Still in York - 6 September 2008
The weather forecast was terrible – pouring rain and flooding they said - but the day dawned bright and clear, if a little cold. After a lovely lazy start, we drove the hire car back to the depot and then started walking back towards the City.
We reached the outskirts of York on the east at Walmgate Bar, one of four main Bars into the city. The word ‘Bar’ is effectively short for ‘barrier’. It would be impractical to call any of the Bars a gate as over 40 of York’s streets are ‘gates’ – gata being the Viking name for street.
York was loyal to King Charles I, and from April 1644 was besieged by the Parliamentarians. Walmgate Bar was heavily pounded by enemy guns set up on nearby Lamel Hill. If you look carefully you can still see the marks left by canon balls and bullets during the siege. With a force of 15,000 men the King’s nephew, Prince Rupert, forced the Parliamentary army to break off the siege and retreat, but they regrouped and, despite being outnumbered, defeated the Prince at Marston Moor. The city finally surrendered on 16 July 1644.
In AD71, the Roman army established a fortress on the banks of the River Ouse called Eboracum. The fortress was rectangular in shape and covered an area of about 50 acres. There were four large gatehouses, one of which stands under Bootham Bar where the wall stands to its original height of 5 metres with the tower rising a further 3 metres above that. The wall continues below the grass as present ground level is nearly 3 metres higher than that of the Roman city.
The Romans left York around AD410 but the legacy of their defensive walls remains. In generally good condition, the north-west and north-east walls still stand today. They are only visible in a few places as they are covered by the grassed-over mediaeval ramparts. Excavations in York have revealed clues to life in the fortress, including barrack blocks, bathhouses and an elaborate system of drains and sewers, but much still remains hidden beneath the ground.
This map shows where the wall is still standing.
Walmgate Bar is the most complete gateway through the City walls. The oldest part of the Bar is a 12th century archway, part of a small gatehouse. It existed when there were only earth ramparts, before the stone walls were built to either side. The Bar retains its portcullis and 15th century wooden gates and is particularly noted for the timber-framed building on its inner façade, built in the time of Elizabeth I.
The Barbican, or walled extension in front of the Bar, is a 14th century addition which originally stretched across a water-filled defensive ditch. The Barbican worked by trapping attackers between two sets of gates so they could be caught in a deadly crossfire. Until the early 19th century, each of the four main bars had a Barbican just like the one that survives at Walmgate.
Since before the 14th century, people have lived in Walmgate Bar, which was leased out as a house. Records show that in 1376, an annual rent of ten shillings was charged and that people were living there as recently as 1957.
Suzi and I walked from Walmgate Bar south and west until it ended and then dropped down into the City.
York was buzzing!
There are lots of pedestrian areas and there was a Festival of Traditional Dance happening in various locations and we kept bumping into one group or another
demonstrating their various dances.
York City Council launched a programme of entertainment in 1987 within the new ‘footstreets’, the largest single pedestrianised area in the country. The purpose of these events is to create vibrancy, spectacle and colour within the City centre. This has been complemented by extensive remodelling and repaving of most of the central area. The annual Festival of Traditional Dance has apparently been the most successful of the major events. Dancers from all parts of the country, sometimes from overseas, gather in York for a weekend of celebration in traditional style. All types of dance, from Garland and Sword to Clog and Rapper can be seen around the streets and civic open spaces.
As we wandered around, taking in the sights and sounds, we noticed the names of some of the roads
And
And the alignment of some of the buildings
We made our way to the Jorvic Centre where we were met by this charming Viking who 'suggested' that Suzi should try on his helmet!
In AD 866, when the Vikings set off from East Anglia to capture York, it was already a place of great importance. Originally a Roman stronghold, and later the capital of the Anglian Kingdom of Northumbria, the city had strong defensive walls, and must have contained a royal palace. The church in York was headed by an Archbishop, and had long been famous throughout Europe for its fine library and scholars. York’s communication networks were good. Roads followed natural ridges across the marshy vale of York and linked the city to fertile lands in east Yorkshire and the Pennine uplands in the west. The River Ouse linked York to the North Sea and brought trading ships to the City from many countries.
Viking Kings, either Danish or Norse, ruled York with only one interruption from AD866 to AD954 when York became part of the new Kingdom of England.
Under the Vikings, York lay at the centre of a huge area of Scandinavian settlement in North Eastern England. The city had grown larger and had become a more important centre for manufacturing, crafts and trade than ever before. In about 1000 AD a writer described York as ‘filled with treasures of merchants from many lands, particularly the Danes’, and when William the Conqueror had the Domesday Book drawn up in 1086 to list England’s wealth, York was second only to London in size and prosperity.
The Jorvic Viking Centre itself takes visitors back the 1,000 years since the Viking rule. We rode on a ‘train’ underground through the backyards and houses of the bustling streets of Jorvik, the Viking city of York. Everything in the centre is based on facts, from the layout of the houses and the language of the gossiping neighbours to the smells of cooking and the cesspit! A tremendous amount of excavation has taken place and over 40,000 ancient relics found. It was a fascinating experience.
We’d walked a long way through the City and round the Centre and were quite tired, so we took ourselves off to see a movie – The Duchess – at the City Screen. After two weeks of exploring things ancient, it was interesting to watch a movie set in much later times, but still a long way back from where we are today. It starred Kiera Knightly and was written about the life of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire.
And so we came to the end of our last full day on holiday. We had dinner at the pub we’d frequented every night because it was so good and fairly close to our B&B – The Exhibition Hotel, Bootham, York YO30 7BW – exhibitionhotel@cityinns.org or www.smoothhound.co.uk It’s definitely a pub but the food was really excellent and the prices very reasonable.