First English Parliament to represent the common people - Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England, UK
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Ddraig Ddu
N 52° 42.536 W 002° 45.136
30U E 516737 N 5839922
The plaque records the first occasion that a parliament was called to represent the people against Dafydd ap Gruffydd who was accused of committing high treason against the English crown.
Waymark Code: WMC1FG
Location: West Midlands, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 07/14/2011
Views: 4
The plaque records the first occasion that a parliament was called to represent the people against Dafydd ap Gruffydd who was accused of committing high treason against the English crown.
He was tried as guilty and put to death on 3rd October 1283 by King Edward I of England (Edward the long shanks). He was the last independent ruler of Wales but is remembered little as the more famous Owain Glyndwr is in common memory.
As "sort of" a double first, the action from this trail for the people was a punishment that was also a first (but not mentioned as a first on the plaque):-
"Dafydd ap Gruffydd was the first person known to have been tried and executed for what from that time onwards would be described as High Treason against the King.
Edward ensured that Dafydd's death was to be slow and agonising, and also historic; he became the first prominent person in recorded history to have been hanged, drawn and quartered, preceded by a number of minor knights earlier in the thirteenth century.
Dafydd was dragged through the streets of Shrewsbury attached to a horse's tail then hanged alive, revived, then disembowelled and his entrails burned before him for "his sacrilege in committing his crimes in the week of Christ's passion", and then his body cut into four quarters "for plotting the king's death".
Geoffrey of Shrewsbury was paid 20 shillings for carrying out the gruesome task on 3 October 1283 (though some sources give the date as 2 October)."
-With thanks to Wikipedia:- (
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