Heirs to the Princes: The Welsh Administrative Elite, from the Edwardian Conquest to the Black Death
(Paperback)
Publishing Details
Heirs to the Princes: The Welsh Administrative Elite, from the Edwardian Conquest to the Black Death
By (Author) David Stephenson
University of Wales Press
University of Wales Press
2nd January 2026
United Kingdom
Classifications
Professional and Scholarly
Non Fiction
European history: medieval period, middle ages
Physical Properties
Paperback
208
Width 138mm, Height 216mm
Description
This ground-breaking study explores the rise of a Welsh elite of administrators and military figures in the generations after the Edwardian Conquests of 127788. It shows how a ministerial aristocracy had developed in the Age of the Princes, before the Edwardian conquest threatened to impose English colonial administrations throughout the land. However, close documentary analysis reveals that Edward I (d.1307) emerged in his later life not as the vindictive conqueror of most accounts, but as a ruler dependent on Welsh support, ready to listen to and remedy Welsh grievances, and to encourage the revival of a Welsh governing class. In addition, the book includes the first detailed study of scores of members of that class throughout Wales in the first half of the fourteenth century. It concludes by exploring the mid-century crises that shook the Welsh establishment and set them on the road to the Glyn Dr rising of 1400.
Author Bio
David Stephenson is an honorary research fellow in medieval Welsh history at Bangor University. He is the author of Political Power in Medieval Gwynedd; Medieval Powys 1132-1293; and Medieval Wales, c.1050-1332.
