History of York
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The History of York starts when the city of York was founded in 71 by the Romans. Every year, thousands of tourists flock to see the surviving medieval buildings, interspersed with Roman and Viking remains and Georgian architecture. The City Council has 34 Conservation Areas, 2,084 Listed buildings and 22 Scheduled Ancient Monuments in its care.
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[edit] Etymology of 'York'
The place where the city now is was originally named by the Celts as Eborakon, which may mean "place of yew trees". The name of the Yew is Efrawg in Brythonic, Efwr in Welsh, Iobhar in Irish Gaelic, Iorc in Scottish Gaelic, Evor in Breton . The Gaulic equivalent Eburos is the basis for toponyms as far as Eburobrittium (Évora) among the Lusitani, or Ebura in Hispania Baetica, for the Celtiberians gens of the Eburanci or peoples like the Eburones or Eburovices in Gaul [1]. As York was a town in Roman times, its Celtic name is recorded in Roman sources, as Eboracum and Eburacum, with the ending -acum Latinized instead of -acon in celtic.
After 400, Anglo-Saxons took over the area and adapted the name by folk etymology to Old English Eoforwīc, which means "wild-boar town". The Proto-Germanic form of Old English eofor is *eburaz. York became Northumbria's centre of power later on. The Vikings, who took over the area later, in turn adapted the name by folk etymology to Norse Jórvík meaning "horse bay", like a town in Bohuslän at the time. This was reduced to York in the centuries after the Norman Conquest.
[edit] Roman York
It was almost thirty years after the Roman conquest of Britain that the Ninth Legion marched north of the Humber. They constructed a military fortress at York in 71 that was later rebuilt in stone. It was the major military base in the north of Britain and, later, the capital of Britannia Inferior and then Britannia Secunda. The Emperor Hadrian visited in 122 and replaced the garrison with the Sixth Legion.
New trading opportunities led local people to create a permanent civilian settlement at Eboracum which was later made a colonia. Emperors Septimius Severus and Constantius I both made the fort their campaigning base in 211 and 306 respectively and both died there. The latter’s son Constantine was proclaimed his successor by the troops based in the fortress.
[edit] Post-Roman, Anglo-Saxon and Viking York
- For Viking York, see Jórvík.
Following the Roman withdrawal from Britain in 410, York became the capital of the British kingdom of Ebrauc in around 470. The Anglians, coming from northern Germany and the jutes from southern Denmark, apparently first appeared in the vicinity in the late 5th or early 6th century, and their cemeteries have been excavated close to York on The Mount and at Heworth. There are, however, few objects from inside the city, and whether York was settled at all at this period remains unclear.
After the later Saxon settlement of the North of England, Anglian York was first capital of Deira and then of the united kingdom of Deira and Bernicia, later know as Northumbria.
Certainly by the early 7th century, York was an important royal centre for the Northumbrian kings, for it was here that Paulinus of York (later St Paulinus) came to set up his wooden church, the precursor of York Minster, and it was here that King Edwin of Northumbria was baptised. The first Minster is believed to have been built in 627, although the location of the early Minster is a matter of dispute.
Throughout the succeeding centuries, York remained an important royal and ecclesiastical centre, the seat of a bishop, and later, from 735, of an archbishop. Very little about Anglican York is known and few documents survive. It is known that the building and rebuilding of the Minster was carried out, and of the construction of great church of the Alma Sophia (Holy Wisdom), the location of which still remains a mystery.
York became a centre of learning under Northumbrian rule , with the establishment of the library and of the Minster school. Alcuin, later adviser to Charlemagne, was its most distinguished pupil and then master.
Of this great royal and ecclesiastical centre, little is yet known archaeologically. Excavations on the Roman fortress walls have shown that they may have survived more or less intact for much of their circuit, and the Anglian Tower, a small square tower built to fill a gap in the Roman way may be a repair of the Anglian period. The survival of the walls and gates will have meant that the Roman street pattern survived, at least in part, inside the fortress. Certainly excavations beneath York Minster have shown that the great hall of the Roman headquarters building still stood and was used up until the 9th century.
