Everything about Cirencester totally explained
Cirencester
is a
market town in
Gloucestershire,
England, 93 miles (150 km) west northwest of London. Cirencester lies on the
River Churn, a tributary of the
River Thames, and is the largest town in
Cotswold District. It is home of the
Royal Agricultural College, the oldest
agricultural college in the
English-speaking world founded in 1840. The town's
Corinium Museum is well-known for its extensive
Roman collection. The Roman name for this place was
Corinium, which is thought to have been associated with the ancient British
Cornovii tribe, having the same root word as the
River Churn. The earliest known reference to the town was by
Ptolemy in 150 AD.
Cirencester is
twinned with the following towns:
- Saint-Genis-Laval, France
- Itzehoe, Germany
Local geography
Cirencester lies on the lower dip-slopes of the Cotswold Hills, an outcrop of oolitic limestone. Natural drainage is into the River Churn, which flows roughly north to south through the eastern side of the town and joins the Thames near Cricklade a little to the south. The Thames itself rises just a few miles west of Cirencester.
The town is split into five main areas: The town centre, the suburbs of
Chesterton,
Stratton (originally villages outside the town),
Watermoor and the Beeches Estate (a 1950s housing development). The village of
Siddington to the south-west of the town is now almost connected to Watermoor.
The town serves as a centre for the surrounding area, providing employment, amenities, shops, commerce, and education.
Transport
Cirencester is the hub of a significant road network with important routes to
Gloucester (
A417),
Cheltenham (
A435),
Warwick (
A429),
Oxford (
A40 via the
B4425),
Wantage (A417),
Swindon (
A419),
Chippenham (A429),
Bristol and
Bath (
A433), and
Stroud (A419).
These good transport links bring the town passing trade. Although the ring-road and by-pass take traffic away from the town centre, both roads have busy service areas with adequate parking. Access to the railway system is at
Kemble railway station on the main line to
London (
Paddington), about four miles from the town. The nearest airports are at
Bristol,
London (Heathrow) and
Birmingham.
History
Roman Corinium
The larger area in the vicinity of Cirencester was known to be an important early Roman area including evidence of significant area roadworks. When the Romans built a fort where the
Fosse Way crossed the
Churn, to hold two quingenary
alae tasked with helping to defend the provincial frontier c. AD 49, native
Dobunni were drawn from
Bagendon, a settlement of the Dobunni situated 3 miles (5 km) to the north, to create a civil settlement near the fort. When the frontier moved to the north following the conquest of
Wales, this fort was closed and its fortifications levelled c. 70, but the town persisted and flourished under the name Corinium Dobunnorum.
Even in Roman times, there was a thriving wool trade and industry, which contributed to the growth of Corinium. A large forum and basilica was built over the site of the fort, and archeological evidence shows signs of further civic growth. When a
wall was erected around the Roman city in the late second century, it enclosed 240 acres (1 km²), making Corinium, in area, the second-largest city in
Britain. It was made the seat of the province Britannia Prima in the fourth century, and some historians would date the pillar the governor L. Septimus erected to the god Jovian to this period, providing evidence of a sign of pagan reaction under the Roman Emperor
Julian.
There are many Roman remains in the surrounding area, including several
Roman villas near the villages of
Chedworth and
Withington.
Sub-Roman and Saxon times
The Roman
amphitheatre still exists in an area known as the
Querns to the SW of the town, but has only been partially excavated. Investigations in the town show that it was fortified in the fifth or sixth centuries. Possibly this was the palace of one of the British kings defeated by
Ceawlin in 577. It was later the scene of a battle again, this time between the
Mercian king
Penda and the
West Saxon kings
Cynegils and
Cwichelm in 628.
The
minster church of Cirencester, founded in the 9th or 10th century, was probably a royal foundation. It was destroyed by Augustinian monks in the 12th century, and replaced by the great
abbey church.
Norman times
At the
Norman Conquest the royal
manor of Cirencester was granted to the Earl of Hereford,
William Fitz-Osbern, but by 1075 it had reverted to the Crown. The manor was granted to
Cirencester Abbey, founded by
Henry I in 1117, and following half a century of building work during which the minster church was demolished, the great abbey church was finally dedicated in 1176. The manor was granted to the Abbey in 1189, although a royal charter dated 1133 speaks of burgesses in the town.
The struggle of the townsmen to prove that Cirencester was a
borough, and thus gain the associated rights and privileges, probably began in the same year, when they were amerced for a false presentment. Four inquisitions during the 13th century supported the abbot's claims, yet the townspeople remained unwavering in their quest for borough status: in 1342, they lodged a Bill of complaint in
Chancery. Twenty townspeople were ordered up to
Westminster, where they declared under oath that successive abbots had bought up many burgage tenenments, and made the borough into an appendage of the manor, depriving it of its separate court. They claimed that the royal charter that conferred on the men of Cirencester the liberties of Winchester had been destroyed when fifty years prior the abbot had bribed the burgess who held the charter to give it to him, whereupon the abbot had had it burned. In reply, the abbot refuted these claims, and the case passed on to the
King's Bench. When ordered to produce the foundation charter of his abbey the abbot refused, apparently because that document would be fatal to his case, and instead played a winning card. In return for a "
fine" of £300, he obtained a new royal charter confirming his privileges and a writ of
supersedeas.
