The path to the monastery: monastic communication networks in the southern Welsh Marches

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis paper presents evidence, still often observable in the field, of a coherent and managed network of roads and tracks in the orbit of medieval monasteries and their estates: a component of a wider Ph.D. research project examining to what extent elements of medieval monastic topography can be discerned within the historic landscape of the southern Welsh Marches.The landscapes associated with three case studies in the area (the Cistercian abbeys of Llantarnam and Tintern, and the Augustinian priory of Llanthony) provide the examples drawn on here. Three routeways in particular, one from each house, are described.The popular view of medieval roads and routeways is that they were much like medieval life: poorly maintained, difficult to progress along and generally only used for localised traffic and travel. But were they always that bad? This paper presents examples to suggest that medieval abbeys and priories were using and improving communication networks across their landed possessions in a more sustained and systematic way.The postulated monastic trods and track-ways introduced here — routes used for trade, for pilgrimage, for travellers to and from the monastery — help to challenge received wisdom that pre-modern roads were uniformly primitive, difficult and very much non-permanent. In fact, a transition of routes from general directions of travel into defined, maintained roads and paths can be heralded as one of the main topographical legacies of the monastic period.