Norwich
Encyclopedia
Norwich is a city
in England
. It is the regional administrative centre and county town
of Norfolk
. During the 11th century, Norwich was the largest city in England
after London, and one of the most important places in the kingdom. Until the Industrial Revolution
, Norwich as the capital of England's most populous and prosperous county, vied with Bristol
as England's second city
.
The urban area of Norwich has a population of 259,100. This area extends beyond the city boundary, with extensive suburban areas on the western, northern and eastern sides, including Costessey
, Hellesdon
, Old Catton
, Sprowston
and Thorpe St Andrew
. The parliamentary seats cross over into adjacent local government districts. 135,800 (2008 est.) people live in the City of Norwich and the population of the Norwich Travel to Work Area (i.e. the area of Norwich in which most people both live and work) is 367,035 (the 1991 figure was 351,340). Norwich is the fourth most densely populated local government district within the East of England
with 3,480 people per square kilometre (8,993 per square mile).
had their regional capital at Venta Icenorum
on the River Tas
, about 5 miles (8 km) to the south of Norwich next to modern-day Caistor St Edmund, which fell into disuse around 450 AD. The Anglo-Saxons
settled on the site of the modern city from around the 5th – 7th centuries founding the towns of Northwic (from which Norwich gets its name), Westwic (at Norwich-over-the-Water) and the secondary settlement at Thorpe.
in 1004 AD when it was raided and burnt by Swein Forkbeard
the Viking
. Mercia
n coins and shards of pottery from the Rhineland
dating to the 8th century suggest that long distance trade was happening long before this. Between 924–939 AD Norwich became fully established as a town because it had its own mint. The word Norvic appears on coins across Europe minted during this period, in the reign of King Athelstan. The Vikings were a strong cultural influence in Norwich for 40–50 years at the end of the 9th century, setting up an Anglo
-Scandinavian district towards the north end of present day King Street.
At the time of the Norman Conquest the city was one of the largest in England. The Domesday Book
states that it had approximately twenty five churches and a population of between five and ten thousand. It also records the site of an Anglo-Saxon church in Tombland, the site of the Saxon market place and the later Norman cathedral. Norwich continued to be a major centre for trade, the River Wensum
being a convenient export route to the River Yare
and Great Yarmouth
, which served as the port for Norwich. Quern stones, and other artefacts from Scandinavia and the Rhineland have been found during excavations in Norwich city centre which date from the 11th century onwards.
Norwich Castle
was founded soon after the Norman Conquest. The Domesday Book
records that 98 Saxon homes were demolished to make way for the castle. The Normans
established a new focus of settlement around the Castle and the area to the west of it: this became known as the "New" or "French" borough, centred on the Normans' own market place which survives to the present day as Norwich Market.
In 1096, Herbert de Losinga
, the Bishop of Thetford, began construction of Norwich Cathedral
. The chief building material for the Cathedral was limestone, imported from Caen in Normandy. To transport the building stone to the cathedral site, a canal was cut from the river (from the site of present-day Pulls Ferry), all the way up to the east wall. Herbert de Losinga then moved his See
there to what became the cathedral church for the Diocese of Norwich
. The bishop of Norwich still signs himself Norvic.
Norwich received a royal charter from Henry II
in 1158, and another one from Richard the Lionheart
in 1194. Following a riot in the city in 1274, Norwich has the distinction of being the only English city to be excommunicated by the Pope.
) was found dead with stab wounds. This was the first incidence of blood libel
against Jews in England. The story was turned into a cult, William acquiring the status of martyr and subsequently being canonised
. The cult of St William attracted large numbers of pilgrims, bringing wealth to the local church. On 6 February 1190, all the Jews of Norwich were massacred except for a few who found refuge in the castle.
At the site of a mediæval well, the bones of 17 individuals, including 11 children, were found in 2004 by workers preparing the ground for construction of a Norwich shopping centre. The remains were determined by forensic scientists to most probably be the remains of Jews murdered in the 12th century, and a DNA
expert determined that the victims were all related, most probably coming from one Ashkenazi Jewish
family. The study of these remains was featured in an episode of the BBC television
documentary series History Cold Case.
