Gwent

From Free net encyclopedia

Image:WalesGwent.png Gwent is the area of south-easternmost Wales, in the Welsh Marches. It is traditionally bounded on the east by the River Wye, the border between England and Wales, and on the south by the Severn Estuary.

The area has been occupied since the Paleolithic, with a famous Roman site at Caerleon.

The mediæval British kingdom of Gwent was the area between the rivers Usk and Wye, and took a name that literally means 'place', or 'the place'. It came into existence after the Romans had left Britain and survived in various forms until the Norman invasion of the west in 1067-91 AD. The Normans partitioned the area into the lordships of Abergavenny, Monmouth, Striguil (Chepstow) and Usk.

The lordships were the basic units of administration for the next 450 or so years, until Henry VIII passed the Laws in Wales Act 1535. This Act abolished the marcher lordships and established the county of Monmouthshire out of them — combining the lordships of Newport (Gwynllwg) and Caerleon east of the river Usk and Abergavenny, Monmouth, Usk and Chepstow to the west of it.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, writers began using the name "Gwent" in a romantic literary way to describe Monmouthshire, and in the local government re-organisations of 1974/5, many new administrative areas in Britain were named after mediæval kingdoms — such as Cumbria, Strathclyde and "Gwent".

This new administrative Gwent was formed by the Local Government Act 1972 on April 1, 1974. It consisted of most of the former administrative county of Monmouthshire and the county borough of Newport , along with Brynmawr and Llanelly from Brecknockshire, and therefore not the same area as the previous kingdom. It was only to last for 22 years though, as with the coming into force of the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994 in 1996, it was abolished.

The name however remains as one of the preserved counties of Wales used for certain ceremonial purposes, and it also survives in various titles, e.g., Gwent Police, Royal Gwent Hospital, the Gwent Levels and the Newport Gwent Dragons rugby team.

When it existed, the administrative area was divided into several districts: Blaenau Gwent, Islwyn, Monmouth, Newport and Torfaen.

The successor unitary authorities are:

City of Newport
Blaenau Gwent county borough
Torfaen county borough
Caerphilly county borough (part of which came from Mid Glamorgan)
Monmouthshire (which covers the eastern half of the traditional county of the same name)

In 2003 the preserved county of Gwent expanded to cover the whole of Caerphilly county borough. [1]

[edit]