Yet the townspeople continued in their fight: for their aid to the crown against the earls of Kent and Salisbury,
Henry IV in 1403 gave the townsmen a
gild merchant, although two inquisitions reiterated the abbot's rights. The struggle between the abbot and the townspeople continued with the abbot's privileges confirmed in 1408‑1409 and 1413, and in 1418 the abbot finally removed this thorn in his side when the gild merchant was annulled. and in 1477 parliament declared that Cirencester wasn't corporate. After several unsuccessful attempts to re-establish the gild merchant, the government in 1592 was vested in the bailiff of the
lord of the manor.
Tudor times
As part of the
Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539,
Henry VIII ordered the total demolition of the Abbey buildings. Today only the Norman Arch and parts of the precinct wall remain above ground, forming the perimeter of a public park in the middle of town. Despite this, the freedom of a borough continued to elude the townspeople, and they only saw the old lord of the manor replaced by a new lord of the manor as the King acquired the abbey's title.
Sheep rearing,
wool sales, weaving and cloth-making were the main strengths of England's trade in the Middle Ages, and not only the abbey but many of Cirencester's merchants and clothiers gained wealth and prosperity from the national and international trade. The tombs of these merchants can be seen in the parish church, while their fine houses of Cotswold stone still stand in and around Coxwell Street and Dollar Street. Their wealth funded the rebuilding of the nave of the parish church in 1515-30, to create the large parish church, often referred to as the 'Cathedral of the Cotswolds'. Other
wool churches can be seen in neighbouring
Northleach and
Chipping Campden.
During the Civil War
The
English Civil War came to Cirencester in February 1643 when
Royalists and
Parliamentarians came to blows in the streets. Over 300 were killed, and 1200 prisoners were held captive in the church. The townsfolk supported the Parliamentarians but gentry and clergy were for the old order, so that when Charles I was executed in 1649 the minister, Alexander Gregory, wrote on behalf of the gentry in the parish register, 'O England what did'st thou do, the 30th of this month'.
At the end of the Civil War King
Charles II spent the night of
11 September 1651 in Cirencester, during
his escape after the
Battle of Worcester on his way to France.
Recent history
At the end of the 18th century Cirencester was a thriving market town, at the centre of a network of
turnpike roads with easy access to markets for its produce of grain and wool. A local
grammar school provided education for those who could afford it, and businesses thrived in the town, which was the major urban centre for the surrounding area.
In 1789 the opening of a branch of the
Thames and Severn Canal provided access to markets further afield, by way of a link through the River Thames. In 1841 a branch railway line was opened to
Kemble to provide a link to the Great Western Railway at
Swindon. The
Midland and South Western Junction Railway opened a station at Watermoor in 1883. Cirencester thus was served by two railway lines until the 1960s.
The loss of canal and the direct rail link encouraged dependency on road transport. An inner ring road system was completed in 1975 in an attempt to reduce congestion in the town centre, which has since been augmented by an outer bypass with the expansion of the A417. Coaches depart from London Road for Victoria in central London and
Heathrow Airport, taking advantage of the M4 Motorway. Kemble Station to the west of the town, distinguished by a sheltered garden, is served by fast trains from Paddington via
Swindon.
In 1894 the passing of the
Local Government Act brought at last into existence Cirencester's first independent elected body, the Urban District Council. The reorganization of the local governments in 1974 replaced the Urban District Council with the present two-tier system of
Cotswold District Council and Cirencester
Town Council. A concerted effort to reduce overhead wiring and roadside clutter has given the town some picturesque streetscenes. Many shops cater to tourists and many house family businesses.
Under the patronage of the Bathurst family, the Cirencester area, notably
Sapperton, became a major centre for the
Arts and Crafts movement in the Cotswolds, when the furniture designer and architect-craftsman
Ernest Gimson opened workshops in the early 20th century, and
Norman Jewson, his foremost student, practiced in the town.
Name
The name stem
Corin is cognate with
Churn (the modern name of the river on which the town is built) and with the stem
Cerne in the nearby villages of
North Cerney,
South Cerney, and
Cerney Wick; also on the River Churn. The modern name 'Cirencester' is formed from the cognate root
Ciren and the standard
-cester ending indicating a Roman fortress or encampment. It seems certain that this name root goes back to pre-Roman times and is similar to the original
Brythonic name for the river, and perhaps the settlement. An early Welsh ecclesiastical list from
St David's gives another form of the name
Caerceri where
Caer is the Welsh for fortress and
Ceri is cognate with the other forms of the name.
