The Offa’s Dyke South Study Group started with a public meeting in Chepstow Drill Hall on 25 September 2018.

Keith Ray, lead author of ‘Offa’s Dyke, Landscape and Hegemony in Eighth Century Britain’ opened with an account of the OD collaborative and the setting up of other similar local initiatives along the length of the Dyke. He covered the placing of the Dyke along the Mercian/British frontier: and in particular  facing the Kingdom of Gwent along the lower Wye; facing Wessex across the Sedbury peninsula; and where it crosses the Roman road above Striguil bridge at Castleford in Tutshill.

Jon Hoyle, Senior Archaeological Project Officer for Gloucestershire, spoke on recent exploration of the Dyke in the county, illustrated with LiDAR images.

Mel Barge of England Heritage covered her role and expertise  which we’re sure will be of great help to our Group.

Andrew Blake, Wye Valley AONB Manager, described how his organisation will be able to assist us.

Over a working lunch we drew up a list of people to form our Steering Group, and a further list of those who would like to be involved when the Group is established.

We finished off with an illuminating walk led by Keith along the Dyke at Sedbury.

Everyone knows that in the late 8th century, Offa King of the Mercians built a mighty earth bank and ditch along the length of the western border of the kingdom. There are a number of other earthen dykes in Britain, but Offa’s was and is the greatest in terms of sheer size as well as importance. No contemporary documentation survives, but the current belief is that Offa’s Dyke was not built just to keep the Welsh under control along the border, but as a symbol of the power and growing dominance of Mercia among the Anglo Saxon Kingdoms.

In Tidenham parish we are lucky to have some of the finest remaining lengths of the Dyke, including the unique section in Sedbury that faces South instead of the prevailing West.

In the last couple of years, a renaissance in interest and study of the Dyke has led to the formation of the Offa’s Dyke Collaboratory whose main purpose is to support a network of individuals, groups and organisations working to promote awareness and appreciation of, and to manage and investigate, Offa’s Dyke and Wat’s Dyke, as well as related monuments and their wider landscapes (Wat’s Dyke is a similar, but probably older, dyke, running quite close to Offa’s from the Dee estuary to  a point in Shropshire).

Which is where our Group comes in! We have the opportunity to be the catalyst for an alliance of local history groups and interested individuals whose aim is the research, study, conservation and promotion of public awareness of Offa’s Dyke in Tidenham and further north to Brockweir. We feel that this alliance has a key part to play in one or more of these aims: from looking for the ‘missing’ bits of the Dyke around Castleford and along the cliffs of the Wye for instance; to looking up local documents and histories; to talking to family and friends who have memories of the Dyke and who may even live in a house whose garden contains possible remnants of it; to taking part in displays and events to promote awareness of the Dyke to young and old in the parish as well as tourists. I’m sure many more activities will come to mind

One particularly important and exciting project will be the investigation of the connection between the Dyke’s progress in the fields below Castleford and its crossing of the Roman road to the old bridge. And all this within sight of an important Norman Castle that the Conqueror had built very soon after landing.