Bristol
 Cathedrals |  Castles |
Originally known as Bricgstow (place of the bridge), a permanent settlement on the site of present day Bristol established itself during the Anglo-Saxon period. The settlement quickly grew in numbers, especially around its harbour on the River Avon, the source of much of the city's future wealth and fame. After the Norman Conquest, Bristol thrived and became one of the great ports and trading centres in Britain.
The modest Saxon complex of Bricgstow, with its fort and small port, expanded rapidly and a mint opened under the reign of King Canute the Dane (1017-35). Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman coins minted in Bristol have been found as far away as Scandinavia, probably Danegeld exacted from England. Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, chief architect of the Domesday Book, instigated the building of the motte and bailey in the late 11 th century, while Robert, Earl of Gloucester added the enormous keep - Bristol Castle grew to be twice the size of Caernarvon and was the residence of Queen Matilda.
Despite Bristol sustaining heavy bomb damage through the Second World War, many outstanding buildings of historical note remain to us; standing side by side with their modern counterparts are ancient churches, old docks, almshouses and inns, the world's first suspension bridge at Clifton, all steeped in centuries of history.
Not least of these is Bristol Cathedral, founded in 1140 by Robert Fitzharding, Provost of Bristol, as an Augustinian monastery, it became a cathedral in 1542. The naïve, first planned by Abbot Newland (1481-1515) to replace the original Norman one, abandoned in 1539 after the Dissolution, and finally completed in 1868 is both spacious and imposing. After completion of the new naïve, the High Altar and carved stone reredos of the choir were also rebuilt in 1899. Whereas the naïve vault-ribs join a central ridge, those of the choir form kiteshaped compartments, foliated and cusped; known as lierne-vaulting, it is both distinctive and beautiful and was the work of Abbot Knowle in the 14 th century.
Again, the aisles reveal some remarkable fan-vaulting and the capitals display ornate foliage. In the south transept is a sculptured coffin lid, possibly Saxon, one of the oldest relics in the cathedral; it depicts the Harrowing of Hell by Christ. The carving was discovered beneath the floor of the Norman chapter house, considered the finest in England. The room has a variety of Norman decoration, zigzag mouldings, rich capitals, arcaded recesses used as seats by the monks, pillared arcades and lattice moulding - the original east wall and window were destroyed during the 1831 Bristol riots. Placed on the altar in the Eastern Lady Chapel are some candlesticks, donated in 1712 as thanksgiving gifts from the privateers who rescued Alexander Selkirk from a desert island in 1709 - the man on whom Daniel Defoe based the character of Robinson Crusoe. The archway of the Abbey Gateway contains some remarkably intricate carving; four niches on the south side of the 16 th century upper storey contain life-size figures in Portland Stone.
Bristol is endowed with a range of churches and chapels of historical significance, but according to Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603) that of St Mary Redcliffe is the "fairest, goodliest and mot famous parish church in England". This triumph of high Gothicism began as the Norman shrine of Our Lady of Redcliffe and developed through succeeding periods until the end of the 14 th century when the main body was complete. The inner north porch, dated about 1200, is a fine piece of Early English craftsmanship with pillars of black Purbeck marble. The naïve is famous for its all-stone roof, rebuilt after the original spire was lopped off by a lightning strike that toppled it onto the roof. The ribbed vaulting is overlaid with gold and the baptistery houses an octagonal medieval font built into the pillar. The spire toppled in the 15 th century was rebuilt in 1872; the graceful replacement soaring 292ft above St Mary's has become a famous landmark on the Bristol skyline. Located in the middle of the main shopping centre is Quakers' Friars, wherein is the oldest Methodist chapel in the world built in 1739. Here, John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement preached from the beautiful double-decker pulpit to his congregation sitting in the mahogany-topped box pews. Other churches of note are Christchurch, late 18 th century, much admired for its elegant Georgian interior, and the wooden figures that strike bells on the quarter hour, the quarterjacks. The 14 th century St John the Baptist, built into the wall of the city's last medieval gate through which Queen Elizabeth rode on a white horse when visiting the city in 1574, and the ruined Temple Church, built in Perpendicular style on the site of a 12 th century Knights Templar church.
