Archenfield is the historic English name for an area of southern and western Herefordshire in England. Since the Anglo-Saxons took over the region in the 8th century, it has stretched between the River Monnow and River Wye, but it derives from the once much larger Welsh kingdom of Ergyng.

History

Ergyng

See also Ergyng

The name Archenfield is derived from the older and larger Welsh kingdom of Ergyng (or Ercic), which in turn is believed to derive from the Roman town of Ariconium at Weston under Penyard. After the withdrawal of the Roman legions from Britain in 410 AD, new smaller political entities took the place of the centralised structure. From about 555 AD, the area was ruled by King Peibio and his descendants until, in the middle of the 7th century, Onbraust of Ergyng married Meurig of Gwent and the two neighbouring kingdoms were combined. The area was converted to Christianity in the 6th century by Saint Dubricius (known in Welsh as Dyfrig). Ergyng eventually became a mere cantref, the Welsh equivalent of a hundred.

English overlordship

By the 8th century, the expanding power of Mercia led to conflict with the Welsh, and by the beginning of the 9th century the western Mercians, who became known as the sub-kingdom of Magonset, had gained control over the area and nearby Hereford. During the rest of the century they moved its frontier southward to the banks of the Dore, the Worm Brook and a stream then known as the Taratur, annexing northern Ergyng. The sites of old British churches fell to Mercia, and the British became foreigners - or, in the English language, "Welsh" - in what had been their own land. The rump of Ergyng then became known to the English as Arcenefelde or Archenfield.

In 915, the area faced an incursion from Vikings led by Ohter and Rhoald, coming from the River Severn. After first capturing Cyfeiliog (Cimeliauc), the Bishop of Llandaff, they were defeated in battle by the combined forces of Gloucester and Hereford, possibly at "Kill Dane Field" near Weston under Penyard.

Archenfield, which lay beyond Offa's Dyke and outside the Hundred system, became a semi-autonomous Welsh district, or commote, with its own customs. Its administrative centre was at Kilpeck Castle. Its customs were described in a separate section of the Domesday Book account of Herefordshire. Domesday recorded that "King Gruffydd and Bleddyn laid this land waste before 1066; therefore what it was like at that time is not known". It also stated the Welsh of Archenfield were allowed to retain their old rights and privileges in return for forming an advance and rear guard when the King's army entered or left Wales. The local priests were required to "undertake the king's embassies into Wales", presumably providing a translation service. The exemption from services was mentioned again in 1250 and 1326, when it was stated: "The Frenchmen and Welshmen of Urchenesfeld hold their tenements in chief of our lord the King by socage, rendering 19 pounds 7 shillings and 6 pence. And they ought to find 49 foot-soldiers for our lord the King in Wales for 15 days at their own cost."

Later history

The Welsh inhabitants of Archenfield thereafter retained their privileged position, living in a shadowy border land that was not really part of England nor Wales. Around 1404, Owain Glyndŵr and his troops raided the area. Glyndŵr himself may have died around 1416 at Kentchurch, within Archenfield, an area which he considered to be part of Wales.

Uncertainty over the border persisted until the Laws in Wales Acts of 1535 and 1542, often known as "The Acts of Union", tidied up many of the administrative anomalies within Wales and the Marcher borderlands. However no consideration was given at the time to ethnic or linguistic realities, and so various territories were grouped together in a rough and ready manner to form the new shires. Archenfield was thus bundled into Herefordshire, as the Hundred of Wormelow. However, it remained a predominantly Welsh speaking region until at least the 17th century, and the language was still spoken in the Kentchurch area as late as 1750. The evidence of its Welsh history remains in many placenames and field names.

Many of the rights and customs of the people of Archenfield were maintained until comparatively recently. Men born in Archenfield had the right to take salmon from the River Wye until 1911. In King's Caple, the only part of Archenfield east of the Wye, Domesday lists the inhabitants as one Frenchman and five Welshmen. Six local men paid the dues which had been owed at this time, and before, for centuries. Payment was still being made by one of these 'King's Men of Archenfield' in the 1960s.

The symbol of Archenfield and, specifically, of the town of Ross-on-Wye is the hedgehog, known in Middle English, and locally, as an "urchin". It has been speculated that the names "Archenfield" and "Ergyng" may ultimately derive from the Latin word for hedgehog, hericius, from which "urchin" is also derived.

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