Offa was King of Mercia, a kingdom of Anglo-Saxon England, from 757 until his death in 796. The son of Thingfrith and a descendant of Eowa, Offa came to the throne after a period of civil war following the assassination of Æthelbald. Offa defeated the other claimant, Beornred. In the early years of Offa's reign, it is likely that he consolidated his control of Midland peoples such as the Hwicce and the Magonsæte. Taking advantage of instability in the kingdom of Kent to establish himself as overlord, Offa also controlled Sussex by 771, though his authority did not remain unchallenged in either territory. In the 780s he extended Mercian Supremacy over most of southern England, allying with Beorhtric of Wessex, who married Offa's daughter Eadburh, and regained complete control of the southeast. He also became the overlord of East Anglia and had King Æthelberht II of East Anglia beheaded in 794, perhaps for rebelling against him.
Offa's Dyke Path is a long-distance footpath loosely following the Wales–England border. Officially opened on 10 July 1971, by Lord Hunt, it is one of Britain's National Trails and draws walkers from throughout the world. About 60 miles (97 km) of the 177-mile (285 km) route either follows, or keeps close company with, the remnants of Offa's Dyke, an earthwork traditionally thought to have been constructed in the late 8th century on the orders of King Offa of Mercia.
The Welsh Marches is an imprecisely defined area along the border between England and Wales in the United Kingdom. The precise meaning of the term has varied at different periods.
The Cornovīī were a Celtic people of the Iron Age and Roman Britain, who lived principally in the modern English counties of Cheshire, Shropshire, north Staffordshire, north Herefordshire and eastern parts of the Welsh counties of Flintshire, Powys and Wrexham. Their capital in pre-Roman times was probably a hillfort on the Wrekin. Ptolemy's 2nd-century Geography names two of their towns: Deva Victrix (Chester) and Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter), which became their capital under Roman rule.
Knighton is a market town and community on the River Teme, straddling the border between Powys, Wales and Shropshire, England. It lies in the traditional county of Radnorshire. Originally an Anglo-Saxon settlement, Knighton is located on Offa's Dyke, the ancient earthwork that divided the two countries. It later became a Norman defensive border town.
The Kingdom of Powys was a Welsh successor state, petty kingdom and principality that emerged during the Middle Ages following the end of Roman rule in Britain. It very roughly covered the northern two-thirds of the modern county of Powys and part of today's English West Midlands. More precisely, and based on the Romano-British tribal lands of the Ordovices in the west and the Cornovii in the east, its boundaries originally extended from the Cambrian Mountains in the west to include the modern West Midlands region of England in the east. The fertile river valleys of the Severn and Tern are found here, and this region is referred to in later Welsh literature as "the Paradise of Powys".
Chirk Castle is a Grade I listed castle located in Chirk, Wrexham County Borough, Wales, 1.5 mi (2.4 km) from Chirk railway station, now owned and run by the National Trust.
Wat's Dyke is a 40-mile (64 km) linear earthwork running through the northern Welsh Marches from Basingwerk Abbey on the River Dee estuary, passing east of Oswestry and on to Maesbury in Shropshire, England. It runs generally parallel to Offa's Dyke, sometimes within a few yards but never more than three miles (5 km) away. It now appears insignificant and is visible in some places as a raised hedgerow and in others no more than a cropmark. The ditch has long since been filled in and the bank ploughed away, but originally it was a considerable construction, considered to be strategically more sophisticated than Offa's Dyke. The date of construction is disputed, ranging from sub-Roman to the early ninth century.
Buttington is a village in Powys, Wales, less than 3 km from Welshpool and about 300 m from the River Severn, in the community of Trewern. The Montgomery Canal passes through the village. The village stands on a slight rise above the river's floodplain, by the ancient ford called Rhyd-y-groes, where Offa's Dyke meets the Severn. The ford retained strategic value: reportedly in 1039 a battle took place here between Welsh and English forces.
The Vallum is a huge earthwork associated with Hadrian's Wall in England. Unique on any Roman frontier, it runs practically from coast to coast to the south of the wall. It was built a few years after the Wall.
Uxelodunum was a Roman fort with associated civilian settlement (vicus) in modern-day Carlisle, Cumbria, England. It was the largest fort on Hadrian's Wall and is now buried beneath the suburb of Stanwix.
Hadrian's Wall is a former defensive fortification of the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian. Running from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west of what is now northern England, it was a stone wall with large ditches in front and behind, stretching across the whole width of the island. Soldiers were garrisoned along the line of the wall in large forts, smaller milecastles, and intervening turrets. In addition to the wall's defensive military role, its gates may have been customs posts.
The Antonine Wall was a turf fortification on stone foundations, built by the Romans across what is now the Central Belt of Scotland, between the Firth of Clyde and the Firth of Forth. Built some twenty years after Hadrian's Wall to the south, and intended to supersede it, while it was garrisoned it was the northernmost frontier barrier of the Roman Empire. It spanned approximately 63 kilometres and was about 3 metres high and 5 metres wide. Lidar scans have been carried out to establish the length of the wall and the Roman distance units used. Security was bolstered by a deep ditch on the northern side. It is thought that there was a wooden palisade on top of the turf. The barrier was the second of two "great walls" created by the Romans in Great Britain in the second century AD. Its ruins are less evident than those of the better-known and longer Hadrian's Wall to the south, primarily because the turf and wood wall has largely weathered away, unlike its stone-built southern predecessor.
The Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust was an educational charity, the objective of which was ‘to advance the education of the public in archaeology’. CPAT was established in 1975 and dissolved in 2024, when it merged with the three other Welsh Archaeological Trusts (WATs) to create Heneb: the Trust for Welsh Archaeology.
The England–Wales border, sometimes referred to as the Wales–England border or the Anglo-Welsh border, runs for 160 miles (260 km) from the Dee estuary, in the north, to the Severn estuary in the south, separating England and Wales.
The Wall of Severus is believed to be a defensive fortification built by the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus during his military campaigns in northern Britannia in the early 3rd century. Although the structure is mentioned in several classical texts, its precise location is academically disputed due to inconsistencies between sources. Scholarly consensus believes they are most likely referring to the Antonine Wall. However, Hadrian's Wall and Offa's Dyke have both been suggested as possible candidates. Archaeological evidence has been discovered showing parts of Offa's Dyke, on the England-Wales border, is at least as old as the mid 5th century, predating the 8th-century reign of the Saxon King Offa of Mercia by 300 years.
Long Mountain is a hill straddling the boundary between Powys (Wales) and Shropshire (England) to the east of Welshpool though the summit at 408 metres at Beacon Ring is within Wales. Long Mountain is a Marilyn, having a prominence of 305 metres.
Brompton is a hamlet in Shropshire, England. It lies on the A489 between Church Stoke and Newtown at its junction with the B4385. The hamlet is notable for the fact that it is impossible to reach any other settlement in England by road without first passing through Wales. Public footpaths are the only access which links it with the rest of England. It is, however, not geographically an exclave. It is also notable as having Welsh language road signage on the B4385 heading south into Powys, unique in England.
Moel y Gaer is an Iron Age hillfort at the northern end of the Clwydian Range, located on a summit overlooking the valley of the River Wheeler, near the village of Bodfari, Denbighshire, Wales, five miles north-east of Denbigh. The site is a scheduled monument, classified as a prehistoric defensive hillfort.
