The Welsh Marches
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Welcome to Klaas Olsson. Klaas Olsson.
The Crosstwires Podcast Festival is back, bigger and better this year, in Sheffield. From Thursday 2nd to Sunday 5th July 2026, BBC Sounds and Radio 4 Fringe are treating podcast listeners to an exciting line-up of shows all for free, including In Our Time. We'll be recording at the Montgomery Theatre on 4th July with a special edition of In Our Time on Casablanca. That's Bogart and Bergman and much more. Visit crossedwires.live slash fringe for the full list of programmes and how to get free tickets. This is In Our Time from BBC Radio 4. I hope you enjoy the programme. Hello. In 1066, William the Conqueror knew that if he wanted to control England, he'd have to subdue the Welsh forces across the border in an area that became known as the Welsh Marches.
Soon, more and more Norman warlords established effectively their own private kingdoms, later their bases for invading Ireland. These marcher lords built castles here, where new towns grew up, new ways of life, with one law for the English and another for the Welsh. And I say here because we're at the Hay Festival and Hay-on-Wye is in these marches. Indeed, one of the very first castles was built here in Hay, just down the road. Well, with me to discuss the Welsh marches are... Ilyn Emlyn, lecturer in history and Welsh history at Aberystwyth University, Helen Fulton, professor of medieval literature at the University of Bristol, and Hugh Price, emeritus professor of Welsh history at Bangor University.
Can I have a big warm hay welcome for my guests?
Deeply appropriate. Thank you. So let me go first of all to Hugh Price. Hugh, I've sketched out a little bit about the marches, but can you give us some essential details? What were the Welsh marches?
Well, I think the first thing to say is that the marches were an essential part of the story of the conquest and colonisation of Wales in the Middle Ages. The marches in the sense we're going to talk about them include, as it were, the border between England and Wales, which is more geographical use of the marches. but extended right along the South Wales coast and into parts of Mid Wales, and later on, after the Edwardian conquest, also parts of North East Wales. And these were essentially created by lords who fought their way, in many cases, into Wales, as we've heard. Hay was an early example of a lordship established in the late 1080s by a Norman, Bernard de Neufmarchais, who had lands in Herefordshire, and he led troops down the Wye Valley.
They would have been responsible for building the motte, which is not at the site of Hay Castle now, which is a bit later, probably from the 12th century, but near the church in Hay. And they continued, and eventually, by the 1090s, Bernard takes over the Welsh kingdom of Brechaeniog, or Brechan, and at the same time, the powerful Welsh king of southwest Wales, Rhys, Rhys ap Teudor, is killed. And after that, the Normans also go further into west and southwest Wales. So that's a further stage. So in a sense, Hay is part of an important sort of thread in the story of the making of the marches.
So how did these martial lords, how did they manage to accrue so much power in their hands, particularly their independence from the English king?
We don't really know exactly how they accrued that power. What is clear is that the power was very extensive by the time the documentation really gives us details about it in the 13th century. They claimed the right to wage private wars. They had rights of jurisdiction. There was a law of the march, which was a hybrid between, if you like, English and Welsh law, and that's recognised in Magna Carta in 1215, and it says disputes...
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–14:03
2
What are the Welsh Marches and why was Hay-on-Wye important?
14:03–35:29
3
How did marcher lords establish power and legal independence?
35:29–50:25
4
Who were the marcher lords and how did their landholdings connect England, Wales and Ireland?
50:25–54:41