A KIDWELLY TOWN RENTAL
OF THE EARLY 16th CENTURY (TEMP. HENRY VII)
(1499 to 1504)

By W. H. MORRIS, M.A.

INTRODUCTION

AMONG the records of the Duchy of Lancaster in the Public Record Office is a lengthy document endorsed, "Extent of manors within the Lordship of Kidwelly 15-19 Henry VII". The manors are given as follows Iscoed, Uchcoed, Penryn, Llanellthy, Maynor Cadogan Iskennen, Llannon, Hengoed, Burwyk, Llaneddy, Carnwallon, the town of Kydwelly, St. Ishmaels, and Messor Patrie,¹ all controlled from the castle at Kidwelly which was the administrative centre of the extensive Duchy possessions in West Wales. The extent, or rental, takes the form of a list of the names of the tenants of the Duchy and an assessment of the rents they paid for their holdings. The assessments were sworn before local officials such as the Receiver and Steward by representatives, or jurors, of the various classes of tenantry. Such a document can yield much valuable information, not only genealogical and topographical but also on land tenure, particularly as the wide extent of the lordship afforded a marked contrast between the Anglicised parts along the coastal fringe and the thoroughly Welsh areas such as Iskennen.

The document which is here presented, and translated, is that part of the rental which applies to the town and chartered borough of Kidwelly. It offers material for several aspects of research—place-names, family names, burgage tenure, the composition of the burgess body etc. but the adoption of a street by street method reveals fully, and for the first time, the physical shape of the town, the extent to which it had grown since its tentative beginnings in the bailey, or enclosure, adjoining the massive motte castle built by Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, in the first decade of the 12th century on the steep west bank of the Gwendraeth Fach river. It is with this aspect of the town’s history that this introduction is concerned. Ideally, one could have wished for the existence of a series of such rentals for the earlier periods in order to assess growth at different points but rentals seem to have been renewed infrequently. None have yet come to light and their very existence is doubtful. What one has to fall back on for aid is a miscellaneous, disparate, series of records such as Ministers’ Accounts, Court Rolls, borough and ecclesiastical charters, the various Calendars of State Papers etc. Most of them can be made to yield nuggets of information for the purpose of tracing the physical growth of the town but the sum total of their evidence would not be very great, or satisfying, were it not for the large number of private deeds in the Muddlescombe Collection in the National Library of Wales, which start in the late 13th century and continue to the end of the 17th. Here, with a gratifying degree of consecutiveness, are the numerous private charters of burgesses and others yielding, in the delineation of the boundaries of their tenements, frequent references to the names of streets slowly coming into being as the town grew.

Kidwelly was in origin a castle town, deliberately founded to contribute to the consolidation of the Norman process of conquest in the early 12th century. The name is of great antiquity and was in preconquest times attached to an area which extended from the Towy river near Carmarthen to the Loughor estuary in the east. It formed part of an administrative and political division, known as a commote, of the ancient native kingdom of Deuheubarth. When Henry I was drawn into affairs in West Wales he put the commote in the charge of his chief minister, Roger, Bishop of Salisbury who proceeded to establish it as a Norman lordship with its boundaries largely unchanged. The centre of the new authority was the castle he built on the lower Gwendraeth Fach, intended to give him, of necessity, a strong base from which to control and administer the new lordship. It was an earth and timber structure consisting of a towering, artificial mound, or motte, defended by a deep ditch. On the flattened summit, ringed by a stockaded rampart, were erected stout wooden buildings. Roger incorporated a natural feature in its defence, the steep shale cliff rising above the river with the motte crowning its summit. Thus, on the landward side, the ditch needed only to be semi-circular with both ends of it resting on the edge of the cliff.

