[7] An ancient structure ornamented with trellis-work, possibly a stoup, a lamp or a piscina, was found built into the wall during restoration.

Swansea University historian Dr Alun Withey has examined in some detail a 1671 dispute over the church seating arrangements.

He reports that the village was ablaze, with divers[e] variances, quarrels and debates even lawsuits, to the utter destruction and overthrow of manie.

Gwin's notebook containing his seating plan still survives, giving us, Withey argues, a rare insight into the world of parochial life in 17th-century Wales, and thus contributes greatly to our general understanding of Welsh history.

The chapel, which is mentioned in Sir Joseph Bradney's A History of Monmouthshire (1923), was designated a Grade II listed building on 12 October 2000.

[11] Allt-y-Bela was built as a hall house in the mid-15th century, originally as a traditional, single-storey, cruck-frame building with wooden mullions and leaded lights.

In 1599 the wealthy Midlands wool merchant Roger Edwards, the founder of Usk Grammar School,[12] added a three-storey Renaissance tower.

Visiting in the late 1940s, when the owner was farmer Mr Moseley, the local writer and historian Fred Hando noted the builder's inscription mark – 1599, E.R.

Curiously the stair treads showed holes through which bell-ropes would once have passed and there was a tiny bellcote, with a bellframe, at the very top of the tower.