The engine of trade was wool
from Norfolk's sheepwalks. Wool made England rich, and the staple port
of Norwich "in her state doth stand With towns of high'st regard the fourth of all the land", as Michael Drayton
noted in Poly-Olbion
(1612). The wealth generated by the wool trade throughout the Middle Ages
financed the construction of many fine churches; consequently, Norwich still has more medieval churches than any other city in Western Europe north of the Alps
. Throughout this period Norwich established wide-ranging trading links with other parts of Europe, its markets stretching from Scandinavia
to Spain and the city housing a Hanseatic
warehouse. To organise and control its export to the Low Countries
, Great Yarmouth
, as the port for Norwich, was designated one of the staple ports under terms of the 1353 Statute of the Staple
.
By the middle of the 14th century the city walls
, about two and a half miles (4 km) long, had been completed. These, along with the river, enclosed a larger area than that of the City of London
. However, when the city walls were constructed it was made illegal to build outside them, inhibiting expansion of the city.
Around this time, the city was made a county corporate
and became capital of one of the most densely populated and prosperous counties of England.
The year 1549 saw an unprecedented urban rebellion, which unlike popular challenges elsewhere in the Tudor period, appears to have been Protestant in nature. For several weeks Kett's rebels took control of industrial Norwich in support of cloth workers suffering the hunger associated with a deep trade recession. Unusually in England it divided a city and appears to have linked Protestantism with the plight of the urban poor. In the case of Norwich this process was underscored by the arrival of Dutch and Flemish 'Strangers
' fleeing Catholic persecution and eventually numbering as many as one third of the city's population. Perhaps in response to Kett, Norwich became the first provincial city to initiate compulsory payments for a civic scheme of poor relief, which Pound claims led to its wider introduction, forming the basis of the later Elizabethan Poor Law of 1597–8.
The great 'Stranger' immigration of 1567 brought a substantial Flemish
and Walloon
community of Protestant weavers to Norwich, where they are said to have been made welcome. Norwich has traditionally been the home of various dissident minorities, notably the French Huguenot
and the Belgian Walloon
communities in the 16th and 17th centuries. The merchant's house—now a museum—which was their earliest base in the city is still known as 'Strangers' Hall'. It seems that the Strangers were integrated into the local community without a great deal of animosity, at least among the business fraternity who had the most to gain from their skills. The arrival of the Strangers in Norwich bolstered trade with mainland Europe, fostering a movement toward religious reform and radical politics in the city.
The Norwich Canary
was first introduced into England by Flemish refugees fleeing from Spanish persecution in the 16th century. They brought with them not only advanced techniques in textile working but also their pet canaries, which they began to breed locally, the little yellow bird eventually to become, in the 20th century, the city's most beloved mascot. The canary is the emblem of the city's football club, Norwich City F.C.
, nicknamed "The Canaries".
Printing was introduced to the city by Anthony de Solempne, one of the 'Strangers' in 1567 but did not become established and had died out by about 1572.
At the cost of some discomfort to the Mayor, a Royalist, and the bishop, Joseph Hall, a moderate, was targeted because of his position as bishop.
Distinguishing Norwich in the period following the Restoration of 1660 and throughout the ensuing century was that it was the golden age of its cloth industry, comparable only to those of the West Country and Yorkshire. But unlike other cloth-manufacturing regions, Norwich weaving brought greater urbanisation; being substantially concentrated in the surrounds of the city itself, creating an urban society, with features such as leisure time, alehouses, and other public fora which provided opportunities for debate and argument.
Writing of the early-18th century Pound describes the city's rich cultural life, the winter-theatre season, the festivities accompanying the summer assizes, and other popular entertainments. Norwich was the wealthiest town in England with a sophisticated poor-relief system, and a large influx of foreign refugees. Despite having suffered severe episodes of plague, the city had a population of almost 30,000. Whilst this made Norwich unique in England it placed her in the company of about fifty cities in Europe. In some, like Lyon or Dresden, this was, as in the case of Norwich, linked to an important proto-industry, such as textiles or china pottery; in some, such as Vienna, Madrid or Dublin,to the city's status as an administrative capital; in others such as Antwerp, Marseilles or Cologne to its positioning on an important trade route of sea or river.
However Norwich of the late-17th century was as ever riven politically. Humphrey Prideaux, dean of the cathedral in 1681, described 'two factions, Whig and Tory...and both contend for their way with the utmost violence'. Nor did the city accept the outcome of the 1688 Glorious Revolution
with a unified voice. The pre-eminent citizen, Bishop William Lloyd, would not take the oaths of allegiance to the new monarchs. One report has it that in 1704 the landlord of Fowler's alehouse 'with a glass of beer in hand, went down on his knees and drank a health to James the third, wishing the Crowne (sic) well and settled on his head' 'Never was a city in the miserable kingdom so wretchedly divided as this' said the London Post.
