NOTES ON ST. DAVID'S CHURCH, MUCH DEWCHURCH by Hubert Reade (1936)

Part 1. BRITONS AND ROMANS

St. David's Church is the Parish Church of Much Dewchurch, the Welsh name of which may have been LLANDEWI FAWR RHOS Y CERION, i.e. "Great St. David's on the moor with the Medlar Trees." * (see footnote)

It is situated on a ridge which separates the head waters of the Worm from the brook running down from Orcop Hill which is known as the Mynde Brook, and commands the ford over the Worm on the road from Callow Hill to the main road at Much Dewchurch, which is known as Low Lane, and which forms a part of the original highroad from Hereford to Abergavenny and the coast of the Bristol Channel at Caerleon and Ogmore, and on the other side to Monmouth and Chepstow at the mouth of the Wye. As for centuries the Worm formed the frontier which divided the English-and Welsh-speaking parts of Herefordshire, Much Dewchurch was an important military position. The parish was originally included in the Welsh Principality of Archenfield, and as early as A.D. 531, a large portion of it became the property of the See of Llandaff, which until A.D. 1131 included much of South Herefordshire east of the Worm.

This part of Wales became Christian at a very early date possibly before A.D. 180, if not a century earlier, for according to Welsh tradition which is most probably correct, the first Welsh Christian was Bran the Blessed, the father of Caractacus, the champion of British independence who was taken as a captive to Rome in hero's day, and whose daughter or niece Claudia was the wife of the Senator Pudens, with whom St. Paul was so intimate. (2 Tim.4.21) It may be added that Vespasian and Titus, the conqueror of Jerusalem , fought against Caractacus in Britain and that the Welsh troops took part in that siege of Jerusalem in which the Templewas laid in ashes. There was little difficulty in finding missionaries for work amongst the Britons. The Galatians, to whom St. Paul wrote his epistle, were a Celtic tribe who had settled in Asia Minor and had adopted the Greek civilisation, but who at the same time had retained their own Celtic language which was identical with that spoken in the Rhineland and north of France. The South of England had been occupied by these tribes (known as the Belgae) about 75 B.C. and consequently all the upper classes as far West as Newportspoke the same language as that of the Galatians. St. Paul, therefore, would have had no difficulty in finding suitable missionaries to send to Britain. Many centuries before the Roman Conquest there had been a most important trade between the Mediterranean and the Bristol Channel, and not only is Irish gold found in Gaza and Cyprus, but lead from the Mendips was used to line bathrooms at Rome in the first days of Christianity.

It was perhaps through the traders in metals that Christianity first came to England, and there may be some truth in the story which tells that Our Lord when a lad visited Somersetshire with St. Joseph of Arimathaea. Consequently, Herefordshire and Monmouthshire had many Christian inhabitants at a very early date. There is a Roman Church for instance at Caerwent, and the Bishop of Caerleon upon Usk took part in a very important Church Council at Arles in Southern France in A.D.312.

As the Saxons did not occupy any part of Archenfield until after A.D. 640, when many of them were already Christian, it is not too much to say that Much Dewchurch has been a Christian parish ever since the Roman Empire became Christian in A.D. 314.

* James Wood, F.S.A., believed that the original name was LLANDEWI CILPEDEC (= cil bedwg), "St. David's in the hollow in the birch country."

See Woolhope Club Transactions1913, pp. 138-141, in the reference room of the City Library - (JMA)

Next month, part 2 will be entitled 'Monks and Missionaries

Copyright © 2009 [Much Dewchurch Society]. All rights reserved.
Revised: November 15, 2010 .