SalisburyGreen lush water meadows near the magnificent cathedral give Salisbury a rural ambience. It is an ancient, prosperous, busy and attractive city, the only city in Wiltshire, and lies on the edge of the 300 square mile chalk plateau that is Salisbury Plain.
Dominated by the incredible cathedral, architecture from every period since the thirteenth century grace the streets. Beautiful medieval buildings that have stood the test of hundreds of years. Chocolate Box half timbered Tudor style evoke thoughts of Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth. Gracious Stuart, Queen Anne and Georgian jumble delightfully with Victorian buildings. It is all there, a walk round the streets of Salisbury is a walk with history. Yet this is a lively city. Plenty of places to eat, drink and shop. Tourism is a major industry and it is catered for. Five rivers and five major roads meet at Salisbury. There are five gates in the old city wall that surrounds the cathedral. The gates are: High Street Gate, St Ann's Gate, the Queen's Gate, and St Nicholas's Gate. One built much later than the city wall is the gate that leads to Bishop Wordsworth School in the Close. The rivers are the Avon, Bourne, Ebbie, Nadder and the Wylye, in reality the Avon and four tributaries. Nowadays these rivers have new directions and feed the beautiful public gardens and the water meadows at Harnham, both such a feature. The city has always been an important crossing and the major roads are the A30, A36, A338, A354, and the A345. There are arguably the A360 and the A3094 as well but not so major. Makes for a lot of traffic, but areas in the centre have been pedestrianised. Accommodation An excellent place to stay perhaps for a short break or perhaps as a touring base to see the delightful county of Wiltshire. A stay in Salisbury just for its own sake is a pleasure in itself. Tourist Information Centre The Tourist Information Centre is in Fish Row which is pedestrianised. From High Street walk along Silver Street, Fish Row starts at the end as Silver Street meets the corner of Minster Street. Salisbury International Arts Festival. is held at the end of May and into June. For details visit The Festival A wonderful, vibrant celebration of the arts. No wonder it was this Festival that recently won the Tourist Event of the Year in the south west.Shopping Pretty well a shopaholic's paradise seven days a week. Specialist shops as well as department stores and shopping centres. Try The Maltings Shopping Centre, The Old George Mall Shopping Centre or Cross Keys, Then there is the pedestrian's only High Street. Browse around and find your own favourite. The Market Place Another great spot. Market Days are Tuesdays and Saturdays and the area gets pretty busy then. Markets have been held here since 1227. Like many other places there were crosses where the various goods could be sold or a trade plied. Only the Poultry Cross remains to this day. Streets would also have had the names of the trade operating there, some still exist. Moves are afoot to rejuvenate the Market Place and Guidhall area. The Cathedral Dominates the city. Beautiful, magnificent, incredible.
By 1320 the spire rose to the heavens. Nowadays at 404 feet it is the tallest surviving pre 1400 spire in the world. With the tower it weighs 6,397 tons. Needless to say weight and height have caused problems and it had to be strengthened. The Library holds the best preserved copy of the Magna Carta and is on display. A copy makes a great memento – Latin or English. The Cathedral has oldest modern working clock which dates from 1386. No face as in those days clocks rang out the hours on a bell. Other claims to fame include the largest cloister and cathedral close in Britain and no ring of bells which is unusual. There are several famous paintings of the cathedral by John Constable as well as Turner. Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum – 65 The Close. Quite a comprehensive and interesting collection. There is a focus on Salisbury, but certainly not exclusively so. Includes an interesting Pitt Rivers Wessex collection. “the father of modern scientific archaeology”. Of real interest if you are a “Time Team” fan! General Pitt Rivers lived nearby in Tollard Royal and created the Larmer Tree Gardens which are open to the public. For a list of the considerable number of interesting events being held here, visit their websiteThe Wardobe – 58 The Close. The Rifles (Berkshire and Wiltshire) Museum – in their words “the story of the Infantry of Berkshire and Wiltshire”. A rather fascinating collection of artefacts to do with these regiments. Well worth a visit. Some material can also be found online – War diaries which have been transcribed by volunteers, Regimental timelines etc. Visit The Wardrobe Family historians – lots of background information. If you are coming from any distance check the website for the latest information regarding opening times etc. The Medieval Hall – West Walk, Cathedral Close A beautiful ancient building. See the exposed beams of that fantastic timber roof. Opening times are on information boards in The Close. Worth a check of the boards to see if your visit to The Close is