Pembrokeshire - History

History

Human habitation of the region of Pembrokeshire extends back to 125,000 and 70,000 BCE. By the late Roman Empire period, an Irish tribe known as the Déisi settled in the region between AD 350 and 400, with their realm known as Demetae.

In the post Roman period, the Irish Déisi merged with the local Welsh, with the name of the region evolving into Dyfed, which existed as an independent petty kingdom until its heiress, Elen, married Hywel the Good in AD 904.

Hywel merged Dyfed with his own maternal inheritance of Seisyllwg, forming the new realm of Deheubarth. The region suffered from devastating and relentless Viking raids during the Viking Age, with the Vikings establishing settlements and trading posts at Haverfordwest, Fishguard and Caldey Island.

Dyfed, the region of Pembrokeshire, remained an integral province of Deheubarth but this was contested by invading Normans and Flemings who arrived between 1067 and 1111. The region became known as Pembroke, after the Norman castle built in the Penfro cantref. But Norman/Flemish presence was precarious given the hostility of the native Welsh Princes. In 1136 Prince Owain Gwynedd sought to avenge the execution of his sister the Princess Gwenllian of Deheubarth and her children, with Gwenllian's husband the Prince Rhys swept down from Gwynedd with a formidable army and at Crug Mawr near Cardigan. There they met and destroyed the 3000 strong Norman/Flemish army. The remnants of the Normans fled across the bridge at Cardigan which collapsed and the Teifi river was choked with drowned Men at Arms and horses.

The Norman Marcher Lord Gilbert de Clare was also killed. Owain's brother Cadwallader took de Clares daughter Alice as his wife. Owain incorporated Deheubarth into Gwynedd re-establishing control of the region. Mortally weakened Norman/Flemish influence never fully recovered in West Wales. Princess Gwenllian of Deheubarth is one of the best remembered victims. In 1138 the county of Pembrokeshire was named as a county palatine

The county has long been divided between an English-speaking south (known as "Little England beyond Wales") and a historically more Welsh-speaking north, along an imaginary line called the Landsker.

The Lord Rhys, Prince of Deheubarth, Princess Gwenllian's son, reestablished Welsh control over much of the region and threatened to retake all of Pembrokeshire, but died in 1197. After Deheubarth was split by a dynastic feud, Llywelyn the Great almost managed to retake the region of Pembroke between 1216 and his death in 1240.

In 1457 Henry Tudor was born at Pembroke Castle and, 28 years later, landing an army not far from his birthplace, he rallied support, marched through Wales to Bosworth field in Leicestershire and defeated the larger army of Richard III. As Henry VII he founded the Tudor dynasty which successfully ruled England until 1603.

The Act of Union of 1536 divided the county into hundreds, which followed with some modifications the lines of the ancient division into cantrefs, which went back to before the Norman conquest. The 1536 hundreds were (clockwise from the north-east): Cilgerran or Kilgerran, Cemais or Kemes, Dewisland or Dewsland, Roose, Castlemartin, Narbeth and Dungleddy or Daugleddau. The Genuki web pages on Pembrokeshire include a list of the parishes within each hundred.