Lady Joan who was the (illegitimate) daughter of King John. Indeed, from the end of the fourteenth century that assumption had been incorporated into genealogies produced in England. Yet, there was an equally strong and separate Welsh genealogical tradition that Gwladus was not the daughter of Joan, but the daughter of Llywelyn’s previous (unmarried) relationship with Tangwystl Goch. In which case, Llwyd’s claim on behalf of Roger was no better than that of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd who was also a grandson of Tangwystl. This paper will assess the evidence for the divergent claims in the context of why Gwladus’ ancestry became significant and will conclude … (you will have to attend to find out!).
Philip Hume
is nearing the end of his second year (part-time) as a PhD History Researcher at Swansea University and is the author and editor of several books on the Mortimers and on the March of Wales in the Middle Ages. Philip is the Chair of the Mortimer History Society.