County in England
West Sussex
West Sussex gave the world a Roman palace found by a workman's trench, a cathedral with its own separate bell tower, and the Bognor Birdman.
Key information
- County
- West Sussex
- Nation
- England
- Population
- about 882,000 (2021 Census)
- Area
- about 1,990 square kilometres
- Known for
- Goodwood, Arundel Castle, Chichester Cathedral, Gatwick Airport, the South Downs, the Bognor Birdman
- What locals are called
- Sussex folk, or simply Sussex people
- Famous people
- Percy Bysshe Shelley, Richard Cobden, Hilaire Belloc, Patrick Moore
About West Sussex
The palace a workman's trench uncovered
In 1960 a workman digging a water-pipe trench near Fishbourne hit something that turned out to be Roman mosaic floor. What lay underneath was the largest known Roman residential building in Britain, a palace complex that has been lying quietly beneath fields and gardens for nearly two thousand years. It is a fitting start for a county that keeps its past close to the surface. Not far away, Bignor Roman Villa has its own mosaics, and the Roman road of Stane Street still runs off towards the Downs from Chichester, the old Roman town of Noviomagus. Chichester itself is still laid out on the Roman cross of four streets, meeting at the 16th-century Chichester Cross.
A cathedral that stands apart from its bell tower
Chichester Cathedral has a trick up its sleeve: its medieval bell tower stands separate from the main building. That is a rarity among English cathedrals. Its spire is also famous for being visible from the sea, which is why sailors in Chichester Harbour have used it as a landmark. The city has a modern landmark too. Chichester Festival Theatre opened in 1962 with Laurence Olivier as its first artistic director, and it helped put a small cathedral city on the national theatre map. Down the road at Bosham, the church appears in the Bayeux Tapestry, and the village tells the tale of King Canute and the tide.
Castles, dukes and a very fast hill
Arundel Castle has been the seat of the Dukes of Norfolk for centuries, rising above the River Arun like something from a storybook, and its cathedral-sized neighbour, Arundel Cathedral, adds to the skyline. The castle also has its own cricket ground, where touring sides have played. Then there is Goodwood, the estate of the Dukes of Richmond. Racing at Glorious Goodwood each summer is a social institution, while the Festival of Speed, launched in 1993, sends everything from vintage racers to modern supercars up the driveway of Goodwood House. The motor circuit opened in 1948 on the site of RAF Westhampnett, and the Goodwood Revival, which began in 1998, asks the crowd to dress in period clothing. Petworth House, filled with paintings, was a favourite haunt of J. M. W. Turner.
Where Jack Worthing got his name
Oscar Wilde wrote The Importance of Being Earnest in Worthing in the summer of 1894, and the hero, Jack Worthing, took his surname from the seaside town. Worthing still has its pier and a seafront with plenty of Victorian and Edwardian bones. Bognor Regis owes its "Regis" to George V, who convalesced there in 1929. The town has become famous for the Bognor Birdman, a contest in which people in homemade flying machines launch off the end of the pier and try to fly. It began in Selsey in 1971 and moved to Bognor a few years later. Most contestants end up in the sea, to the delight of the crowds. Inland, Crawley was designated as a new town in 1947, and sits beside Gatwick Airport, one of the busiest airports in the UK. In 2011 Crawley Town reached the fifth round of the FA Cup, and played Manchester United at Old Trafford.
Poets, plantsmen and Downs
Percy Bysshe Shelley was born in 1792 at Field Place near Horsham, and the poet's roots are all over the Horsham area. Richard Cobden, the Victorian campaigner against the Corn Laws, was born at Dunford near Midhurst, and Hilaire Belloc, who loved the Downs, lived at Shipley. Astronomer Patrick Moore lived for decades in Selsey. Most of the county's northern and central parts are made up of the Weald and the South Downs. Black Down, at 280 metres, is the highest point in West Sussex. The Weald and Downland Living Museum at Singleton has rescued historic buildings and rebuilt them, while Wakehurst, Kew's country garden near Ardingly, houses the Millennium Seed Bank, which stores seeds from plants around the world. The county motto is the stubborn Sussex one: "We wunt be druv."
Pond pudding and English sparkling wine
The traditional Sussex pond pudding is a suet crust that hides a whole lemon and a lot of butter and sugar, which melts into a sticky sauce when the pudding is cut open. The chalk of the Downs is now just as famous for fizz. Nyetimber near West Chiltington has been making English sparkling wine since the early 1990s, and it is one of the names that persuaded the world to take English sparkling wine seriously. The sunny coastal plain around Chichester is also a major source of glasshouse-grown tomatoes and salad crops for the nation.