Funded by a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship and an OUP John Fell Fund award, Dr Emma Cavell is working on a project to examine the aristocratic women of the Anglo-Welsh frontier between 1066 and 1284, exploring the interaction of gender, status and locality in shaping the women’s lives (as compared to noblewomen elsewhere in England/Western Europe) and determining their contribution to the creation, maintenance and decline of landed estates and family power. The women are examined in the context of the gender roles of the frontier, while the study addresses the paradox that an essentially masculine, militarised Marcher society provided new avenues for female participation.