In 1716, at a play at the New Inn, the Pretender was cheered and the audience booed and hissed every time King George's name was mentioned. In 1722 supporters of the king were said to be 'hiss'd at and curst as they go in the streets', and in 1731 'a Tory mobb, in a great body, went through several parts of this city, in a riotous manner, cursing and abusing such as they knew to be friends of the government'. But the Whigs gradually gained control and by the 1720s they had successfully petitioned parliament to allow all adult males working in the textile industry to take up the freedom, on the correct assumption that they would vote Whig. But it had the effect of boosting the city's popular Jacobitism, says Knights (qv),and contests of the kind described continued in Norwich well into a period in which political stability had been discerned at a national level, and the city's Jacobitism perhaps only ended from 1745, well after it had ceased to be a significant movement outside of Scotland. Despite the Highlanders reaching Derby, and Norwich citizens mustering themselves into an association to protect the city, some Tories refused and the vestry of St Peter Mancroft resolved that it would not ring its bells to summon the defence. But it was the end of the road for Norwich Jacobites, and the Whigs organised a massive celebration following Culloden.
What the events of this period illustrate is that precursory to an organised radical movement Norwich had had a strong tradition of popular protest favouring Church and Stuarts and attached to the street and alehouse. Knights qv tells how in 1716 the mayoral election had ended in a riot, 'with both sides throwing 'brick-ends and great paving stones' at each other. A renowned Jacobite watering-hole, the Blue Bell Inn (nowadays The Bell Hotel), owned in the early-18th century by the high-church Helwys family, in the 1790s became the central rendez-vous point of the Norwich Revolution Society!
Britain's first provincial newspaper, the Norwich Post , had been published in 1701. By 1726 there were rival Whig and Tory presses and even in mid-century some parishes had three quarters of the males as literate. In Norwich alehouses 281 clubs and societies met in 1701, and at least 138 more were formed before 1758. The Theatre Royal had opened in 1758 adding to the city's stage productions in inns, and puppet shows in rowdy alehouses. In 1750 Norwich could boast nine booksellers and after 1780 a 'growing number of circulating and subscription libraries'. Knights says: '[All this] made for a lively political culture, in which independence from governmental lines was particularly strong, evident in campaigns against the war with America and for reform...in which trade and the impact of war with Revolutionary France were key ingredients. The open and contestable structure of local government, the press, the clubs and societies, and dissent all ensured that politics overlapped with communities bound by economics, religion, ideology and print in a world in which public opinion could not be ignored.'
Amidst this metropolitan culture the city burghers had built a sophisticated political structure. Freemen, who not only had the right to trade but to vote at elections, numbered about 2,000 in 1690, rising to over 3,300 by the mid-1730s. With growth partly the result of political manipulation, their numbers did at one point reach one third of the adult male population. This was notoriously the age of 'rotten' and 'pocket' boroughs, and Norwich was unusual in having such a high proportion of its citizens able to vote. 'Of the political centres where the Jacobin propaganda had penetrated most deeply', says E.P.Thompson, 'only Norwich and Nottingham had a franchise deep enough to allow radicals to make use of the electoral process.' 'Apart from London, Norwich was probably still the largest of those boroughs which were democratically governed', says Jewson, describing other towns under the control of a single fiefdom. In Norwich, he says, a powerful Anglican Establishment, symbolised by the Cathedral and the great church of St Peter Mancroft was matched by scarcely less powerful congeries of Dissenters headed by the wealthy literate body [of Unitarians] worshipping at the Octagon Chapel
.'
Moreover in the midst of political disorders of the late-18th century, Norwich intellectual life flourished. And it contained one, so far unmentioned, characteristic. Harriet Martineau writes of the city's literati of the period, which included such people as William Taylor, one of the first German scholars in England. The city 'boasted of her intellectual supper-parties, where, amidst a pedantry which would now make laughter hold both his sides, there was much that was pleasant and salutary: and finally she called herself The Athens of England.
