The place names and language in St. Florence are almost exclusively English, stemming, as in the rest of South Pembrokeshire below the Landsker, from a two-fold process in the early 12th century. Firstly, the Normans possessed the land and encouraged English followers; secondly, Henry I is said to have sent the Flemings, (who had first migrated and then fled to England after their land was inundated by the sea and who had become a nuisance top the King), to colonise South Pembrokeshire, centred in Rhos. They brought with them the English to teach them the customs and language. Giraldus Cambrensis says they were also to, 'despoil the unquiet Welshmen'. Little is known of the village before the 13th century, the first reference being in a return of lands owned by Walter Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, in 1248/9: this included the 'Lordship of Sanctus Florencius', which later passed to the next Earl, William de Valence. When William's son, Aymer de Valence, died in 1324 the manor of St. Florence was valued at £33-14s-0d.
In the 12th century, the population of the village could have comprised a mix of Scandinavians, Irish, Normans and Flemings, all being 'anglicised', together with Anglo-Saxons and some of Welsh origin. B G Charles reports that out of 60 tenants in 1324, there were only 5 or 6 with Welsh names. There was at one time a walled deer park, owned by the Earls of Pembroke, on the northern slopes of the Ridgeway: in his travels (1538-1544) Leland observed, 'the church of St. Florence and Tounlet is in a botom by the parke'. By 1600 this park had largely been enclosed for farming.

Park Wall farm remains today. By the Act of Union 1536, which constrained the palatinadal powers of the Earls of Pembroke and established Pembrokeshire as a County within the English Realm, St. Florence became a part of the hundred of Castlemartin.

Author: Owen Thomas, Copyright: 'Planed' Narberth, Pembrokeshire