The 200 images in this book have been selected from the extensive archive of the National Monuments Record of Wales. They take us inside the houses of Wales from prehistory to the modern day. From the simple interiors of the humblest cottages and urban terraces through to the elaborately decorated rooms of the great country houses, they provide a rare glimpse behind closed doors and give a unique insight into the ways people have lived their day-to-day lives in Wales.
The East India Company at Home, 1757–1857 explores how empire in Asia shaped British country houses, their interiors and the lives of their residents. It includes chapters from researchers based in a wide range of settings such as archives and libraries, museums, heritage organisations, the community of family historians and universities. It moves beyond conventional academic narratives and makes an important contribution to ongoing debates around how empire impacted Britain. The volume focuses on the propertied families of the East India Company at the height of Company rule. From the Battle of Plassey in 1757 to the outbreak of the Indian Uprising in 1857, objects, people and wealth flowed to Britain from Asia. As men in Company service increasingly shifted their activities from trade to military expansion and political administration, a new population of civil servants, army officers, surveyors and surgeons journeyed to India to make their fortunes. These Company men and their families acquired wealth, tastes and identities in India, which travelled home with them to Britain. Their stories, the biographies of their Indian possessions and the narratives of the stately homes in Britain that came to house them, frame our explorations of imperial culture and its British legacies.
The remains of the Roman frontiers in Wales are unique in the Roman Empire. More than 60 stone and timber fortresses, forts and fortlets, some of which seem to have been occupied for only a few years, while others remained in use for far longer, tell the story of the long and brutal war against the Celtic tribes.
This sixth volume of the Buildings of Wales series covers two counties, Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion (formerly Cardiganshire) in the south-west of Wales. Like the same authors' Pembrokeshire, the volume covers an architecture still little known, hut encompassing a sweep from prehistoric chambered tombs to the high technology of the world's largest single-span glasshouse. The Buildings of Wales, founded by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner (1902-83), will, when complete, document and describe the architecture of the Principality in seven regional volumes, complementing the sister series on England, Ireland and Scotland. In each one a gazetteer details all buildings of significance from megalithic tombs and Iron Age hill-forts, via grand seventeenth-century houses to Victorian domestic extravaganzas, great industrial centres and monumental public buildings. The countryside is explored to reveal churches, chapels, farmhouses, and traces of early industry. The gazetteer is complemented by an introduction which explains the broader context and builds a complete picture of the country's architectural identity. Each work is illustrated by numerous maps, plans and photographs, completed by glossaries and indexes, and gives a comprehensive and illuminating survey of the buildings of Wales.
This authoritative guide to the southwest corner of Wales by three local experts encompasses a wide sweep of history, from the rugged prehistoric remains that stud the distinctive windswept landscape overlooking the Atlantic to distinguished recent buildings that respond imaginatively to their natural setting. The comprehensive gazetteer encompasses the great cathedral of St David's and its Bishop's Palace, the numerous churches, and the magnificent Norman castles that reflect the turbulent medieval past. It gives attention also to the lesser-known delights of Welsh chapels--both simple rural and sophisticated Victorian examples--in all their wayward variety and provides detailed accounts of a rewarding range of towns, including the county town, Haverfordwest, the attractively unspoilt Regency resort of Tenby, and Milford Haven and Pembroke Dock, with their important naval history. An introduction with valuable specialist contributions sets the buildings in context.
The untold history of Wales's rich gallery of magical specialists suspected of harmful witchcraft and how they were tracked down by a vengeful community. Witchcraft studies are central to the study of the history of religion, power, and community in early modern Europe. This book establishes that Wales was one of the peripheral areas of witch-hunting where prosecutions started relatively late. Nevertheless, Wales had a rich array of magical specialists--including prophets, cunning-men, and physicians--some of whom were suspected of harmful witchcraft. This book takes an inclusive approach to witchcraft and examines all types of magical specialists, including those regarded as beneficial as well as harmful.