Notwithstanding Norwich's hitherto industrial prosperity, by the 1790s the wool trade was experiencing intense competition. It came from both Yorkshire woollens, and increasingly from Lancashire cottons. The effects were aggravated by the loss of continental markets after Britain went to war with France in 1793. The early-19th century would see deindustrialisation accompanied by bitter squabbles. The 1820s would be marked with wage cuts and personal recrimination against owners. Thus amid the rich commercial and cultural heritage that was its recent past, there lurked in the alleys of 1790s Norwich an unwelcome stranger, incipient decline; exacerbated by a serious trade recession.
As early in the war as 1793 a major city manufacturer and government supporter, Robert Harvey, had complained of low order books, languid trade and a doubling of the poor rate. As with many generations of their Norwich forbears, the hungry poor took their complaints on to the streets. Hayes describes a meeting of 200 people in a Norwich public house, at which 'Citizen Stanhope' spoke. The gathering is said to have '[roared its] applause at Stanhope's declaration that the Ministers, unless they changed their policy ' deserved to have their heads brought to the block; – and if there was a people still in England, the event might turn out to be so.' Hayes says that 'the outbreak of war, in bringing the worsted manufacture almost to a standstill and so plunging the mass of the Norwich weavers into sudden distress made it almost inevitable that a crude appeal to working-class resentment should take the place of a temperate process of education which the earliest reformers had intended'.
However by 1795 it was not just the Norwich rabble which was causing the government concern. In April that year the Norwich Patriotic Society was established, its manifesto declaring 'that the great end of civil society was general happiness; that every individual...had a right to share in the government...' In December the price of bread reached its highest yet, and in May 1796, when William Windham was forced to seek re-election following his appointment as war secretary, he only just held his seat. Amid the same disorder and violence as was often the case with Norwich elections, it was only by the narrowest of margins that the radical Bartlett Gurney, campaigning on the platform of: 'Peace and Gurney – No More War – No more Barley Bread'failed to unseat him.
Though informed by issues of recent national importance, the vibrant two-sided political culture of Norwich in the 1790s cannot be totally disconnected from local tradition.Two features stand out from a political continuum of three centuries. The first is the dichotomous power balance. From at least the time of the Reformation, there is a record of Norwich as a 'two-party city'. In the mid-16th century the weaving parishes actually fell under the control of opposition forces, as Kett's rebels held the north of the river, in support of poor cloth workers.
Secondly there does seem to be some case for saying that with this tradition of two-sided disputation, the city had over a long period of time developed an infrastructure, evident in her many cultural and institutional networks of politics, religion, society, news media and the arts, whereby argument could be managed short of outright confrontation. indeed at a time of hunger and tension on the Norwich streets, with the alehouse crowds ready to have 'a Minister's head brought to the block', that, unusually in England, the Anglican and Dissenting clergy were doing their best to conduct a collegiate dialogue, seeking common ground, and reinforcing the same well-mannered civic tradition of consensus as that illustrated by historians of earlier periods.
In 1797 Thomas Bignold
, a 36-year-old wine merchant and banker, founded the first Norwich Union Society
. Some years earlier, when he moved from Kent to Norwich, Bignold had been unable to find anyone willing to insure him against the threat from highwaymen. With the entrepreneurial thought that nothing was impossible, and aware that in a city built largely of wood the threat of fire was uppermost in people's minds, Bignold formed the "Norwich Union Society for the Insurance of Houses, Stock and Merchandise from Fire". The new business, which became known as the Norwich Union Fire Insurance Office, was a "mutual" enterprise. Norwich Union was later to become the country's largest insurance giant.
From earliest times, Norwich was a centre of textile manufacture. Towards the end of the 18th century, in the 1780s, the manufacture of Norwich shawl
s became an important industry and remained so for nearly one hundred years. The shawls were a high-quality fashion product and rivalled those made in other towns such as Paisley
(which entered shawl manufacture in about 1805, some 20 or more years after Norwich). With changes in women's fashion in the later Victorian period, the popularity of shawls declined and eventually manufacture ceased. Examples of Norwich shawls are now highly sought after by collectors of textiles.
Norwich's geographical isolation was such that until 1845 when a railway connection was established, it was often quicker to travel to Amsterdam
by boat than to London. The railway was introduced to Norwich by Morton Peto
, who also built the line to Great Yarmouth
.