The important role the castle was intended to fulfil required the addition of a bailey adjoining it. This was laid out on its southern side. A short transverse ditch running west from the semi-circular castle ditch defined its northern limits, the whole forming a roughly wedged shape area tapering to the south. As part of the outer or first line defence of the castle the bailey too demanded protection by earthen rampart and ditch. Its eastern or river-side was defended by a continuation of the same natural feature utilised by the motte—the shale cliff which, however, was less precipitous at this point and was probably strengthened by a rampart. On the more exposed and vulnerable western and southern sides the ramparts were reinforced by a ditch along the line of what is now New Street but which, significantly, the rental describes as Ditch street, a name which it retained well into the 19th century. The short transverse ditch cut from that of the castle completed the defences. The ditches beyond this, to the north of the castle, were probably not part of the original plan for the bailey. The Ministers’ Accounts covering the period of the Glyndwr rebellion, when the castle was under threat of attack, refer to the digging of new ditches in this area, for its greater protection.²Archaeological investigation here might yield some interesting information on this later phase of the castle’s history.

It was within the bailey that there was induced to settle a small, alien community whose activities as traders and agriculturists were intended not only to supplement and support the garrison but also to spread out into the countryside to consolidate the conquest. Their presence was in time to bring about a division of the lordship into Englishry, or "foreignry", and Welshry based on racial and economic grounds. The former was confined to the coastal belt with settlements at Llanelli, Pembrey and Llandyry, West of Kidwelly it extended to the lower reaches of the Towy near Iscoed, with communities at Halgynchirch (now Llansaint), Penallt, and in the vicinity of a Celtic church dedicated to St. Ishmael. In the Welshry the inhabitants were allowed to retain much of their traditional ways of life provided they acknowledged the authority of the new order. The terms Englishry and Welshry continued to be used for local administrative purposes well into the 18th century long after the racial and economic divisions had lost their significance.

Evidence for these beginnings comes almost entirely from incidental, but significant, details which can be gleaned from a charter of Roger to the monks of Sherborne Abbey in Dorset.³ It was given by Roger himself in the "castle of Kadweli", a fact which firmly sets its completion between 1106 when he was put in charge of the commote, and July 1114 the date which is now confidently assigned to the charter.⁴ Among the witnesses was Alwyn, "the priest of the town". A newly erected water mill with its ditch formed one of the boundaries of the carucate granted to Sherborne and the house of "Balba" formed another. English, French, and Flemish settlers, "burgesses" as they are described, were working land at Penallt and Pembrey and were present at the dedication of a cemetery three days after the ceremony in the castle. Within the bailey they had probably already been allocated their building plots, or burgages, and were paying for them the customary annual rent of 12d to Roger acting on behalf of the King. The other piece of evidence in this period is a charter granted by Henry I to "the men of Cadweli" giving them freedom from tolls upon their goods and merchandise. It is undated but it is reasonable to assume that it was granted between 1106 and 1114⁵ These were modest enough privileges and did not confer borough status but they were desirable and underlined the intention to establish, and encourage, Kidwelly as a centre for trade and commerce. The frequent references to it as port throughout the Medieval period serve to confirm this.

In addition to the carucate of land, Roger gave to Sherborne part of the hill called "Mons Salomonis". There is not much doubt about its location as the hill to the west of the town but the whereabouts of the carucate are much more difficult to determine. Although its boundaries are delineated by the proximity of the river and several unnamed streams, the absence of place-names, suggesting the newness of the settlement, makes precise identification impossible. The likelihood is that it lay across the river from the castle and near the site chosen by Roger for the establishment of a small priory as a daughter house of the Benedictine order of Sherborne Abbey. His charter does not indicate whether it was already in existence but it may have been in process of building. In its vicinity there came into being a foreign community, tenants of the Prior, who worked on his manor but never attained the extensive privileges of self government which the burgesses in the bailey were to enjoy. No ditch or rampart defended their cluster of tenements which by the middle of the 14th century had taken shape as St. Mary Street,⁶ a development which in the fullness of time was to contribute to the present layout of the town.

