Wroxeter
Encyclopedia
Wroxeter is a village in Shropshire
Shropshire
Shropshire is a county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. It borders Wales to the west...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. It forms part of the civil parish of Wroxeter and Uppington
Wroxeter and Uppington
Wroxeter and Uppington is a civil parish in the English county of Shropshire. It lies mainly between the River Severn and the old A5 and stretches from Atcham to The Wrekin.The main villages are Wroxeter and Uppington...

 and is located in the Severn Valley
River Severn
The River Severn is the longest river in Great Britain, at about , but the second longest on the British Isles, behind the River Shannon. It rises at an altitude of on Plynlimon, Ceredigion near Llanidloes, Powys, in the Cambrian Mountains of mid Wales...

 about 5 miles (8 km) south-east of Shrewsbury
Shrewsbury
Shrewsbury is the county town of Shropshire, in the West Midlands region of England. Lying on the River Severn, it is a civil parish home to some 70,000 inhabitants, and is the primary settlement and headquarters of Shropshire Council...

.

History

Wroxeter is on the site of the Roman
Roman Britain
Roman Britain was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire from AD 43 until ca. AD 410.The Romans referred to the imperial province as Britannia, which eventually comprised all of the island of Great Britain south of the fluid frontier with Caledonia...

 city of Viroconium Cornoviorum, which was the fourth largest civitas
Civitas
In the history of Rome, the Latin term civitas , according to Cicero in the time of the late Roman Republic, was the social body of the cives, or citizens, united by law . It is the law that binds them together, giving them responsibilities on the one hand and rights of citizenship on the other...

capital in Roman Britain
Roman Britain
Roman Britain was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire from AD 43 until ca. AD 410.The Romans referred to the imperial province as Britannia, which eventually comprised all of the island of Great Britain south of the fluid frontier with Caledonia...

. In Old Welsh
Old Welsh language
Old Welsh is the label attached to the Welsh language from about 800 AD until the early 12th century when it developed into Middle Welsh. The preceding period, from the time Welsh became distinct from the British language around 550, has been called "Primitive Welsh".Many poems and some prose...

 it was called Caer Guricon and may have served as the early post-Roman
Sub-Roman Britain
Sub-Roman Britain is a term derived from an archaeological label for the material culture of Britain in Late Antiquity: the term "Sub-Roman" was invented to describe the potsherds in sites of the 5th century and the 6th century, initially with an implication of decay of locally-made wares from a...

 capital of the kingdom of Powys. Mercian encroachment forced the Welsh to move to Mathrafal
Mathrafal
Mathrafal near Welshpool, in Powys, Mid Wales, was the seat of the Kings and Princes of Powys probably from the 9th century until its destruction in 1212 by Llywelyn ap Iorwerth of Gwynedd.- Location :...

 castle sometime before AD 717. The main section of the Watling Street
Watling Street
Watling Street is the name given to an ancient trackway in England and Wales that was first used by the Britons mainly between the modern cities of Canterbury and St Albans. The Romans later paved the route, part of which is identified on the Antonine Itinerary as Iter III: "Item a Londinio ad...

 Roman road
Roman road
The Roman roads were a vital part of the development of the Roman state, from about 500 BC through the expansion during the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire. Roman roads enabled the Romans to move armies and trade goods and to communicate. The Roman road system spanned more than 400,000 km...

 runs across England between Dubris
Dubris
Dubris or Portus Dubris was a town in Roman Britain. It is now Dover, Kent, England.As the closest point to continental Europe and the site of the estuary of the Dour, the site chosen for Dover was ideal for a cross-channel port...

(Roman Dover
Dover
Dover is a town and major ferry port in the home county of Kent, in South East England. It faces France across the narrowest part of the English Channel, and lies south-east of Canterbury; east of Kent's administrative capital Maidstone; and north-east along the coastline from Dungeness and Hastings...