From 1808 to 1814 Norwich hosted a station in the shutter telegraph chain which connected the Admiralty
in London to its naval ships in the port of Great Yarmouth
.
or Van Dal brands), clothing, joinery, and structural engineering as well as aircraft design and manufacture. Important employers included Boulton & Paul, Barnards (inventors of machine produced wire netting), and electrical engineers Laurence Scott and Electromotors.
Norwich also has a long association with chocolate manufacture, primarily through the local firm of Caley's, which began as a manufacturer and bottler of mineral water and later diversified into making chocolate and Christmas crackers. The Caley's cracker-manufacturing business was taken over by Tom Smith in 1953, and the Norwich factory in Salhouse Road eventually closed down in 1998. Caley's was acquired by Mackintosh in the 1930s, and merged with Rowntree's
in 1969 to become Rowntree-Mackintosh. Finally, it was bought by Nestlé
and closed down in 1996 with all operations moved to York
; ending a 120-year association with Norwich. The demolished factory stood on the site of what is now the Chapelfield development. Caley's chocolate has since made a reappearance as a brand in the city, although it is no longer made in Norwich.
HMSO, once the official publishing and stationery arm of the British government and one of the largest print buyers, printers and suppliers of office equipment in the UK, moved most of its operations from London to Norwich in the 1970s.
Jarrolds
, established in 1810, was a nationally well-known printer and publisher. In 2004, after nearly 200 years, it passed out of family ownership. Today, the Jarrold name is now best-known and recognised as being that of Norwich's only independent department store
.
The city was home to a long-established tradition of brewing, with several large breweries
continuing in business into the second half of the century. The main brewers were Morgans, Steward and Patteson, Youngs Crawshay and Youngs, Bullard and Son, and the Norwich Brewery. Despite takeovers and consolidation in the 1950s and 1960s in attempts to remain viable, by the 1970s only the Norwich Brewery (owned by Watney Mann
and on the site of Morgans) remained. In 1985 the Norwich Brewery closed, and was subsequently demolished. Small-scale brewing continues in Norwich in "microbreweries"
.
Norwich suffered extensive bomb damage during World War II, affecting large parts of the old city centre and Victorian terrace housing around the centre. Industry and the rail infrastructure also suffered. The heaviest raids occurred on the nights of 27/28th and 29/30 April 1942; as part of the Baedeker raids (so called because Baedeker's series of tourist guides to the British Isles
were used to select propaganda-rich targets of cultural and historic significance rather than strategic importance). Lord Haw-Haw
made reference to the imminent destruction of Norwich's new City Hall
(completed in 1938), although in the event it survived unscathed. Significant targets hit included the Morgan's Brewery building, Coleman's Wincarnis works, City Station
, the Mackintosh chocolate factory, and shopping areas including St. Stephen's Street, St. Benedict's Street, the site of Bond's department store
(now John Lewis
) and Curl's department store (now Debenhams
).
In 1976 the city's pioneering spirit was on show when Motum Road in Norwich, allegedly the scene of "a number of accidents over the years", became the third road in Britain to be equipped with "speed bumps", intended to encourage adherence to the road's 30 mph (48 km/h) speed limit. The humps, installed at intervals of 50 and 150 yards, stretched twelve feet across the width of the road and their curved profile was, at its highest point, 4 inches (10 cm) high. The responsible quango
gave an assurance that the experimental devices would be removed not more than one year following installation.
, Norwich has had two tiers of local government
. The upper tier is Norfolk County Council, which provides "wide area" strategic services such as education, social services and libraries. The lower tier is Norwich City Council, which provides more local services such as housing, planning and leisure facilities.
saw the election of 6 Green Party
, 3 Liberal Democrat
, 2 Labour Party
and 2 Conservative
councillors. The county council has a large Conservative majority.
The current composition, as of the 5 May 2011 council elections, is:
"in view of the position occupied by that city as the chief city of East Anglia and of its close association with His Majesty" The title was regranted on local government reorganisation in 1974.
From 1404 the citizens of Norwich, as a county corporate
, had the privilege of electing two sheriffs. Under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835
this number of sheriffs was reduced to one, and it became an entirely ceremonial post. Both lord mayor and sheriff are elected at the council's annual meeting.
of the arms is:
The arms appeared on a 15th century seal, and were confirmed during a heraldic visitation
in 1562 by William Harvey
, Clarenceux King of Arms
. The royal lion was, according to Wilfrid Scott-Giles
, "said to have been granted by Edward III
". By the 19th century the city corporation had added supporters, two angels, to the arms, which were surmounted by a fur cap. These apparently originated in a carving of about 1534 outside Norwich Guildhall. A C Fox Davies
noted that "whether or not these figures were then intended for heraldic supporters is a matter for dispute. At any rate there is no official authority for their use".