coinciding with an opening time.They are open to pre booked groups all the year if you wish to make your own arrangements - Medieval Hall Mompesson House – Cathedral Close This elegant National Trust Property makes for a very pleasant visit. An oasis of peace in a busy world. Sunny day – take tea in the garden – very nice. “Sense and Sensibility” was filmed here – not surprisingly. Harnham Water Meadows You will see them alongside the cathedral. An area of beauty within a busy city. A Site of Special Scientific Interest and an Environmentally Sensitive Area. There is a proposed Visitor Centre. As they are water meadows the Town Path can get very muddy and impassable at times! Their website Water Meadows makes for very interesting reading. All about the wildlife of the meadows. See Leroy the new Llama. Salisbury Racecourse Situated at Netherhampton. Take the A3094 – the Netherhampton Road - out of the city. There are buses to the course. For lots more information see Racecourse. Old Sarum
Can be found two miles to the north on Castle Road. Follow the signs on the A345 out of the city. Buses run from the city. It was the site of the earliest settlement and can be traced back 3000 years. Magnificent views were of more use as defence in those days and so it became an Iron Age Hill fort. It remained a fort to Saxon times (in Saxon - burgh) and then the Normans built a castle there for similar reasons. It was also the site of the original cathedral but because of arguments between the castle and the cathedral factions a new cathedral was built in the valley below. Some historical information below. There are plenty of information boards put up by English Heritage giving the history of the site. Great place for a picnic - take your rubbish home. Stonehenge
8 miles north of the city. Take the A345 and follow the signs. Buses run from Salisbury. One of the most famous Neolithic/Bronze Age sites in the world. English Heritage own the site and The National Trust the surrounding land. Now a World Heritage Site. Mystic, massive circles of standing stones which line up with the rising sun on the midsummer solstice. The site started as a circular bank and ditch with burial mounds around 3000 years ago. There are actually also signs of activity getting on for 8000 years ago! The stones themselves were brought to the site, dressed, fashioned and erected in what is possibly a double ring. The blue stones were brought in later. What they were for is still open to conjecture – ritual or religious site the most likely scenario. With so much work it has to have been of major importance. Even allowing for its significance as a burial site. To have lined up with the solstice suggests mathematical skill as well as construction skill, yet these people had no written language. Mind blowing! Access ideas Simple. Train, bus or road. is available locally. Two train lines serve the city from the station in South Western Road. Trains run from Waterloo Station in London to Exeter. Another line runs from Portsmouth to Cardiff, a pleasant cross country run stopping at many delightful places along the way - actually not a bad idea for a short break! National Express run services through Salisbury to and from the bus station in Endless Street, but book in advance particularly in summer, those coaches are popular. Another great idea for an inexpensive short break would be to ride the bright red Wilts & Dorset buses from the bus station in Endless Street to such places as Winchester, Bournemouth, Romsey, Southampton and many more. No advance booking needed and tickets are not too expensive. A timetable can be found online at Wilts & Dorset While you are there check out the Dayrider and Explorer tickets, very useful. Road. With its plentiful water, Salisbury has been a cross roads for centuries. Before the advent of modern transport not only the traveller needed water but so did the horses that carried and pulled them. Traffic these days along these major routes is very heavy, particularly the A36. There are four Park & Ride facilities: Beehive on the A345 to the north of the city. 400 parking places. Bus 501 to the city. Wilton in the west of the city on The Avenue. 420 parking spaces. Bus 502 to the city. Britford to the south along the A338. 486 parking spaces. Bus 503 to the city. London Road for the A30 and the A36, from the north or east. 380 parking spaces, Bus 504 to the city. Look at Park and Ride for the latest information. That very ancient highway, the Great South West Road, from London to Lands End aka the A30, runs as it always has through Salisbury. For its first thirty or so miles the road is known by its modern name of the M3. Responsible for a lot of the traffic in Salisbury is the A36 which connects Southampton and Bath, then on to Bristol via the A4 – thereby connecting two major ports. Through Salisbury it follows the Ring Road. Another through route is the ninety mile long A338 which runs from the centre of Bournemouth to the little village of Besselsleigh just south of Oxford where it meets the A420. A road which terminates, or starts in Salisbury is the A354 which goes to Portland in Dorset. Stonehenge and Old Sarum can be reached via the A345 which