) and Wroxeter.
Pengwern
Pengwern
Pengwern was a Brythonic settlement of sub-Roman Britain situated in what is now the English county of Shropshire, adjoining the modern Welsh border. It is generally regarded as being the early seat of the kings of Powys before its establishment at Mathrafal, further west, but the theory that it...

 and Powys
Powys
Powys is a local-government county and preserved county in Wales.-Geography:Powys covers the historic counties of Montgomeryshire and Radnorshire, most of Brecknockshire , and a small part of Denbighshire — an area of 5,179 km², making it the largest county in Wales by land area.It is...

 may have been divisions of the pre-Roman
British Iron Age
The British Iron Age is a conventional name used in the archaeology of Great Britain, referring to the prehistoric and protohistoric phases of the Iron-Age culture of the main island and the smaller islands, typically excluding prehistoric Ireland, and which had an independent Iron Age culture of...

 Cornovii
Cornovii
The Cornovii were a Celtic people of Iron Age and Roman Britain, who lived principally in the modern English counties of Cheshire, Shropshire, north Staffordshire, north Herefordshire and eastern parts of the Welsh county of Powys. Their capital in pre-Roman times was probably a hill fort on The...

tribal federation whose civitas or administrative centre was Viroconium Cornoviorum (now Wroxeter). The minor Magonsæte sub-kingdom also emerged in the area in the interlude between Powys and Mercian rule. Some substantial standing ruins from Viroconium are just outside the village, where there is also a small museum. The Roman city was rediscovered in 1859 when workmen began excavating the baths
Thermae
In ancient Rome, thermae and balnea were facilities for bathing...

 complex. A replica Roman villa was constructed in 2010 for a Channel 4 television program called Rome Wasn't Built in a Day and was opened to the public on 19 February 2011.

Parish church

At the centre of Wroxeter village is Saint Andrew's parish church
St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter
St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter, is a redundant Church of England parish church in the village of Wroxeter, Shropshire, England . It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building, and is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust...

, some of which is built from re-used Roman masonry. The oldest visible section of the church is the Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxon architecture
Anglo-Saxon architecture was a period in the history of architecture in England, and parts of Wales, from the mid-5th century until the Norman Conquest of 1066. Anglo-Saxon secular buildings in Britain were generally simple, constructed mainly using timber with thatch for roofing...

 part of the north wall which is built of Roman monumental stone blocks. The chancel and the lower part of the tower are Norman
Norman architecture
About|Romanesque architecture, primarily English|other buildings in Normandy|Architecture of Normandy.File:Durham Cathedral. Nave by James Valentine c.1890.jpg|thumb|200px|The nave of Durham Cathedral demonstrates the characteristic round arched style, though use of shallow pointed arches above the...

. The gatepiers to the churchyard are a pair of Roman columns and the font
Baptismal font
A baptismal font is an article of church furniture or a fixture used for the baptism of children and adults.-Aspersion and affusion fonts:...

 in the church was made by hollowing out the capital of a Roman column. Later additions to the church incorporate remains of an Anglo-Saxon preaching cross and carvings salvaged from nearby Haughmond Abbey
Haughmond Abbey
Haughmond Abbey at Haughmond Hill in Shropshire, otherwise known as the Abbey of Saint John the Evangelist, was founded in about 1100 AD. A statue of St John with his emblem can be found carved into the arches of the chapter house. His image also appeared on the Abbey's great seal.-History:The...

 following the Dissolution
Dissolution of the Monasteries
The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, priories, convents and friaries in England, Wales and Ireland; appropriated their...

.

St. Andrew's was declared redundant
Redundant church
A redundant church is a church building that is no longer required for regular public worship. The phrase is particularly used to refer to former Anglican buildings in the United Kingdom, but may refer to any disused church building around the world...

 in 1980 and is now managed by The Churches Conservation Trust
Churches Conservation Trust
The Churches Conservation Trust, which was initially known as the Redundant Churches Fund, is a charity whose purpose is to protect historic churches at risk, those that have been made redundant by the Church of England. The Trust was established by the Pastoral Measure of 1968...

. St. Andrew's parish is now united with that of St. Mary, Eaton Constantine
Eaton Constantine
Eaton Constantine is a small village in the English county of Shropshire. It is located just off the B4380 road, between Atcham and Buildwas, near The Wrekin hill.The theologian Richard Baxter lived here in his boyhood...

.

Literary reference

A.E. Housman visited the site and was impressed enough to write of "when Uricon the city stood", the poem ending "Today the Roman and his trouble Are ashes under Uricon."

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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