The growth of the town was in the early centuries spasmodic and uncertain, disrupted by burning and looting in Welsh attacks in 1190, 1215, 1231, and 1257. Thereafter there began a more prosperous, stable period due in large measure to the activities of the Chaworth family which had come into possession of the lordship through marriage to an heiress of the De Londres, holders of the lordship after Roger of Salisbury. Payne de Chaworth obtained in 1268 a grant from Henry III which allowed the burgesses to hold two weekly markets, on Tuesdays and Saturdays, and also a yearly fair.⁷ It was an important concession benefiting not only Payne who received the tolls but also encouraging the economic and commercial life of the town by attracting traders and merchants from without. Military and political affairs also served to stimulate growth. Payne by about 1275 had skilfully adapted the outdated motte castle he had inherited from his De Londres ancestors to meet new demands in military architecture. Retaining the massive mound, he built on its summit a quadrilateral shaped stone inner ward with four strong drum towers, one at each corner, a transformation which turned it into one of the most powerful baronial fortresses. It was probably barely completed before the outbreak of hostilities with Llywelyn in 1276. Payne, a close friend of Edward I, was made commander of royal forces to deal with Llywelyn’s supporters in West Wales. Castle and town, along with Carmarthen and Cardigan, became assembly points for Payne’s soldiery drawn from many English shires and Welsh marcher lordships. Kidwelly’s sea borne trade grew with the arrival of military equipment and stores and food which could not be found from local resources. Bristol was the chief supply base but other West Country ports contributed such as Bridgwater, Totnes and Dartmouth, contacts which without doubt were maintained and extended in more peaceful times.

Payne died in 1279 shortly after the successful outcome of the campaign and was succeeded by his brother Patrick. In 1280 he requested from the king licence to enclose the town with walls.⁸ This took the form of a grant of murage whereby the cost of erection would be borne by the imposition of a tax upon specified saleable articles coming into the town. In the first instance it was to run for five years but in 1281 was extended by another three. The terms of Edward’s grant made it clear that considerations of greater defence and security were uppermost at a time when Llywelyn, although checked in the first campaign, still posed a formidable threat. Defence by ditch and rampart alone was by now inadequate, even outdated, and a walled town was a necessary adjunct and complement to the new-found strength of the castle. Defence apart, it conferred new status and prestige. The walls and gateways were certainly in existence before 1332 as one of the Muddlescombe deeds proves (Appendix 2) but no evidence has come to light to date their completion more precisely.

It is in the 14th century, with the aid of the Muddlescombe deeds, that it is possible to glimpse an incipient expansion and the emergence of streets outside the walls, stimulated by immigration which had increased congestion within the bailey. It was a natural, spontaneous, and unplanned accretion beyond the security of the walls which, however, were not demolished and then rebuilt to embrace it, as happened in Carmarthen. There were two areas of growth, both governed by the existence of route ways. The first of these led from the bailey westward over the hill, the Mons Salomonis of Roger’s charter, to the Towy and the ferry crossing to Llanstephan—the way Gerald the Welshman and Archbishop Baldwin must have taken in 1188 to reach Carmarthen. Along the line of this, shortly after emerging from the bailey, there had developed a cluster of tenements at a place called Scholand which occurs in a deed of 1369.⁹ In 1393 William Bonter, chaplain, granted a tenement in "a street (vico) called Scholand".¹⁰ By the 18th century the name had been corrupted to Shoe lane street and is now Ferry road. The same deed, in delineating the boundaries of the tenement gives a clue to the existence of another street, "Boierstrete is lake". leading into it. The "lake" element in the name refers to a stream, a "laque", along which Boiertstrete had spread. This is the Bower Street of the rental and now the lower part of Water Street. Where the streets converged and created an open space was the site of a market cross referred to in the rental. The other development was also linear, along the route from the east which crossed the river, turned sharply to avoid a hillock and then passed into the bailey through its southern gate. This was the causeway, "Le Cawsey", not so named in the rental, raised above a marsh (Morfa Mawr), used by the burgesses as commons, which skirted it on its seaward side. The probability is that it was a pre-conquest route and used by the Normans in their advance into the commote from the east. Le Cawsey is the "royal way" in a deed of 1392¹¹ and the spread of tenements along it seems to be typical of an expansion encouraged by a bridge head. It is today known as Bridge Street. The present "Causeway Street" is the result of 18th century growth and probably does not represent the line of the original Le Cawsey which, as some evidence suggests, veered towards the churchyard, passed to the left of the Town Hall,¹² joined Monksford Street and continued as the route way over Pembrey Mountain to LIanelli and beyond to the Loughor crossing. Branching from Le Cawsey was a short length of street, the "Frogmerstrete" of the rental, and "Vrogemerystrete" in a 1345 deed.¹³ It is now the town end of Station Road and was in origin a pathway to burgesses’ holdings on "Le West Hill".

