City in Cheshire, England
Chester
Chester has a Roman amphitheatre bigger than any other in Britain, plus city walls you can walk all the way round and shops built on the first floor.
Key information
- County
- Cheshire
- Nation
- England
- Known for
- Almost complete city walls, the Rows, a Roman amphitheatre, Chester Zoo and the Roodee racecourse
- What locals are called
- Cestrians
- Famous people
- Daniel Craig, Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester, George Mottershead (zoo founder, by adoption)
About Chester
The fortress that never quite went away
Around AD 79 Roman soldiers began building a legionary fortress on a sandstone ridge above the River Dee. They called it Deva Victrix, and it became one of the biggest military bases in Roman Britain. Legio II Adiutrix started the job, and the Twentieth Legion, Valeria Victrix, took over around AD 87 and stayed into the late fourth century, roughly three centuries. The fortress plan still shapes the centre. The main streets largely follow the Roman layout, though the four-way junction at the Cross was not a Roman crossroads. The Roman headquarters stood just north of the east-west road, blocking the direct route along what is now Northgate Street. The amphitheatre sat just outside the walls. Excavated in the twentieth century, it is the largest known in Britain, with room for around 7,000 spectators. Only part of it is uncovered today, but it is big enough to make you picture a rowdy night out in the second century.
A wall you can walk all the way round
Chester has the most complete set of city walls in Britain, with a walking circuit of about two miles, mostly along the ramparts. The Romans laid the first stone defences. Medieval builders extended them, and the Saxon ruler Æthelflæd strengthened the city in the early tenth century, when it needed protection against Viking raiders. The walls had one more starring moment in the Civil War. In 1645 Charles I is said to have watched the Battle of Rowton Moor go badly from a tower on the northern stretch. It is now called the King Charles Tower. His Royalists lost, and Chester finally surrendered to Parliament the following year after a long siege. The walls also help explain why Chester was such a busy port for so long. The Dee silted up over the centuries, and Liverpool took over as the great port of the north-west.
Why Chester's shops are upstairs
The Rows are Chester's best-known oddity: medieval-looking galleries that run along the first floor of buildings, so you can shop at street level or on a raised walkway above it. Nobody can say for certain how they began. Some people suggest they were built over the rubble of ruined Roman buildings, while others say they were a clever medieval way to gain extra shopfront space. The black-and-white timber look is partly a Victorian flourish. Architect John Douglas, who worked all over Cheshire, helped create the timber-framed style that makes the streets look so very Tudor. Look closely and some of it is younger than it seems. Above the Eastgate stands the ornate Eastgate Clock, built in 1899 to mark Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. It is often described as the most photographed clock in Britain after Big Ben.
Zoos, racehorses and a very small circuit
Chester Zoo was opened in 1931 by George Mottershead, who had dreamed of a zoo without bars where animals lived in naturalistic enclosures. It grew into one of the UK's most visited zoos and is known for its conservation work. Then there is the Roodee, home to Chester Racecourse. Racing here goes back to 1539, which makes it one of the oldest racecourses in England. Its flat, tightly turning track is about a mile around, and the city walls form one side of the setting, so spectators can watch from the ramparts. Chester FC, formed in 2010 after the old Chester City club was wound up, plays at the Deva Stadium. A young Ian Rush played for Chester City before he became a Liverpool legend.
Kings, earls and Cestrians
After the Norman Conquest, William I made the Norman nobleman Hugh d'Avranches Earl of Chester in 1071. Known as Hugh Lupus, or Hugh the Wolf, he held a semi-independent border earldom to keep the Welsh in check. The title Earl of Chester has been held by the heir to the throne since the Middle Ages, so the city has a royal tie that goes back centuries. The cathedral began as a Benedictine abbey dedicated to St Werburgh and became a cathedral in 1541 after the Dissolution of the Monasteries. It stands beside a modern bell tower, opened in 1975. Chester's medieval Mystery Plays, performed by the city's trade guilds, were revived in 1951 and still turn up in the city's cultural calendar. People from Chester are Cestrians. Daniel Craig, the actor who played James Bond, was born here in 1968. For a local treat, try Chester pudding, a sharp lemony tart topped with meringue, which is rarely seen outside the region.
Related articles
Roman Britain
Published
Rome ran Britain for almost 400 years, yet the island's most famous Roman road builders left behind a province that was never fully conquered and a capital that was never Rome's idea.