The shires of Cardigan and Carmarthen were re-organised so as
to include the southern districts which had been subject to Llewelyn,
or to the Welsh lords who had fallen with him. These were put under the
justice of west Wales, whose chancery and exchequer were established at
Carmarthen. It is significant that Edward prepared the way for making
these districts into shires by persuading his brother Edmund, to whom
they had been granted, to abandon his claims over them in return for
ample compensation elsewhere. Without this step the new shires would
only have been palatinates of the Glamorgan or Pembroke type, and the
creation of such franchises was directly contrary to Edward's policy.
It was different in the vale of Clwyd, where it would have been natural
for Edward to have extended the shire system to the four cantreds.
Military exigences had, however, already erected most of these lands
into new marcher lordships, and Edward was perforce content with the
union of some fragments of Rhos to the shire of Carnarvon, and with
joining together Englefield and some adjoining districts in the new
county of Flint.
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