Much of the undoubted increase in the town’s prosperity was owed to the influence and authority of the house of Lancaster holders of the lordship since 1298 when Maud, the last of the Chaworths, was married to Henry Earl of Lancaster. Henry, with far greater resources than the Chaworths, started a building programme on the castle which within ten years had added immeasurably to its strength by the construction of an outer line of defence to the inner ward, with a large gateway at the southern end of it.¹⁴ When finished it had taken essentially the form it bears today. Lancastrian piety also contributed to the rebuilding of the priory church into the parish church of St. Mary which is effectively a new building of the early 14th century. Urban prosperity may be reflected in its exceptionally broad nave, the two chapels forming transepts, and the impressive south porch, north-west tower and spire probably added towards the end of the century. Lack of documentation makes it extremely difficult to gauge the commercial life of the town but the few items that survive are not without significance. Walter and Adam Aylward each borrowed £100 from Henry of Lancaster for trading purposes in l341¹⁵ and another member of the family, Thomas, exported a cargo of hides to Gascony in 1356.¹⁶ Towards the end of the century a Welsh burgess, John ap Owen, was a prominent merchant.¹⁷ The privileges and concessions enjoyed by the burgesses were embodied in a charter of 1356 which was largely a confirmation of one granted in 1309.¹⁸

The expansion beyond the walls was, however, viewed with concern by Duchy officers in 1401, on one of their periodical visits, at a time when the Glyndwr revolt was expected to erupt in West Wales. They hinted darkly at imminent danger and drew up ordinances for "the benefit and salvation" of the town.¹⁹ Their concern lay not only with the security of the walled town in face of the expected onslaught but also with the growth outside it. The ordinances make it clear that much of the commercial and social life had shifted markedly from the bailey. Burgages were deserted and in a state of neglect and public markets were held outside the walls. All these developments loosened the hold of the Duchy upon the borough, opening the way to illicit trading, the evasion of tolls and payment of rents, encouraging those who were not burgesses to, unlawfully, share in the privileges of burgesship. The ordinances were a strong attempt to reverse this trend and to restore the importance of the bailey. All holding burgages were to repair them within a stated period, and to reside in them, on penalty of forfeiting them to Englishmen of the King’s choosing. Markets were to be held in the accustomed place within the walls and the retailing of all forms of food and drink outside was forbidden. Failure to obey would mean that victuals were to be forfeited to the King and the proceeds of the sale of half of them were to be handed to burgesses residing within the bailey to be used in the upkeep of the walls.

Two years later, in October 1403, the walls were breached by Glyndwr’s French and Welsh forces under Henry Donne but the castle successfully withstood a three week siege.²⁰ Damage to the town was extensive, particularly to the "schirehall" above the south gate.²¹ The burgesses, mindful of their transgressions and failure to make their town secure, petitioned the King to be allowed to retain their tenements and privileges and undertook to repair the walls.²² They received a pardon in December 1403 with restoration of their liberties for having made good the damage.²³ But the effects of the revolt were long lasting and recovery slow. Special consideration had to be given to the burgesses for their inability to pay their rents between 1403 and 1406. ²⁴There is a significant gap in the run of Muddlescombe deeds from 1409 to 1423. It seems likely that many burgesses and others had fled the town. The Crown attempted to revive its fortunes and to induce new townsmen to settle by the granting of a new charter in 1443.²⁵ The town became a corporate body well in line with the most progressive elements in municipal development, with extensive powers of self-government, the creation of the Mayoralty, the right of holding its own lands and its own Hundred Court, and a monopoly of trade within a five mile radius. There was still the same insistence that markets should be held within the walls, and the memory of the revolt was kept fresh. The charter harked back to "the malice of the Welshmen" as the cause of the town’s troubles and enjoined that no Welshman was allowed to act as a juror in a case concerning an Englishman. Nevertheless it undoubtedly served to revive the town and Welsh burgesses seem not to have been excluded from municipal affairs. Welsh names were becoming more frequent in the Muddlescombe deeds towards the end of the century and the rental shows a significant number of Welsh burgesses.