At the end of the Civil War of 1642-9, the victorious Parliamentarians razed the stronghold to the ground. Not for the last time Bristol, during the Norman period, was involved in slave trading, shipping young girls and boys to the Viking port of Dublin in exchange for goods and money. By 1373 Bristol had been made a county, with its first acting sheriff or officer of the Crown; city status was not conferred until the middle of the 16 th century. The medieval town was enclosed by walls pierced by four main entrance gates, of which only St John's remains, adorned with the sculptures of the Gaulish chiefs Brennus and Belinus, fabled founders of Bristol in 390BC.
The 15 th century ushered in a period of sustained growth as merchants found outlets in Ireland, France, Holland and Spain - cloth being the major export, wine the favoured import. John Cabot of Venice settled in Bristol in 1495 and became the most renowned of Bristol's merchants. He set sail in his tiny ship Matthew on 14 th June 1497 and landed in North America, near present day Newfoundland. His achievement was commemorated in the year of Victoria's Diamond Jubilee by the construction of the 150ft Cabot Tower, a Tudor Gothic folly atop Brandon Hill. In 1552 the Society of Merchant Venturers was founded, and Bristol's position as a major port was reinforced; exporting wool and leather and importing wines, tobacco and chocolate. Medieval Bristol was a place of great fairs. The most famous, on the festival of St James, took place at the Horsefair, now a central part of Broadmead Shopping centre.
From the 17 th century, until its abolition in the 19 th century, Bristol also greatly prospered from the more dubious trade in slaves. Increased consumption of imported goods from the New World and the West Indies required increased productivity; the demand for extra labour grew at an alarming rate and England found the answer in African slaves. This plentiful source of cheap labour, bought with trinkets, firearms and hardware, were then shipped to the West Indies, where they were worked until they expired. In 1725, some 16,550 slaves were transported to plantations by Bristol slave ships called ‘Blackbirds'; perhaps only half that number survived the hardships of the voyage.
Bristol Castle
In the old quarter of the city, in Corn Street, stands the Exchange (1741), the only work in Bristol by John Wood the Palladian genius of Bath. Flanking the Corn Exchange are four flat-topped brass tables or ‘nails', upon which merchants struck their deals in the 16 th century - hence "to pay on the nail". The Foster's Almshouses are a particularly attractive cluster of Victorian buildings, built in 1861 in ornate Burgundian-Gothic style; gables, porches, crocketed finials and spired turrets present a busy but pleasing picture. The Chapel of the Three Kings of Cologne, adjoining the almshouses, was founded in the 16 th century, incorporating three traceried niches for the statues of the three wise men. In Broad Street is the bright Art Nouveau façade of Edward Evarard's Printing House (1901), a jaunty dazzle of ceramic colour depicting the union of print, literature and poetry.
King Street, laid out in 1663, is still cobbled and lined with many historic buildings, giving us a glimpse of centuries past. Here is the Theatre Royal, the oldest working theatre in Britain, opened in 1766 and home to the Bristol Old Vic. Older still is its neighbour, the Llandoger Trow, built in 1664. This ancient inn, once the watering hole of pirates (the notorious Blackbeard was a Bristolian), is supposed to have been the inspiration for the ‘Admiral Benbow' in Robert Louis Stevenson's ‘Treasure Island'. The nearby Hole in the Wall, an 18 th century tavern, is the alleged model for the ‘Spyglass Inn' found in the same book. Another antique thoroughfare is the Christmas Steps, cut in 1699 to improve the steep route down to the bank of the River Frome; at the bottom of these Dickensian Steps, their old gas lamps still intact, is the medieval arch of St Bartholomew's 13 th century hospital.
An idea of how busy the bustling quays of the city docks were in the 18 th century, with legitimate trading fare, as barrels of rum and bales of tobacco were constantly being unloaded and taken away on horse-drawn sledges, comes from the poet Alexander Pope. Intrigued by the animated scene witnessed on the docks, Pope described in a letter dated 1739 the hundreds of ships "their masts as thick as they can stand by one another" berthed side by side at every quay; a tortuous web of masts and rigging amid the tight-packed grubby dwellings and narrow dark streets.
As the Regency period drew to a close the early 19 th century was marked by rioting and reform, franchise being the issue of the day. The Bristol Riots of 1831 were violent, sustained and bloody as the mob resisted troops sent in to quell them. Intoxicated by the moment and drunk on cheap liquor, the rioters conformed to universal mob behaviour, totally out of control they fired the gaols, toll-houses, public buildings and various establishments of the wealthy. About 600 people died before peace was restored and much damage was sustained by the city.