Local government reform in 1974 saw the abolition of the county borough
of Norwich and its replacement by a new Norwich City Council. An Order in Council transferred the ancient coat of arms (the shield alone) to the present authority. The city council has also received the grant of an heraldic badge
, depicting the seal of 1404 encircled by the lord mayor's chain.
produced a Local Government White Paper
inviting councils to submit proposals for unitary restructuring. Norwich submitted its proposal in January 2007, which was rejected in December 2007, as it did not meet all the rigorous criteria for acceptance. In February 2008, the Boundary Committee for England
, (from 1 April 2010 incorporated in the Local Government Boundary Commission for England
), was then asked to consider alternative proposals for the whole or part of Norfolk, including whether Norwich should become a unitary authority
, separate from Norfolk County Council. In December 2009, the Boundary Committee recommended a single unitary authority covering all of Norfolk, including Norwich.
However, on 10 February 2010, it was announced that, contrary to the December 2009 recommendation of the Boundary Committee, Norwich would be given separate unitary status. The proposed change was strongly resisted, principally by Norfolk County Council and the Conservative opposition in Parliament. Reacting to the announcement, Norfolk County Council issued a statement that it would seek leave to challenge the decision in the courts. A letter was leaked to the local media, in which the Permanent Secretary for the Department for Communities and Local Government noted that the decision did not meet all the criteria and that the risk of it "being successfully challenged in judicial review proceedings is very high". The Shadow Local Government and Planning Minister, Bob Neill
, stated that should the Conservative Party
win the 2010 general election, they would reverse the decision.
Following the 2010 general election, Eric Pickles was appointed Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government
on 12 May 2010 in a Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition government
. According to press reports, he instructed his department to take urgent steps to reverse the decision and maintain the status quo in line with the Conservative Party manifesto. However, the unitary plans were supported by the Liberal Democrat group on the city council, and by Simon Wright
, LibDem MP for Norwich South, who intended to lobby the party leadership to allow the changes to go ahead.
The Local Government Act 2010
to reverse the unitary decision for Norwich (and Exeter and Suffolk) received Royal Assent on 16 December 2010. The disputed award of unitary status had meanwhile been referred to the High Court
, and on 21 June 2010 the court (Mr. Justice Ouseley, judge) ruled it unlawful, and revoked it. The city has therefore failed to attain permanent unitary status.
by two members of parliament. Until 1950
the city was an undivided constituency
, returning two MPs. Since that date the area has been divided between two single-member constituencies: Norwich North and Norwich South.
Both constituencies have proved to be marginal seats in recent elections; until 2010 switching between the Labour
and Conservative
parties:
The city's economy, originally chiefly industrial with shoemaking a large sector, has changed throughout the eighties and nineties to a service-based economy. Aviva (formerly known as Norwich Union
) still dominates these, but has been joined by other insurance and financial services companies.
New developments on the former Boulton and Paul site include the Riverside entertainment complex with nightclubs and other venues featuring the usual national leisure brands. Nearby, the football stadium is being upgraded with more residential property development alongside the river Wensum.
Archant
, formerly known as Eastern Counties Newspapers (ECN) is a national publishing group that has grown out of the city's local newspaper, the Norwich Evening News
and the regional Eastern Daily Press
(EDP).
Norwich has long been associated with the manufacture of mustard
. The world famous Colman's
brand, with its yellow packaging, was founded in 1814 and continues to operate from its factory at Carrow. Colman's is now being exported world wide by its parent company Unilever
(Unilever UK Export) putting Norwich on the map of British heritage brands. The Colman's Mustard Shop, which sells Colman's products and related gifts, is located in the Royal Arcade in the centre of Norwich.
Norwich's night-time economy of bars and nightclubs is mainly located in Tombland, Prince of Wales Road and the Riverside area adjacent to Norwich railway station.
characterises Norwich Market as an ongoing conflict between the market traders and Norwich City Council
, which operates the market.
The Mall Norwich (Castle Mall until 2007), a shopping mall designed by local practice Lambert, Scott & Innes and opened in 1993, presents an ingenious solution to the problem of sensitively accommodating new retail space in a historic city-centre environment—the building is largely concealed underground and built into the side of a hill, with a public park created on its roof in the area south of the Castle.
