68.Llewelyn the Great Hangs William de Braose, Aber Garth Celyn , Wales May 2, 1230

William de Braose was hung from a tree — one of the chronicles says it was at Crogen, in Corwen. So, maybe one of the ancestors of one of the trees you see here. (Clearly, the castle that was here has been rebuilt; the building there now is much more recent. However! You can rent it, if you would like!

So, one day in 1230, William de Braose was over at Llewelyn the Great’s castle, and he was found in Llewelyn’s private chambers with Joan, who was Llewelyn’s wife. As well as the daughter of the King of England. Now, according to Welsh law, Llewelyn would then have been in his rights to beat William up, but instead, there was a trial, and William ended up being hung from some tree or other; two are in the running for being The Tree, but who knows. At any rate, messing around with the Queen did not carry the death penalty in Wales, but Llewelyn hung him anyway, and then wrote to his widow to see if she still wanted their children to get married. And she did, so they were. And what scandalizes Michelle most about all this is that the de Braoses and the relatives of Llewelyn were so intermarried that you don’t know what to call their various relations. Also, that William and Joan and Llewelyn were all middle aged and not teenagers and really there is no excuse for all this.

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