POLITICAL HISTORY IN size and wealth the county of Hereford is one of the lesser coun- ties of England, but in historic interest it is one of the first. The greater part of it lies in the fertile valley of the Wye, after that river has emerged from the confines of the Welsh hills. It is cut off from the lower valley of the Severn, occupied by the shires of Worcester and Gloucester, by the narrow ridge of the Malvern Hills on the east and by the broken country of the Forest of Dean to the south. To the north no well-marked natural division now separates it from Shropshire and the upper valley of the Severn, though in former times the inconsiderable stream of the Teme formed its boundary from Ludlow to Whitbourne. On the south- west the Monnow parts Herefordshire from Monmouthshire, while to the west and north-west lie the mountains of Wales, broken into two great masses by the upper channel of the Wye, which divides the Black Moun- tains of Brecknockshire from the less inaccessible hills of Radnorshire, pierced by the valleys of the Arrow, the Lugg, and the Teme. Those mountains were for centuries the abode of a hostile race, ever ready to burst forth on the fertile plains of Herefordshire, plundering and slaying, and carrying off the cattle of the inhabitants. The county itself is divided by the Wye into two parts, which histori- cally as well as geographically have a distinct character. The larger part, to the north and east of the river, forms the county proper, shielded from attack from the west by the Wye and the frontier districts beyond, and only in contact with the Welsh frontier on the narrow and shifting north- western border line. This part of the county contains all its important towns, Hereford and Ross on the Wye itself, with Leominster, Weobley, and Ledbury. South-west of the Wye in the time of Domesday, when we first get an accurate view of the extent of the county, lay the frontier districts of Archenfield and Stradel. Archenfield comprised the district to the south- east between the Wye and the Monnow, the modern archdeaconry of Irchenfield, while to the north-west lay Stradel, roughly corresponding to the modern Golden Valley through which runs the River Dore. From their situation these districts acquired a distinct character ; the inhabitants of Archenfield were warlike borderers, dwelUng in small fortified strongholds, while those of Stradel were mainly Welsh by race. The early history of the western midlands is more obscure than that of any other part of England. In the first century a.d. Herefordshire formed part of the territory of the Silures, who occupied the eastern half of South Wales, apparently between the lower course of the Severn and the Bay of Car- marthen.^ Their country was occupied by Ostorius Scapula in a.d. 50, but he ' Tacltcs, Agrko.a, cap. ii ; Rhys, Celtic Britain (190+), 81-2 ; Arch. Cambr. (Ser. 3), i, 193-5. 347
