OFFA’S Dyke could soon join the likes of the Great Barrier Reef and the Taj Mahal in becoming a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Earlier in the year, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport called for World Heritage Site nominations. A total of 38 came forward hoping to be included on the tentative list of sites.
Other Welsh nominations include Merthyr Tydfil, and the slate industry of North Wales. Pontcysyllte aqueduct and canal in Denbighshire is already a World Heritage Site, as is the Blaenavon Industrial Landscape in south Wales, close to the border with Powys.
However, if approved this would be the first World Heritage Site to directly affect Powys itself, as large parts of Offa’s Dyke go through the county.
Dating from the 8th century, Offa's Dyke is a great frontier earthwork built by Offa, King of Mercia. It gives its name to a long distance footpath, one of Britain's National Trails, which runs from Chepstow to Prestatyn through the varied landscapes of the Welsh Marches. In places, it is up to 65 feet wide and 8 feet high and in some places even goes through gardens.
The origins of the Dyke are so shrouded in mystery that many of its aspects are speculated upon rather than being fully understood.
Asser, the biographer of King Alfred gave the first known reference to it when he wrote that ‘a certain vigorous king called Offa... had a great dyke built between Wales and Mercia from sea to sea.’
For Offa’s Dyke to become a World Heritage Site would be a bold and ambitious task, said Chris Martin from Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust, regional archaeologist for almost all of the Welsh section of Offa’s Dyke.
“Along its length the Dyke has so many different ownerships – some parts even go through people’s back gardens,” he said.
“However we support the bid all the way, it’s a bold and ambitious task, and we would encourage people to look at it sensibly. But it’s a jolly good idea.”
Next year is also the 40th anniversary of the designation of Offa's Dyke Path as a National Trail. In June of this year a group of American travel writers came to the Offa’s Dyke Visitor Centre in Knighton as part of a promotional visit, and were impressed with what they saw.
July saw the Centre play host to the International Medieval Congress which featured historians and archaeologists from Norway, Belgium, the USA, Canada, Israel and Ireland.
An independent expert panel will now be set up to assess each bid with a new list of potential sites drawn up for submission to UNESCO in 2011.