Edward was resolved to incorporate Wales with England.  The children of Llewelyn and David were honorably and safely disposed of in monasteries, from which they never seem to have emerged.  The great Welsh lords who had joined the rebellion were punished with deprivation of all their lands.  Out of the conquered territory Denbigh and Ruthyn seem to have been made into march lordships under powerful Englishmen.  Anglesey and the land of Snowdon, Llewelyn’s territories of Carnarvon and Merionethshire, with Flint, Cardigan, and Carmarthenshire, were kept in the hands of the Crown.  The Welsh divisions of commotes were retained, and several of these constituted a sheriffdom, which bore pretty much the same relation to an English shire that a Territory bears to a State in the American Union.  The new districts were also brought more completely under English law than the marches, which retained their privileges and customs.

The changes, where we can trace them, seem to have been for the better.  The blood-feud was abolished; widows obtained a dower; bastards were no longer to inherit; and in default of heirs male in the direct line, daughters were allowed to inherit.  On the other hand, fines were to be assessed according to local custom; compurgation was retained for unimportant cases and inheritances were to remain divisible among all heirs male.

The ordinance that contains these dispositions is no parliamentary statute, but seems to have been drawn up by the King in council, March 24, 1284.  It was based on the report of a commission which examined one hundred and seventy-two witnesses.  Soon afterward an inquest was ordered to ascertain the losses sustained by the Church in Wales, with a view to giving it compensation.

Nor did Edward neglect appeals to the national sentiment.  The supposed body of Constantine was disinterred at Carnarvon, and received honorable burial in a church.  The crown of Arthur and a piece of the holy Cross, once the property of the Welsh princes, were added to the King’s regalia.  It was probably by design that Queen Eleanor was confined at Carnarvon, April 25, 1284, of a prince whom the Welsh might claim as a countryman.[74] At last, having lingered for more than a year about the principality, Edward celebrated the consummation of his conquests, August 1, 1284, by a splendid tournament at Nefyn, to which nobles and knights flocked from every part of England and even from Gascony.  It was even more a demonstration of strength than a pageant.

The cost of the Welsh campaign must have been enormous, and it is difficult to understand how Edward met it.  But no sort of expedient was spared.  Commissioners were sent through England and Ireland to beg money of clergy and laity.  Next, the cities of Guienne and Gascony were applied to; then, the money that had been collected for a crusade was taken out of the consecrated places where it was deposited.  The treasures put in the Welsh churches were freely