The Bishop's Palace, St Davids - the ruins of a lavish palace dating from the 13th century

We visited the ruins of the Bishop's Palace in St David's, while on vacation there back in April.

St David's is dominated by its cathedral complex. The complex consists of the cathedral, the remains of the bishop's palace, a large grave yard, and grand entrance gate and some other facilities. Its quite an impressive place, and helps to understand where power and wealth sat in those days - clearly with the clergy !

The palace is quite large, and has buildings centering around a large grassed area. There are actually two palaces in the area, that were owned by the same religious order - they really did have a lot of cash back in those days, with the senior clergy living quite a life of comfort.

The palace was developed over an extended period of time, but the remains there today date from around the 13th century. Its quite interesting, because the cathedral next to it is of a similar age, but is fully preserved !

Its quite an amazing structure with fantastic architectural features throughout - it really must have been something to see in its heyday.

Above you can see some of the lovely stonework around the door of one of the main routes in and out of the palace.

Its maintained by the Welsh government, so its safe to visit, and you can still get up high in some parts. And its clear to see that there would have been more to it, at its full height.

Thats a view down into one of the larger halls - with my wife and daughter posing for effect !

And thats another view from within the palace, over to the cathedral. It looked quite lovely with the stream separating the two - it really must have been an incredible place when it was at the height of its glory. Although I think questionable in terms of the wealth, when the local population would have been very poor at that time.

The great hall has a beautiful rosette window at one end which was casting a stunning shadow while we were there (and yes, I did use it for shadow hunters a the time !).

The palace had everything it needed - accommodation, halls, stores, gardens, kitchens, etc - all very self sufficient.

Above is one of the lower vaulted cellars that would have been used for storage,

Religious activity on the site actually dates back to the 6th century (1500 years ago), however construction would have started on the ruins we see today sometime in the 1200s (800 years ago).

It was in use for a good 300 years or so, before its decline in the 1500s, coinciding with Henry the VIIIs reformation, from when he fell out with the pope and the catholic church over his marriage plans. The reformation had a similar impact to many such religious buildings throughout Britain at the time, so it comes as no surprise that this is also when the palace started going to ruin. Basically the reformation allowed Henry to plunder the catholic church across the country.

Its a shame to see it like this, but its still an impressive place to explore, and to imagine how it must have been and what went on here. The information boards around certainly provide a lot of information to help with that.

And the ruins are an important site for the the history of welsh Christianity, as is St David's generally.

As can be seen, we were lucky with the weather when we were there, and we really enjoyed visiting it and exploring the ruins.

An impressive place, and well worth the visit !!!