Programme: Spring Term 2026
Wednesday 28th January, 7.30pm.
Dr Rachel Harkes
The link to the programme will be provided when available ☛☛
Cooperative Justice? The Council of the Marches and local governance in the early sixteenth century
Despite its perceived importance, the operation of the Council of the Marches (originally founded by Edward IV in the 1470s and then periodically renewed over the following 200 years) prior to the 1530s remains largely unknown. Its records survive patchily in the State Papers or preserved in antiquarian copies, yet the majority of the documentation that detailed its day-to-day activity in its formative years has been lost. To counter this lacuna, this paper will focus instead on the records created by the Marcher lordships (with whom the Council interacted in this period) and by local town governments, collating and analysing references to the Council to reconstruct the working relationship between these institutions. Rather than emphasising the relative degrees of lawlessness and violence in the region, we can instead ask questions about the practice of governance to build a more constructive framework for understanding the multifaceted relationships between centres and peripheries, lords and Council, governors and governed. How did the Council intersect with, support, or interrupt the governance of individual lordships? To what extent was communication to and from the Council reciprocated by a lordship’s officers?
Dr Rachel Harkes
is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Bristol on the ‘Mapping the Medieval March of Wales’ team, having previously held a lectureship at the University of Durham. Her first monograph, Forging Fraternity in Late Medieval Society , is out in November 2025 with the University of London Press/Royal Historical Society.
Wednesday 11th March, 7.30pm.
Dr Caroline Bourne
Chair: Philip Hume
The link to the programme will be provided when available ☛☛
The Lordship of Gower: Keystone of the Southern March
Gower has often been overlooked in traditional historiography of Marcher power in Wales, overshadowed by more evidence-rich lordships. However, Gower played a crucial role in the early twelfth-century expansion of Marcher power in south Wales. This paper delves into the early history of the lordship and its pivotal role in the administrative reforms of Henry I and the military conflicts of the region. Strategically located, Gower’s centrality was vital for linking east and west, thereby weakening Welsh authority. It served as a key hub for mobility, with the main land route of south Wales passing through it and acting as a central point for navigating the treacherous waters of the Bristol Channel, historically known as the Severn Sea. As a coastal lordship, Gower facilitated sea trade and maritime travel, providing a means of retreat from Welsh hostility and enabling communication with England. The Marcher lordship of Gower was a vital player in the evolving political landscape of medieval Wales, with a strategic significance that extended far beyond its immediate borders.
Dr Caroline Bourne
is a Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Reading, specialising in the development of regional identities in the north-west Atlantic region. She recently contributed to the project Magic in the Court of Alfonso X and the edited volume Medieval Perceptions of Magic, Science, and the Natural World (Arc Humanities Press, 2024), with a chapter on the use of the Severn Sea for religious travel. In 2023, she received a MHS Essay Prize commendation and was awarded her doctorate by the University of Reading in 2024, with her thesis focusing on the Gower region in south Wales prior to the thirteenth century.