A large army of Danish Vikings, called the "Great Heathen Army" captured York in 866, and, in 876, the Vikings settled permanently in parts of the Yorkshire countryside. Viking kings ruled this area, known to historians as "The Viking Kingdom of Jorvik", for almost a century. In 954 the last Viking king, Eric Bloodaxe, was expelled and his kingdom was incorporated in the newly consolidated Anglo-Saxon state. Another renowned scholar of this era was Wulfstan II, Archbishop of York.
[edit] Medieval York
Following the Norman Conquest of 1066, York was substantially damaged by the punitive harrying of the north (1069) launched by William the Conqueror in response to regional revolt. Two castles were erected in the city on either side of the River Ouse. In time York became an important urban centre as the administrative centre of the county of Yorkshire, as the seat of an archbishop, and at times in the later 13th and 14th century as an alternative seat of royal government. It was an important trading centre. Several religious houses were founded following the Conquest, including St Mary's Abbey and Holy Trinity Priory. The city as a possession of the crown also came to house a substantial Jewish community under the protection of the sheriff.
On March 16, 1190, a mob of townsfolk forced the Jews in York to flee into Clifford's Tower, which was under the control of the sheriff. The castle was set on fire and the Jews were massacred. It is likely that various local magnates who were indebted to the Jews helped instigate this massacre or, at least, did nothing to prevent it. It came during a time of widespread attacks against Jews in Britain. Commemoration of the York massacre passed into the Jewish liturgy and, until 1990, Orthodox Judaism forbade Jews from living within the city.
York prospered during much of the later medieval era and this is reflected in the built environment. Twenty medieval parish churches survive in whole or in part, though only eight of these are regularly used for worship. The medieval city walls, with their entrance gates, known as bars, encompassed virtually the entire city and survive to this day. The city was also designated as a county corporate, giving it effective county status.
The later years of the 14th and the earlier years of the 15th centuries were characterised by particular prosperity. It is in this period that the York Mystery Plays, a regular cycle of religious pageants (or plays) associated with the Corpus Christi cycle and performed by the various craft guilds grew up. Among the more important personages associated with this period was Nicholas Blackburn senior, Lord Mayor in 1412 and a leading merchant. He is depicted in glass in the (now) east window of All Saints' Church in North Street. The period from the later 15th century seems to have witnessed economic contraction and a dwindling in York's regional importance. The construction of the city's new Guildhall around the middle of the century can be seen as an attempt to project civic confidence in the face of growing uncertainty.
Dating from the later medieval era, and now a popular tourist attraction, is the Shambles, a street of timber-framed shops originally occupied by butchers. Some retain the outdoor shelves and the hooks on which meat was displayed. They have overhanging upper floors and are now largely souvenir shops.
[edit] Early modern York
Few buildings of significance were put up in the century after the completion of the Minster in 1472, the exceptions being the completion of the King's Manor (which from 1537 to 1641 housed the Council of the North) and the rebuilding of the church of St. Michael le Belfrey, where Guy Fawkes was baptised in 1570. In 1547, fifteen parish churches were closed, reducing their number from forty to twenty-five - a reflection of the decline in the city's population.
[edit] 17th century York
Following his break with Parliament, King Charles I established his Court in York in 1642 for six months. Subsequently, during the English Civil War, the city was regarded as a Royalist stronghold and was besieged and eventually captured by Parliamentary forces under Lord Fairfax in 1644. After the war, York slowly regained its former pre-eminence in the North, and, by 1660, was the third-largest city in England after London and Norwich.
[edit] 18th century York
York elected two members to the Unreformed House of Commons.
On 22 March 1739, the highwayman Dick Turpin was convicted at the York Grand Jury House of horse-stealing, and was hanged at the Knavesmire on 7 April 1739. Turpin is buried in the churchyard of St George's Church, where his tombstone also shows his alias, John Palmer.
