The peninsula forms a strong natural defensive position and the ramparts of an Iron Age fort, known as Spital Meend, across this neck can still be identified.

[4] Offa's Dyke, which was constructed in the late 8th century to define the area controlled by the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia and to deter incursions by the Welsh from the west, passed to the east of Lancaut, and incorporated part of the defences of the Spital Meend hillfort.

The peninsula and parish of Lancaut, though on the eastern bank of the river, remained under Welsh control until the 10th century;[5] by 956 it had been incorporated within the English king's manor of Tidenham.

Today the only significant trace of the village above ground is the church of St James, which is a Grade II listed building within the site of a scheduled monument.

[13] Another suggestion is that it may once have been the site of a leper colony,[14] and an unusual number of medicinal herbs including the non-native elecampane - once used to treat respiratory ailments - and green hellebore have been found in and around the churchyard.

[15] Lancaut, together with the adjacent woodland at Ban-y-Gor immediately to the north, was established in 1971 as a nature reserve, now managed by the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust.

The woodland contains dormice, the rare lapidary snail, and uncommon plants such as narrow-leaved helleborine and the wild service tree.

Fishing was historically important in the area, and the river contains traces of several medieval weirs, but salmon numbers have fallen markedly in recent years.

[19] This walk passes through the distinctive woodland of the Wye valley, including such rare and locally endemic species as the small-leaved lime.

[20] It crosses a scree slope of large boulders, created when an illegal post-war stone quarry blasted some of the limestone cliffs.