The Offa's Dyke Path is close by and the Marches Way, the Beacons Way and Usk Valley Walk all pass through the town.

That Offa could summon the resources to build Offa's Dyke is testament to his power.

He is noted for Offa's Dyke, built as a defence against Welsh marauders.

* Offa's Dyke is constructed.

Offa's Dyke near Clun

Offa's Dyke () is a massive linear earthwork, roughly followed by some of the current border between England and Wales.

Map of the British isles in AD 802, showing ( when enlarged ) Offa's Dyke between Mercia and Wales

Schematic cross-section of Offa's Dyke, showing how it was designed to protect Mercia against attacks / raids from Powys.

A section of Offa's Dyke

That he was able to raise a workforce and resources sufficient to construct such an earthwork as Offa's Dyke is testament to his power.

His greatest contribution was to stir up new academic interest in Offa's Dyke.

His MPhil thesis, " Offa's Dyke Reviewed " ( 1978 ), raised several questions.

Noble also helped establish the Offa's Dyke Association, which maintains the Offa's Dyke Path.

Ongoing research and archaeology on Offa's Dyke has been undertaken for many years by the Extra-Mural department of the University of Manchester.

According to Hill and Worthington, dykes in the far north and south may have different dates, and though they may be connected with Offa's Dyke, there is as yet no compelling evidence behind this.

Recently, some writers have suggested that Eutropius may have been referring to the earthwork later called Offa's Dyke.

Archaeologists concluded that this part of Wat's Dyke, so long thought of as Anglo-Saxon and a mid-8th century contemporary of Offa's Dyke, must have been built 300 years earlier in the post-Roman period in Britain.

Offa's Dyke Centre

The Offa's Dyke Centre is a purpose-built information centre in the town of Knighton, situated on Offa's Dyke on the border between England ( Shropshire ) and Wales ( Powys ).

In the 780s he extended Mercian supremacy over most of southern England, allying with Beorhtric of Wessex, who married Offa's daughter Eadburh, and regained complete control of the southeast.

Æthelbald, who ruled Mercia for most of the forty years before Offa, was also descended from Eowa according to the genealogies: Offa's grandfather, Eanwulf, was Æthelbald's second cousin.

A northern part of the Offa's Dyke footpath, one of the UK's most popular National Trails, crosses the summit of Moel Famau and the Jubilee Tower.

This reduction in the power of Canterbury may have been motivated by Offa's desire to have an archbishop consecrate his son Ecgfrith of Mercia as king, since it is possible Jaenberht refused to perform the ceremony, which took place in 787.

Other surviving sources include a problematic document known as the Tribal Hidage, which may provide further evidence of Offa's scope as a ruler, though its attribution to his reign is disputed.

These letters in particular reveal Offa's relations with the continent, as does his coinage, which was based on Carolingian examples.

The overlordship of the southern English which had been exerted by Æthelbald appears to have collapsed during the civil strife over the succession, and it is not until 764, when evidence emerges of Offa's influence in Kent, that Mercian power can be seen expanding again.

The limited evidence for Offa's direct involvement in the kingdom between 765 and 776 includes two charters of 774 in which he grants land in Kent ; but there are doubts about their authenticity, so Offa's intervention in Kent prior to 776 may have been limited to the years 764 – 765.

It has traditionally been interpreted as a Mercian victory, but there is no evidence for Offa's authority over Kent until 785: a charter from 784 mentions only a Kentish king named Ealhmund, which may indicate that the Mercians were in fact defeated at Otford.

Simeon of Durham, a twelfth-century chronicler, records that in 771 Offa defeated " the people of Hastings ", which may record the extension of Offa's dominion over the entire kingdom.

However, doubts have been expressed about the authenticity of the charters which support this version of events, and it is possible that Offa's direct involvement in Sussex was limited to a short period around 770 – 771.

Accounts of the event have survived in which Aethelberht is killed through the machinations of Offa's wife Cynethryth, but the earliest manuscripts in which these possibly legendary accounts are found date from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and recent historians do not regard them with confidence.

Other earthworks exist along the Welsh border, of which Wat's Dyke is one of the largest, but it is not possible to date them relative to each other and so it cannot be determined whether Offa's Dyke was a copy of or the inspiration for Wat's Dyke.

Much of the long route either follows, or keeps close company with, the remnants of Offa's Dyke, an 8th century earthwork, the majority of which was probably constructed on the orders of Mercian King Offa.

In the early years of Coenwulf's reign he had to deal with a revolt in Kent, which had been under Offa's control.

In the centuries which followed, Offa's Dyke largely remained the frontier between the Welsh and English.

In the Early Middle Ages, the area was a battleground between the Welsh and the Anglo Saxon Kingdom of Mercia and Offa's Dyke, which is partially in the district, is a permanent reminder of the areas border status.

The town is close to the southern point of Offa's Dyke, which begins on the east bank of the Wye at Sedbury and runs all the way to the Irish Sea in north Wales.

The pound in use in Offa's day, also known as the Saxon pound or moneyers ' pound, remained essentially unchanged until 1526, by which time it had come to be known as the Tower pound.

Llanidloes is popular with hikers who walk on the scenic footpaths surrounding the town, including Glyndŵr's Way, which in conjunction with the Offa's Dyke path forms a 160-mile circuit around Mid Wales and local passage over the spine of the Cambrian Mountains.

They conflicted over land which they both claimed as theirs, and Jænberht refused to crown Offa's son Ecgfrith.

In the Dingle is a single track road, locally known as ' Millionaire's Row ', because of the large, Victorian houses which line the route up to Offa's Dyke Path, one of the popular walking tracks in the West of England.