Extent of the king of England's realms before Edward I (1272–1307).
We turn first to England. The English kings who preceded Edward I had ruled over only a portion of the island of Great Britain. To the west of their kingdom lay the mountainous district of Wales, inhabited by that remnant of the original Britons which the German invaders had been unable to conquer. To the north of England was the kingdom of Scotland, which was quite independent except for an occasional vague recognition on the part of its rulers of the English kings as their feudal superiors. Edward I, however, succeeded in conquering Wales permanently and Scotland temporarily.
The Welsh and their bards.
For centuries a border warfare had been carried on between the English and the Welsh. William the Conqueror had found it necessary to establish a chain of earldoms on the Welsh frontier, and Chester, Shrewsbury, and Monmouth became the outposts of the Normans. While the raids of the Welsh constantly provoked the English kings to invade Wales, no permanent conquest was possible, for the enemy retreated into the mountains about Snowdon and the English soldiers were left to starve in the wild regions into which they had ventured. The long and successful resistance which the Welsh made against the English must be attributed not only to their inaccessible retreats but also to the patriotic inspiration of their bards. These fondly believed that their people would sometime reconquer the whole of England, which they had possessed before the coming of the Angles and Saxons.[176]
Edward I conquers Wales.
The title of 'Prince of Wales.'
When Edward I came to the throne he demanded that Llewelyn, Prince of Wales, as the head of the Welsh clans was called, should do him homage. Llewelyn, who was a man of ability and energy, refused the king's summons, and Edward marched into Wales. Two campaigns were necessary before the Welsh finally succumbed. Llewelyn was killed (1282), and with him expired the independence of the Welsh people. Edward divided the country into shires and introduced English laws and customs, and his policy of conciliation was so successful that there was but a single rising in the country for a whole century. He later presented his son to the Welsh as their prince, and from that time down to the present the title of "Prince of Wales" has usually been conferred upon the heir to the English throne.
Scotland before Edward I.
The Highlands and Lowlands.