Beaumaris’s town walls were a fifteenth-century defensive structure built around the town in Anglesey, Wales.
History
The town of Beaumaris was constructed by Edward I in 1296, following the English King’s successful invasion of North Wales. The town was guarded by a castle, but had no protective wall. Limited foundations appear to have been built for a protective circuit, but despite requests from the townspeople for a town wall in 1315, none was constructed.
In 1400, the Welsh prince Owain Glyndŵr rose in rebellion against English rule, and took Beaumaris in 1403; the town was not recovered until 1405. In response the decision was taken by 1407 to build a town wall; ditches and an earth bank were constructed and by 1414 a stone wall had been built, with three gates and a number of probable towers. This necessitated the moving of a number of residents whose houses fell in the way of the new defences. Despite damage from the nearby sea in 1460, which resulted in some of the walls being rebuilt between 1536 and 1540, the walls were maintained until the late 17th century.
Today only a few fragments of the wall survive; these are protected as a scheduled monument and a grade I listed building. There are some foundations by the “Gate next the Sea” of Beaumaris Castle, and the side wall of one property near the churchyard may be part of the curtain wall, according to the authors of a 2009 guide to the buildings of the region. They also suggest that much of the stone was taken to build houses and Beaumaris Gaol.
Bibliography
- Creighton, Oliver Hamilton and Robert Higham. (2005) Medieval Town Walls: an Archaeology and Social History of Urban Defence. Stroud, UK: Tempus. ISBN 978-0-7524-1445-4.
- Haslam, Richard; Orbach, Julian; Voelcker, Adam (2009). “Anglesey”. The Buildings of Wales: Gwynedd. New Haven, US: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-14169-6.
- Taylor, Arnold. (2009) Beaumaris Castle. Cardiff, UK: Cadw. ISBN 978-1-85760-208-1.
Attribution
The text of this page was adapted from “Beaumaris town walls” on the English language website Wikipedia, as the version dated 22 July 2018, and accordingly the text of this page is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Principal editors have included Hchc2009, Bencherlite and Helpful Pixie Bot, and the contributions of all editors can be found on the history tab of the Wikipedia article.
Photographs on this page are drawn from the Wikimedia website, as of 4 August 2018, and attributed and licensed as follows: “Beaumaris walls in 1610” (Public Domain).