In Saxon times the name of the town was written
Cirrenceastre or
Cyrneceastre (the Saxon 'c' was pronounced like the 'ch' in change). The Normans mispronounced the 'ch' sound as [ts] resulting in the modern name
Cirencester . The form
Ciceter /sɪsɪtɚ/ invented by
William Shakespeare was once used locally as an abbreviation. Sometimes the form
Cicester /ˈsɪsɪstɚ/ was heard instead. These forms are now very rarely used, while many local people abbreviate the name to
Ciren (/ˈsaɪrən/).
Today it's usually, although occasionally it's still /ˈsɪsɪtɚ/),
Leisure and entertainment
Cirencester has an important tourist trade as well as providing shopping, entertainment, and sports facilities for the inhabitants of the town and the surrounding area. Cirencester boasts a number of popular
pubs. The town also has a local chess club - Cirencester Chess Club
Sites of interest
The parish church of
St John the Baptist, often referred to as the Cathedral of the Cotswolds, has a nave built in 1515 – 1530, and also features a high embattled tower and a remarkable south porch with parvise. A fine example of the
wool church, among its numerous chapels, that of St Catherine has a beautiful roof of fan-
tracery of stone that dates to 1508. Other wool churches can be seen in neighbouring
Northleach and
Chipping Campden.
The town also has a Roman Catholic Church of
St Peter's; the foundation stone was laid on 20 June 1895.
To the west of the town is
Cirencester House, the seat of
Earl Bathurst and the site of one of the finest
landscape gardens in England, laid out by the first Earl Bathurst after 1714.
Abbey House, Cirencester was a country house built on the site of the former Cirencester Abbey following its dissolution and demolition at the Reformation in the 1530s. The site was granted in 1564 to Richard Master, physician to Queen Elizabeth I. The house was rebuilt and altered at several dates by the Master family, who still own the agricultural estate. By 1897 the house was let, and it remained in the occupation of tenants until shortly after the Second World War. It was finally demolished in 1964.
On Cotswold Avenue is the site of a Roman
amphitheatre which, while buried, retains its shape in the earthen topography of the small park setting. Cirencester was one of the most substantial cities of Roman-era Britain.
Sport
In April 2006 the Cotswold Leisure Centre moved to its new site, the centre is run by the
local district council. It includes a swimming pool, sauna, steam room, showers, relaxation area, a large sports hall, gym and fitness centre. The centre was closed for eight months to be repaired after the
flooding in July 2007. The town also has an open air swimming pool, dating back to 1870, this is run by a charity and local volunteers and is only open during the summer months.
Football
The local football club,
Cirencester Town F.C., was relegated from the
Southern League Premier Division in 2007, however were reinstated due to changes to the football league. The team is known as
The Centurions and moved in 2002 from their former ground at Smithsfield on the Tetbury Road to a purpose built sports complex known as the
Corinium Stadium.
The club is designated by The Football Association as a Community Club because each week it provides football awareness, coaching and competition for over 300 children ranging from age 6+ to 18.
As well as the main pitch there are six additional football pitches, mainly used by the junior football teams. The club has also developed a full size indoor training area, known as The Arena, which is used for training, for social events and for 5 a side leagues throughout the year.
The town also has another football team
Cirencester United F.C. and they play in the
Hellenic Football League Division One West.
Other Sports
Cirencester also has a
Netball Club, Cirencester Ladies, with three squads. The A team play in the 1st division of the Gloucestershire League. The B team in the 3rd Division and the C team in the 5th Division.
The town has its own
Rugby Club who are based at the Whiteway. They have four main teams, a colts, a Youth and Mini sections.
The town also has
Cirencester Polo Club, the oldest
polo club in the
UK. Its main grounds are located in
Earl Bathurst's Cirencester Park. It is frequently used by
Prince Charles and his sons
William and
Harry.
The town is also home to
Cirencester Car Club, one of the oldest
car clubs in the
UK.
Education
The town and the surrounding area have several
Primary schools and two
Secondary schools,
Deer Park School located on the Stroud Road and
Kingshill School off the London Road. It also offers an Independent School, catering for 3-18 year olds,
Rendcomb College. The town used to have a 500 year old
Grammar School, which in 1966 joined with the Secondary Modern to form
Cirencester Deer Park School. In 1991
Cirencester College was created taking over the sixth form of Deer Park, the College is located adjacent to the Deer Park School.
The town also hosts the
Royal Agricultural College which is located between the Stroud and Tetbury Roads.
References
Bibliography
H.P.R. Finberg. "The Origin of Gloucestershire Towns" in Gloucestershire Studies, edited by H.P.R. Finberg. Leicester: University Press, 1957Further Information
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