I’m currently working on a journal article exploring the heritage interpretation of Offa’s Dyke. In that regard, I want to share my perspective on yet another heritage interpration panel. I recently saw it for the first time in Plas Power Wood, placed on the ground adjacent to Offa’s Dyke where it descends from Coedpoeth to the Clywedog from north to south before ascending and heading towards Cadwgan Farm and Pentrebychan. It is an odd panel – not fixed and while clearly old although I haven’t previously witnessed it situated in its current position despite many visits to the woods since 2008.

At Plas Power Wood, Offa’s Dyke cuts across a narrow valley at a carefully selected location. This is one of the locations addressed in terms of the placement of Offa’s Dyke in relation to navigating and controlling movement alongside water courses in Offa’s Dyke Journal 5 (Williams 2023a).

As this is a popular country park, the Dyke has long been marked on trail maps appended at Bersham (the downstream end of the Plas Power Woods) and there is a tree sculpture of King Offa close by the line of the Dyke. See my earlier post about the Dyke and its heritage interpretation here and here (see also Ray and Bapty 2016: 367).

Despite this, however, I’ve long felt that the absence of either a sign pointing out the presence of the Dyke or indeed a heritage interpretation panel. This is because this location is visited by many thousands of people each year who have long been denied an opportunity to learn about the monument. This applies not only to tourists, but especially to residents of nearby Wrexham city and its satellite villages in Wrexham County Borough.

The location of the sign is odd as it is temporary: placed on the ground surface of the Dyke’s bank facing west beside the Clywedog Trail. Where was it before? To reiterate: I’ve never seen it here before this visit!

What does the panel say and how is it designed? This is a bilingual sign with text in Cymraeg to the left and English to the right, with a map of the central section of the country park showing the relationship between walking paths – the Clywedog Trail in yellow and footpaths in red, the site of the weir and the line of Clawdd Offa/Offa’s Dyke where it bisects the main trail. The map is clear and useful since it helps visitors understand where and how one can see the monument.

The text fails from the offset in two regards – (i) the monument is not described – features and their proportions; (ii) it inaccurately reports that the monument extensions from Treuddyn to Caerleon. This is confused in itself, since ‘Chepstow’ is on the Wye whilst Caerleon is the Usk!

It is then described as the ‘largest ancient monument’ in the UK, which is indisputable.

The separation of the ‘hills of Wales’ from the ‘plains of England’ is a useful simplification. However, it serves to naturalise the topographical identity of the two modern nations and does not explain the polities extant at the time, which were objectively not Wales and England!

We then are told it was built in the latter part of Offa’s reign: 784-796, for which we cannot be at all sure other than this represents the ‘height’ of his power and authority.

The landscape placement is explained as a response to the ‘thickly wooded foothills and the stubborn resistance of the Welsh princes’ – but this begs the question ‘stubborn and resistant to what?’ To an invasion? To paying tribute? Eliseg, Prince of Powys is cited as the opposition to the dyke and Offa but no further details are explained.

What of the function of the monument? We learn that ‘Offa instructed his local princes to construct this impressive earthwork’ and that Offa died in battle at Rhuddlan in 796 ‘just as the Dyke was completed’, all of which is speculative nonsense. The narrative that following his death Offa’s successors were more ‘active’ against Gwynedd establishing Rhuddland (Cledemuth) by 921 writes out over 120 years of bordlerand story.

The present-day condition and the preservation of the Dyke are helpfully explored – impressive and supporting oak trees, and then broken by the line of an old tramway through the woods.

We learn the section is managed in consultation with Cadw (spelt CADW) and that in 1990, following acquisition in 1988 with grant aid from Cadw by Clwyd County Council and Wrexham Maelor Borough Council, after which the Dyke was cleared of many large trees in 1990.

The sign is copyrighted 2008.

This is already dated, contains misleading and inaccurate information and lacks a fixed location. Where has it been? All I can say is that, in over 15 years of visiting this stretch of Woodland Trust-owned and managed landscape, I don’t recall ever seeing it before. Was it previously installed but removed following vandalism?

In conclusion, this (temporary) ground-level presence for heritage interpretation is welcome, despite the inaccuracies of the information it contains and the absence of detailed explanation regarding its placement and significance in the landscape past or present. Such signs help visitors to punctuate and engagement with a monument that is difficult to apprehend and comprehend for many, even historical and archaeological enthusiasts and professionals (Williams 2023b). In this context, despite the identified issues of content and location, I welcome this addition to the heritage interpretation of Offa’s Dyke.

References

Ray, K. and Bapty, I. 2016. Offa’s Dyke: Landscape and Hegemony in Eighth-Century Britain. Oxford: Windgather.

Williams, H. 2023a. Rethinking Offa’s Dyke as a hydraulic frontier work. Offa’s Dyke Journal 5: 140–169.

Williams, H. 2023b. Art on the March. Offa’s Dyke Journal 5: 260–264.