The rental embodies the slow, fitful evolution of the town over some 400 years. The total number of burgages used as dwellings was about 136, compared with some 164 in a survey taken in the early 17th century (1609), but if former burgages converted to other uses arc included the total would appear to be 172. There were 5 half-burgages, 14 tenements probably held by freeholders who were not burgesses, 10 messuages with or without gardens, and 8 cottages. The greatest concentration lay to the west and north west of the bailey along the Scholand, Bower and Ditch street axis. The bailey, the former core, had only three burgages, seven tenements and eight cottages, the last perhaps indicative of its decline in status. Four burgages had been converted into gardens, possibly because of their ruinous state. A hint of this may be contained in the Ministers’ accounts for 1496 where a burgage is described as unroofed and fallen to the ground.²⁶ The precise measurements of the gardens might give a clue to the size of burgage plots and the regularity with which they were laid out. They appear not to have been of uniform size, one for instance, 180 ft. by 24 ft., another 64 ft. by 18 ft.

No street names are given within the bailey. Today’s triangular outline is not likely to have been the result of an early, planned layout. The present Castle street follows the original line of that which is described in 1361 (Appendix 3) as "the highway leading to the castle" from the point where it entered the bailey through the south gate. Where it neared the castle there developed an open space, "the Green" in the 18th century, which was probably the site of the market cross. The other streets seem to have grown rather haphazardly out of lanes and passage ways.

Leland, on his visit some forty years later, noted three gates.²⁷ The rental refers to two of them, the west, fronting part of Ditch street, of which no trace remains, and the north gate above the short transverse ditch from the castle ditch. This, along with a stretch of the wall, survives. The more elaborate south gate is not mentioned. Leland describes it as containing the ruins of a "fair toun haul, and under, a prison", the former probably that which was damaged during the Glyndwr attack. South of the bridge, along the line of Le Cawsey, were eight burgages, one half-burgage, and two messuages. The existence of three burgages in St. Mary’s street seems to point to the spreading of burgages along Le Cawsey and its physical joining with the lower end of this street. The dwellings of the Prior’s tenants in the rest of St. Mary street numbered some 28 in a priory rental of 1518.²⁸ This physical, and presumably social and commercial, union did not receive the blessing of the Duchy administration. The medieval insistence on all activity having to take place with the walls died hard and in 1524 the burgesses were, among other things, indicted because, contrary to their charter of 1443, they were holding a market in the Prior’s street, in foreign land".²⁹

Isolated from this pattern was a group of burgages lying close along the route to the east, which skirted the manor of Muddlescombe and the settlement at Llandyry in the foreignry, crossed the Gwendraeth Fawr river by Spudder’s bridge.³⁰ climbed Pembrey mountain and made for Llanelli. These were at Stockwell, Monksford, Le Holwey and Longe street, the first two in close proximity to each other, and all of them appearing in 14th and 15th century Muddlescombe deeds. Monksford by the 18th century had extended along what is now Abbey street to meet St. Mary Street (Lady street) at its upper end. Le Holwey (Holloway lane) lay a little further back along the route, branching off from it near Muddlescombe. It was to remain isolated from the general town pattern. All these names have survived except that of Longe Street, with 14 burgages, all trace of which disappeared after the 17th century. Its location presents some difficulty. Beyond the bare affirmation of its existence the rental offers no help. Muddlescombe deeds of the 17th century,³¹ which name it variously as Lange and Lane street, appear to place it west of Le Holwey and as joining a path running from the town to the commons at Morris Cross now traversed by the Kidwelly-Pembrey road. Another isolated but much smaller cluster of burgages lay on the hillside west of the town at Le Arles and Le Cobwell and in the vicinity of the Ferry way ("Le Very Wey") to the passage of the Towy.³²

Leland perceived the town as clearly divided by the bridge into Old and New. The former was the walled town all but deserted, although there was still a strong concentration of dwellings in Bower street, Ditch street, and Scholand. His view that the latter was "but newly made" needs qualification. It was new only in the sense that by the time of his visit the shift of the commercial and civic life of the town to the St. Mary street and Le Cawsey axis had become marked. A Muddlescombe deed of 1574³³ reveals the existence of a civic hall ("the Yeld haull") which in the 1609 survey can be located firmly in the new town and in the vicinity of the present structure.³⁴ It might also be that the newness he perceived could be attributed in some measure to rebuilding after a fire which he mentions as having taken place a few years before his visit.

