Thursday, November 25, 2010

Another photo of Conwy's town walls

2 comments:

Charlieman said...

I'm pleased to see people walking along the walls and touching them. Sometimes preservationists are overly protective of monuments and that isolation reduces understanding.

The guide book may tell you that the wall is 1.5 metres deep at the bottom, narrowing to 0.8 metres at the top, composed of whatever material. But unless people are allowed to see it for themselves, that data is difficult to comprehend.

There is a fine line between preciousness and preservation, but the people at Conwy seem to have it right.

John H said...

Conwy, Rhudddlan, Caernarfon. It was these that gave me my final shift on Palestine. The connection, well reading the guidebook that explained how the English kings encouraged settlers with subsidised rents on siezed lands, how they built fortified towns. The graphic in Caernarvon depicting a Welsh raid.

Was Gruffydd ap Gruffydd a terrorist or a freedom fighter. The Welsh never stood a chance against an organised army.

Of course the attacks on settlers and the reprisals were all very medieval. But the image of a fortified town translates well to a hilltop settlement surrounded by ditches and barbed wire.