The enchanted valley pt 1: Llanthony Priory, Vale of Ewyas

A place of visions and missions on the English-Welsh border, marked by ancient Offa's Dyke; home of Falstaff, painted by Turner, and still utterly deserted

It’s been a while, friends — I hope you’ve all been keeping well these dark and cold few months. I know it’s been radio silence, but now I’m back with more adventures of the weird and wonderful — this time in the Welsh(!) landscape! I’m so happy to be out exploring again so please do read, share and enjoy. And please subscribe if you’d like more inspiration for post-pandemic escapes.

Long ago, the place had been called Ty-Cradoc — and Caractacus is still a name in these parts — but in 1737 an ailing girl called Alice Morgan saw the Virgin hovering over a patch of rhubarb, and ran back to the kitchen, cured. To celebrate the miracle, her father renamed the farm ‘The Vision’ and carved the initials A.M. with the date and a cross on the lintel above the porch. The border between Radnor and Hereford was said to run right through the middle of the staircase.

— Bruce Chatwin, On the Black Hill

Such visions are liable to happen here. In 1100, Walter de Lacy, a Norman nobleman, had a similar experience when he stumbled across a ruined Chapel of St David in the area, and was called to found Llanthony Priory.

Immediately across the English border there is a summit called the Black Hill, one of many possible locations associated with Chatwin’s novel. It tells the story of two brothers on a Black Mountains upland farm who live out a fading way of life.

Also on the other side of the ridge is Oldcastle, once home of John Oldcastle, a Lollard friend of Henry V, thought to be Shakespeare’s model for the character of Falstaff.

Here it’s easy to fall under the spell of these and many other stories.

We drive up the Vale of Ewyas (pronunciation still uncertain) on probably the third good day of the year. It is the first time since last summer that I have not been cold. As we drive up the winding single-track road, the sun highlights the valley’s flanks: after a long, wet winter, almost electric green. We trundle along behind an old tractor, who pulls aside to let us pass. Errant lambs trot along the road and bolt through a gap in the fence. The sun bounces off the gently swollen river.

If the Vale feels a little like entering a separate, enchanted realm, this may be because of its history as a small Welsh kingdom following the Roman withdrawal from Britain. Aled grew up a little to the north of here, but he’s never visited. As cantref of Ewias, running north to south just within the border with England, it was an autonomous lordship within the March of Wales until 1536 when it became part of the county of Monmouthshire.

Rounding the corner, we catch sight of the Augustinian priory at Llanthony, dissolved by Henry VIII around the same time. It strikes a more solid figure than many of the honey-coloured, half-disintegrated English abbeys, in a darker and harder-wearing Welsh stone. Information boards show the gradual stages of decline through 18th and 19th century etchings. I’m always struck by how even the Romantic obsession couldn’t prevent stonework and arches falling down. JMW Turner came here to paint it but apparently it occurred to nobody to try to preserve the structure itself, or perhaps that was part of the appeal. That inherent danger; I wonder whether anyone was ever killed by a piece of falling masonry.

Looking at this surprising feat of engineering deep in such a remote valley I wonder whether the monks worried, within it, if they were losing touch with nature. Or perhaps mediaeval religion didn’t concern itself with such things. Indeed today’s peace is an illusion; Gerald of Wales wrote that the Priory was ‘fixed among barbarous people’ and attacks by the local Welsh population forced most of the brothers to retreat to a second house in Gloucester in the early twelfth century. The Priory was however subsequently rebuilt with funds from various descendants of Walter de Lacy, the original founder, which explains its later splendour.

Assaulted by a sudden lashing rainstorm, we take shelter beneath the remains of the Chapter house with three fellow walkers. Middle-aged men in anoraks and wide-brimmed hats, one of them tells us they are doing the Offa’s Dyke Path. He says he’s from Kingston, but sounds more Welsh than Aled.

Once the rain clears off we see them tramping up the valley’s eastern slope towards Hatterall Ridge, the border between England and Wales. The Offa’s Dyke path traverses this route. Growing up in the Midlands, this was the scene of many childhood marches. Although no evidence of a dyke exists in these upland parts, the route traces the line north to south ‘from sea to sea’ on which it is traditionally believed Offa, 8th century King of Mercia, maintained a defensive earthwork against the Welsh.

Though quiet, the valley now seems more welcoming to outsiders. We meet an Englishwoman in Hunter wellies and dungarees walking her two dogs. Later, stalking local Airbnbs, we recognise her muscular yellow labrador in the photo of one of the properties. We see two people camping by the river, a spot so idyllic it could be out of a children’s book — Swallows and Amazons.

Still, it maintains a slightly offbeat atmosphere, as if you had suddenly found yourself in The Shire. We see two men working in the yard of some of the monastery’s old outbuildings, bashing something on a blacksmith’s anvil. Finding the footpath, we pick our way through the garden of a house with rambling sheds and lean-tos, rusting caravans in the back garden. Heading up the sides of the valley, there are old Welsh farmhouses with beautifully cultivated gardens — bamboo and climbing roses — and upland sheep grazing outside the walls. In the mud, I catch sight of two violets, which I’ve never seen in the wild before.

The valley’s English cousin lies across the border — the Golden Valley. I’ve never been there, but its name suggests similar enchantment. Although, one theory suggests that the Normans confused the Welsh name for the River Dore (dwr) with ‘d’or’, of gold — a similar corruption of the Celtic accounts for the name of the River Douro in Portugal.

That’s just the kind of strange magic that happens here.

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This is the first in a two part instalment about the Vale of Ewyas… the next one includes more stories and visions, this time from the upper end of the valley, at Capel-y-ffin. Twentieth-century artists were drawn here — among them Eric Gill and Eric Ravilious.

I hope you enjoyed this return after a long absence… I certainly did. As ever, if you enjoyed what you read, please do consider sharing it with a friend, to whom it might also bring joy.

I’d also love to hear your comments, feedback and suggestions. What trips are you planning now lockdown is (almost) at an end?

Take care,

Ruth