runs from Salisbury to Marlborough via Amesbury. For Old Sarum follow the A345 for about two miles and turn right on to Portway. The site is located on Castle Road. For Stonehenge continue along the A345 to the junction of the A303, turn left along the A303 and follow the signs. Coming from overseas? Besides the airports at Heathrow and Gatwick, there are three local airports, Southampton and Bristol International Airports plus the smaller, but rapidly expanding short haul airport at Bournemouth By sea – Cross Channel ferries come into Portsmouth, then by train direct to Salisbury. History The area with its abundant water must always have been an important settlement, meeting and crossing place. Definite signs of habitation can be traced to the Iron Age and the following Bronze Age in the hill fort at Old Sarum about two miles away from the current city. It may well have also been important to the Neolithic people with Stonehenge so close. The incredible Stonehenge built 3000 years ago shows there must have been an organised habitation of Wiltshire aeons before that. The mind boggles as to how they did build such a massive structure! The settlement of Old Sarum and Salisbury's name has changed over time with the people who lived there. Britons called it Kaer Gradawc. To the Romans it was an important and strategic place, their name was Sorviodunum. The Saxons named it Searoburh after they won their battle with the Celts here. In their language burh or burg is Saxon for borough. These burh's were often fortified hill forts either pre exisitng like Sarum or new ones. King Alfred the Great converted or built many of them in his defence of Wessex against the Vikings. Sarum can be an offshoot of Saer/Sar - the 'um' is probably to do with Latin script. Under Saxon rule the place was very important both as a secular and a town with religious foundations. It is thought that King Egbert of Wessex spent a little time at Old Sarum during the early 800's. This is quite possible. Like others before him he would have found the Iron Age hill fort an excellent place the view the surrounding countryside. With the major crossroads it was he would also have been able to strike out to where he needed to be in his campaigns, as did King Alfred after him. A century later King Edgar of Wessex was finding the Danes in the north a little troublesome and he convened a national council at Old Sarum to map out a collective answer to the problem. With the Normans it became Seresberi and from their Doomsday Book it is getting more modern with Salesberie. Like others before them they realised the significance of this important crossroads and it was one of the first places to which William the Conqueror came. The Castle was built at Old Sarum by the Normans around 1069. A Cathedral and Bishop's Palace followed. That castle at Old Sarum must have been seen as a secure place because Eleanor of Aquitane was kept a prisoner there by her husband Henry II for many years. Arguments between the Castle and Cathedral groups caused the Cathedral to be relocated in the valley of The Avon on land belonging to the then current Bishop, Bishop Poore. The new town was planned in a grid pattern and construction started in 1219. Work on the Cathedral began in 1220. That this magnificent cathedral was finished in one generation is a tribute to those brilliantly skilled people who built it. Settlement around the new Cathedral grew. Life in the valley was less stark than the barren hillfort, plenty of water and arable land. There was work to be had with the building of the Cathedral. With the influx of people services and traders followed. In contrast Old Sarum became abandoned. Henry III granted the Bishop of Salisbury in 1226 a Charter to hold an eight day fair in The Market Place. The fair can be relocated to the Cathedral Close. Nowadays it is a three day fun fair. In 1289 the Treaty of Salibsury was signed. An agreement between Robert The Bruce of Scotland and Edward I and of England and others. Margaret, the Maid of Norway, was to be sent to Scotland the following year and her future marriage was not to be decided until then. Unfortunately Margaret died on the way to Scotland. By the following century the city wall had been built and it was already the biggest town of the county. It never was the capital of Wiltshire. Wilton was the original capital and that town gave the name of Wiltshire to the county. Trowbridge is the current capital. At the end of 1483 Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham (one of the suspects in the plot to murder the Princes in the Tower) was beheaded in The Market Place after a failed rebellion against Richard III. Debenhams in Blue Boar Row occupies the very spot and Henry's beheaded ghost is said to haunt the shop. The blood stains from his severed head manifest themselves from time to time! 1688 - some of James II's army officers deserted at Salisbury and he fled to France. (William and Mary succeeded to the throne). The city has remained an important centre to this day. The Army and Salisbury Plain have been synonymous for some time so that area is still important in the defence of the realm. Return to Wiltshire Return to Home |
