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‘Three crosses, raised at Penda’s dire command, Bore Oswald’s royal head and mangled hands.’”

After this battle the Welsh, or Cymry, (who seemed to have possessed for some time the district including Oswestry,) had called it Croes-Oswallt (Oswald’s Cross), in allusion to Penda’s ignominious exposure of Oswald’s slaughtered body. The spot where the battle was fought is said to have borne the name of Maeshir (the long field), as marking the length and obstinacy of the conflict. In the fulness of the Saxon period the town was known as Oswald’s Tree, in evident reference to Oswald’s death, and subsequently, to the present day, “without let or impediment,” by the name of Oswestry.

Industrious and talented antiquarian writers have given to the town other names and derivations. For instance, we are told that it was termed by the Saxons Blanc-Minster, White-Minster, Album-Monasterium, from its “fair and white Monastery,” whilst the Cymry, or “Old Britons,” as Williams denominates them, “called the town Tre’r Fesen, Tre’r Cadeiriau, the Town of the Oak Chairs,” or, as another writer has it, “the Town of Great Oaks.” These terms bear special allusion to Oswald’s unfortunate arrival in this district; for the ancient seal of the town, cut in brass, represents King Oswald sitting in his robes on a chair, holding a sword in his right hand, and an oak branch in his left, with the words around, “De Oswaldestre sigillum commune.” In repeating the long and tedious catalogue of names and derivations, it will be proper to mention that one writer renders the designation Tre’r Cadeiriau as follows:—“Oswestry was called by the Britons Tre’r Cadeiriau, literally the Town of Chairs, or Seats, commanding an extensive view, (as Cadair Idris, the chair of Idris, and others,) as there are several eminences commanding such views in the neighbourhood.”