Oswestry

History

The earliest known human settlement in Oswestry is Old Oswestry, one of the best-preserved Iron Age hill forts in Britain, with evidence of construction and occupation between 800BC and 43AD. The site is known in Welsh as Caer Ogyrfan, meaning 'City of Gogyrfan', referring to the father of Guinevere in Arthurian legend. The Battle of Maserfield is widely thought to have been fought at Oswestry in 641 or 642, between the Anglo-Saxon kings Penda of Mercia and Oswald of Northumbria. However, the location of the battle is debated among scholars. Alan fitz Flaad (died c.1120), a Breton knight, was granted the feudal barony of Oswestry by King Henry I who, soon after his accession, invited Alan to England with other Breton friends, and gave him forfeited lands in Norfolk and Shropshire, including some which had previously belonged to Ernulf de Hesdin (killed at Antioch while on crusade) and Robert of Bellême. Alan's duties to the Crown included supervision of the Welsh border. He also founded Sporle Priory in Norfolk. He married Ada or Adeline, daughter of Ernulf de Hesdin. Their eldest son William FitzAlan was made High Sheriff of Shropshire by King Stephen in 1137. He married a niece of Robert of Gloucester. Alan's younger son, Walter, travelled to Scotland in the train of King David I, Walter becoming the first hereditary Steward of Scotland and ancestor of the Stewart Royal family. The town changed hands between the English and the Welsh a number of times during the Middle Ages and still retains some Welsh-language street and place names. In 1972, ITV broadcast a television report asking residents if they thought the town should be English or Welsh, with mixed responses. In 1149 the castle was captured by Madog ap Maredudd during 'The Anarchy', and it remained in…