Caernarfon Castle - Wales

Part of Tours By Tape : Wales ( United Kingdom ) narrated and written by Richard Mitchley Richard also runs a walking holiday company in Wales, vist his site at: http://www.dragontrails.com More tours by tape of Wales on YouTube Coracles -Wales - Teifi Valley http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUwlL8m8110 Tintern Abbey http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHNsMaoNPQI Chepstow Castle http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf3LkXF2KR4 Penrhyn Castle http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1jBznyy6z8 Edward I built castles and walled towns in North Wales to control the area following his conquest of the independent principality of Wales, in 1283. Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, prince of Wales, having rejected a bribe of one thousand pounds a year and an estate in England, if he would surrender his nation unreservedly to the king of England, had been lured into a trap on 11 December 1282, and put to death. His brother Dafydd ap Gruffudd had continued the struggle for continuing independence, but had been captured at Bera Mountain in the uplands above Garth Celyn, in June 1283. Edward surrounded and overshadowed Garth Celyn, the royal home and the headquarters of resistance to English domination, with Caernarfon and Conwy castles, and later Beaumaris Castle. The other fortress in the iron ring encirling Snowdonia was Harlech Castle. The site selected for Caernarfon was strategically important, located on the banks of the River Seiont where it flows into the Menai Strait. It had been the site of a Roman fort, and a later motte and bailey castle built c. 1090 by Hugh d'Avranches. The castle was, at the time, surrounded on two sides by water, and the other by the Caernarfon city walls, but in the 19th century, the area on the River Seiont was filled in to enlarge the port of Caernarfon, and is today part of the castle's car park. Audio Robert Nichol AudioProductions