POWIS CASTLE

Grid Ref: SJ 215 064
Dates: 18 July 2016 & 7 June 2023

Powis Castle is a Grade I listed building now in the care of the National Trust. It lies just to the south east of Welshpool. It was the family seat of a Herbert family, earls of Powis. They were descended from the earls of Pembroke, whose family were prominent at Wilton near Salisbury in Wiltshire.

The present castle was built in the 13th century. Unusually for a castle on the Marches, it was constructed by a Welsh prince, Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn, rather than by a Norman baron. Gruffydd was prince of the ancient Kingdom of Powys and maintained an alliance with the English king Edward I during the struggles of the later 13th century. He was able to secure the position of his son, Owain, although the kingdom itself was abolished by the Parliament of Shrewsbury in 1283. After his father's death, Owain was raised to the peerage as Owen de la Pole, 1st Lord of Powis. Following his own death c. 1293, and the death of his only son, he was succeeded by his daughter, Hawys Gadarn, "the Lady of Powis". Hawys married Sir John Charlton in 1309.

In the late 16th century the castle was purchased by Edward Herbert, a younger son of the Earl of Pembroke, beginning a connection between the family and the castle that continues today. The Herberts remained Roman Catholic until the 18th century and, although rising in the peerage to earls, marquesses and Jacobite dukes of Powis, suffered periods of imprisonment and exile. Despite these setbacks, they were able in the late 17th and early 18th centuries to transform Powis from a border fortress into an aristocratic country house, and surround it with one of the very few extant examples of a British Baroque garden.

The Castle is perhaps best known for its connection with the controversial Clive of India. In 1784, Henrietta Herbert married Edward Clive, eldest son of Clive of India, a match which replenished the much-depleted Herbert family fortune. In the early 20th century, George Herbert, 4th Earl of Powis redeveloped the castle with the assistance of the architect George Frederick Bodley. Herbert’s wife, Violet, undertook work of equal importance in the garden, seeking to turn it into "one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful, in England and Wales". On the 4th earl's death in 1952, his wife and his sons having predeceased him, the castle passed into the care of the National Trust.

Unlike many National Trust properties, photography is not allowed in the house because it does not own all the artifacts. In any case, it would be very difficult as, to protect items from fading, many of the rooms are kept at very low light levels. While this is necessary, it makes for poor visibility of most of the items. Furthermore, use of images on the web such as a portrait of Clive of India by Nathaniel Dance can be challenged on copyright grounds.

Powis Castle was the location for an episode of Antiques Roadshow, shown on BBC1 on Sunday 2 July 2023.