Welsh castles celebrated with set of stamps

Mar 4 2010 by Hywel Trewyn, Caernarfon and Denbigh Herald

TEN Welsh castles, including Caernarfon and Criccieth, feature on a set of Royal Mail stamps issued to celebrate St David’s Day this week.

The castles featured on this year’s St David’s Day issue include Beaumaris, Caernarfon, Carreg Cennen, Conwy, Criccieth, Chepstow, Dinefwr, Dolbadarn, Dolwyddelan and Harlech.

They are on sale as a sheet of 10 Smiler stamps, which are Royal Mail stamps which feature various photographs.

The Welsh Castles stamp sheet marks the end of Royal Mail’s “grand tour” of castles around the UK, the fourth and final miniature sheet in the UK Castles series.

Royal Mail group’s director of Welsh affairs Huw Roberts presented a set of the stamps, together with a framed copy of last year’s Celebrating Wales stamps, to Peter Hain MP, Secretary of State for Wales, at the Senedd building in Cardiff Bay on Monday.

Celebrating Wales stamps, issued in time for St David’s Day last year, featured the popular First Class Welsh definitive stamp, a First Class Welsh National Flag, an 81p stamp of St David, and an 81p stamp showing a photograph of the National Assembly for Wales, the seat of Welsh government and a new landmark on the Cardiff waterfront.

Mr Roberts said of the Welsh Castles stamps: “This is a wonderful set of stamps featuring a particular aspect of Welsh history spread across the country for all to see – our Welsh castles. The photographs of these surviving stone fortifications and monuments are stunning.”

The Welsh castles generic sheet will be on sale, price £8.35, at post offices.