The later fortunes of the town are of course beyond the terms of this introduction. Subsequent development did not profoundly alter its medieval stamp which is still strong upon it. The layout of the streets is, in essence, that of the rental. The press of traffic has to come to terms with narrow streets, bends, and sharp turns created by leisurely and unplanned growth over centuries. The townscape, despite the injudicious siting of some dwellings and housing estates in this century, and also rashes of miscellaneous clutter, still affords intimate glimpses of the past at many points. No major re-development appears to loom and the designation in 1971 of the medieval core of the town as a conservation area will, it is hoped, serve to safeguard, preserve and enhance its character, although the price must be eternal vigilance.

Watkyn Ormond holds one burgage with one small garden which were lately of Elena Legette, and renders for them each year etc (blank)

Moris ap Owen holds one burgage with one garden there which were formerly of Gt (? Walter) ap Ievan ap David, and renders for them each year etc 12d

1 The office of "the reaper" (messor) responsible for collecting the rents of bond, or unfree, tenants, in the foreignry of St. Ishmael's, Llandyry ("Llandedyry"), and Pembrey.

2 P.R.O. Duchy of Lancaster, Ministers' Accounts, DL 29/584/9242 ; Account of Walter Morton, 6 Henry IV to Michaelmas 8 Henrv IV "for the new digging and making of a ditch outside the east gate of the castle near the garden of the castle for protection, defence and safe custody .... 2s."

3 From the inspeximus by David, Bishop of St. David's, 15 October 1301, Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, IV, No. I, pp. 64-5, ed. J. Cayley, H. Ellis and B. Bandinel (1817-1830).

4 Knowles D. and Hadcock R.N., Medieval Religious Houses in England and Wales, p. 69. (London 1953).

5 Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi asservati 1199-1216, Ed. T. D. Hardy (1837). Record Commissioners' Publication: Charter of John, Dec.28, 1205, confirming the grant to Roger by Henry I.

6 D. D. Jones, A History of Kidwelly, Carmarthen 1908, pp. 52-53, Court Roll, Portfolio 215. No. 39 P.R.O.

7 Cal. Charter Rolls, 1257-1300, p. 113, (Oct. 22, 1268).

8 Cal. Patent Rolls, 1272-81, p. 418, (Dec. 8, 1280, and March 21, 1281).

9 Muddlescombe 2242 N.L.W.

10 Ibid. 2221.

11 Ibid. 2127.

12 Rev. Gruffydd Evans, Carmarthenshire Gleanings (Kidwelly), Y Cymmrodor, Vol. XXV (1915), p. 142, note 2.

13 Muddlescombe 2247 N.L.W.

14 There is evidence that it underwent a major reconstruction in the early years of the 15th century. See The History of the King's Works, eds. Brown, Colvin, Taylor, Vol. 1, 1963, H.M.S.O., pp. 685-86.

15 Documents relating to the Castle, Town and Lordship of Kidwellv from the earliest times to Henry VIII, E. A. Lewis,Add. Mss., 454C, N.L.W. (Ancient Deeds L 3578 and 3580).

16 E. A. Lewis, A Contribution to the Commercial History of Medieval Wales, Y Cymmrodor, Vol. XXIV, p.51.

17 Ibid., p. 55, and Cal. Patent Rolls, 1396-99.

18 T. 0. Morgan, Kidwelly Charters, Arch. Cambr., 3rd Series, ii, (1856), pp. 274-7 (translation of the 1356 charter from a 1792 copy) : also, D. D. Jones, op., cit., pp. 121-126. There is a digest of the 1356 charter in Weinbaum, British Borough Charters, 1307-1660, Cambr. Univ. Press, 1943, with mention of the 1309 charter.

