Harold, who also strengthened the castle. The whole district is of
antiquarian interest, since, at the period of the Roman invasion,
Herefordshire was inhabited by the Silures, who also occupied the
adjacent counties of Radnor, Monmouth, and Glamorgan, together with that
part of Gloucestershire which lies westward of the Severn. The Silures,
in conjunction with the Ordovices, or inhabitants of North Wales,
retarded, for a considerable period, the progress of the Roman victors,
whose grand object seems to have been the conquest of these nations, who
had chosen the gallant Caractacus as their chieftain, and resolutely
exhausted every effort in defence of the independence of their country.

[1] Mackintosh's Hist. England, vol. i, p. 247.

The present demolished state of the Castle is referred to the Royalist
Governors of Hereford, by whose orders it was burnt to the bare walls
during the reign of Charles I. in the absence of its then possessor, Sir
J. Brydges.

The scenery of the WYE, at this point is thus described by tourists:
"From Hereford to Ross, its features occasionally assume greater
boldness; though more frequently their aspect is placid; but at the
latter town wholly emerging from its state of repose," it resumes the
brightness and rapidity of its primitive character, as it forms the
admired curve which the churchyard of Ross commands. The celebrated
spire of Ross church, peeping over a noble row of elms, here fronts the
ruined Castle of Wilton, beneath the arches of whose bridge, the Wye
flows through a charming succession of meadows, encircling at last the
lofty and well-wooded hill, crowned with the majestic fragments of
Gooderich Castle, and opposed by the waving eminences of the forest of
Dean. The mighty pile, or peninsula, of Symonds' Rock succeeds, round