Malpas is a large
village which used to be a
market town, and it is also a
civil parish in the unitary authority of
Cheshire West and Chester and the ceremonial county of
Cheshire,
England. The parish lies on the border with
Shropshire and
Wales. The name is from Old French and means bad/poor (mal) and passage/way (pas).
History
Roman
There is no evidence for Roman settlement in Malpas but it is known that the
Roman Road from Bovium (
Tilston) and Mediolanum (
Whitchurch) passes through the village.
Mercian
Dedications to
St Oswald are thought to be associated with Æthelræd II (879-911), also known as
Earl Aethelred of Mercia and Æthelflæd of Mercia (911-918); they are known to have encouraged the growth of this cult along the Welsh border in places such as
Hereford and
Shrewsbury. This may indicate that Malpas was not a Norman ‘New Town’, but an Anglo-Saxon
burh.
Medieval (Norman 1066–1154)
After the
Norman conquest of 1066 Malpas is recorded as being called
Depenbech and is mentioned in the
Domesday book of 1086 as belonging to
Robert FitzHugh, Baron of Malpas. Malpas and other holdings were given to his family for defensive services along the Welsh border and as reward for services in the
Battle of Hastings. The
Cholmondeley family who still live locally at
Cholmondeley Castle are reputed to be descended from Robert FitzHugh and the half-sister of
William the Conqueror.
A concentrated line of castles protected Cheshire's western border from the Welsh;...
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