19 P.R.0. DL 41/10/49. (6 Oct., 1401).

20 J. E. Lloyd, Owen Glendower (1931), p. 76 W. H. Morris, Cydweli (Kidwelly) and the Glyn Dwr Revolt, Carm. Antiq., Vol. III, 1959.

21 P.R.O. DL 29/584/9242.

22 P.R.O. SC 8/255 No. 12723 (Ancient Petitions).

23 Cal. Patent Rolls, 1401-1405 (1 Dec. 1403).

24 P.R.O. DL 42/16 f. 203.

25 T. 0. Morgan, Kidwelly Charters, Arch. Carnbr., ii., pp. 277-81 D. D. Jones, op. cit., pp. 126-130. Digest in Weinbaum, op. cit.

26 P.R.O. : DL 29/575/9101 (decay and decrease of rents and farms).

27 The ltinerary in Wales of John Leland In or About the Years 1536-1539, ed. L. T. Smith (London 1906).

28 E. A. Lewis, Add. Mss., 454C, N.L.W. (A.O. Misc. Book, 402, if. 56-71).

29 P.R.O. : DL 3/16/R II. (Rex V. Mayor of Kidwelly).

30 "Ponte Rees Powdwr" in 1499 (Muddlescombe 2110), and "Pont Spoder" in 1626 (Muddlescombe 1446).

31 "Lange Street" in 1626 (Muddlescombe 1767), and "Lane Street" in 1675 (Muddlescombe 781).

32 "The Portway" in 1599 (Muddlescombe 618).

33 Muddlescombe 2216.

34 A Survey of the Duchy of Lancaster Lordships in Wales, 1609-1613, ed. William Rees, Cardiff, 1953.

35 Duchy of Lancaster, Chancery Roll, No. 68 records the grant for life to Thomas Yorarth, chaplain, of the chantry of St. Michael in the church of St. Mary, Kidwelly (29 Feb. 1492). B. A. Lewis, Add. Mss., 454C, N.L.W

36 The earliest recorded form is "Halwencherche" in a deed of 1280, Penrice and Margam Deeds, ed. Birch, 4th series, part iii, No. 2797, pp. 138-9, N.L.W. It has now been proved beyond reasonable doubt that it can be identified with Llansaint about two miles west of Kidwelly in the parish, and "foreignry", of St. Ishmaels, (Y Cymmrodor, Vol. XXV (1915), pp. 127-131, and Arch. Cambr. (1937), pp. 311-19). Its etymology is explained by Dr. B. G. Charles in London Medieval Studies, VoL I, part 2, 1938, as Eccelesia Omnium Sanctorum, ''the church of All Saints'', from Old English "Halgena", genitive plural of "halga" saint, and "circe" church. It is referred to as the church of All Saints in the territory of Cadweli in a charter,undated but between 1115 and 1148, of Richard son of William addressed to Bernard, Bishop of St. David's, Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, IV, No. 2, p. 65. The church is still dedicated to All Saints. The Welsh form, "Llansaint", began to appear about the middle of the 16th century: cf. Appendix I for one of the many variant English forms..

37 Within the foreignry on the marsh between Kidwelly and Llandyry. In 1711 it is "Pinged Marsh alias Morva Pingett", Ashburnham MSS. 259-285, N.L.W.

38 One of the "open fields" about a mile north of the town on the south eastern side of Mynydd y Garreg. Cf. a grant of land in 1317 "in the field of Pengwern", Muddlescombe 2143.

39 Another of the "open fields" about a mile to the north of the town and close to the east bank of the Gwendraeth Fach river. Reputedly the site of the battle in 1135 between Gwenllian, wife of Gruffydd ap Rhys, and the Norman garrison of the castle. She was captured and executed. Gerald the Welshman relates the event in his Itinerary, The itinerary through Wales and the Description of Wales by Giraldus Cambrensis, Everyman's edition, pp. 71-72. The area is still known as "Maes Gwenllian".