The new Chapelfield
shopping mall has been built on the site where the Caleys (later Rowntree Mackintosh and Nestlé
) chocolate factory once stood. Chapelfield opened in September 2005, featuring as its flagship department store House of Fraser
. Detractors have criticised Chapelfield as unnecessary and damaging to local businesses; its presence has prompted smaller retailers to band together to promote the virtues of independent shops. Despite this in August 2006 it was reported by the Javelin Group that Norwich was one of the top five retail destinations in the UK, and in October 2006 the city centre was voted the best in the UK, in a shopping satisfaction survey run by Goldfish Credit Card.
To the north of the city centre is the Anglia Square
shopping centre. The centre and the surrounding area is to be redeveloped; demolition work was due to commence in 2010 after an archaeological dig (conducted in 2009 and due to the centre being located around the site of a Saxon fortified settlement). The new development is planned to be a mixture of shops and housing, unlike the original which consisted of offices, shops and a cinema. In February, 2009, it was announced that, due to the economic climate, plans for the area have been delayed and the developers are unable to say for certain when work will commence.
on the outskirts of Norwich is, contrary to popular belief, not one of the so-called plate glass universities. The UEA along with Sussex University were both founded before Robbins Report
. UEA was founded in 1963, before the Robbins Report
. UEA adopted the city's motto of independence Do different and is especially well-known for its creative writing programme; established by Malcolm Bradbury
and Angus Wilson
, its graduates include Kazuo Ishiguro
and Ian McEwan
. The university campus is the home of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts
which houses a number of important art collections in many media. It is also well known for staging exhibitions of work on a wide range of diverse themes. The city also has a long-established (since 1845) art college, the Norwich University College of the Arts (formerly Norwich School of Art and Design), which is situated in the city centre. Additionally, the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital
on the city's periphery at Colney
was opened in 2001.
The Forum
, designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners and opened in 2002 is a building designed to house the Millennium Library, a replacement for the Norwich Central Library building which burned down in 1994, and the regional headquarters and television centre for BBC East
. The building provides a venue for exhibitions, concerts and events, although the city still lacks a dedicated concert venue.
The Millennium Library contains the 2nd Air Division
Memorial Library, a collection of material about American culture and the American relationship with East Anglia, especially the role of the United States Air Force
on UK air bases throughout the Second World War and Cold War
. Much of the collection was lost in the 1994 fire, but the collection has been restored by contributions from many veterans of the war, both European and American.
Recent attempts to shed the backwater image of Norwich and market it as a popular tourist destination, as well as a centre for science, commerce, culture and the arts, have included the refurbishment of the Norwich Castle Museum
and the opening of the Forum. The proposed new slogan for Norwich, England's Other City, has been the subject of much discussion and controversy—and it remains to be seen whether it will be finally adopted. A number of signs at the approaches to the city still display the traditional phrase—"Norwich—a fine city".
As part of ambitious aims to promote Norwich's heritage internationally, Norwich 12
has been launched—a collection of listed buildings in Norwich. The group consists of: Norwich Castle
, Norwich Cathedral, The Great Hospital
, The Halls – St Andrew's and Blackfriars'
, The Guildhall, Dragon Hall
, The Assembly House
, St James Mill, St John the Baptist RC Cathedral
, Surrey House, City Hall
and The Forum
.
In February 2010, it was announced that Norwich was among four finalists for the prestigious title of UK City of Culture
(a new designation), in 2013. However, on 15 July 2010, the city of Londonderry
was pronounced the winner.
celebrates the arts, drawing many visitors into the city from all over eastern England. The Norwich Twenty Group
, founded in 1944, presents exhibitions of its members to promote awareness of modern art. Norwich was home to the first arts festival in Britain in 1772.
Norwich Arts Centre
is a notable live music venue, concert hall and theatre located in St. Benedict's Street. The King of Hearts in Fye Bridge Street is another centre for art and music; although, as at April 2010, it is threatened with closure through lack of funding.
Norwich has a thriving music scene based around local venues such as the University of East Anglia
, Norwich Arts Centre
, The Waterfront, The Queen Charlotte (closed March 2010) and the Marquee. "Live" music, mostly contemporary musical genres, is also to be heard at a number of other public house
and club venues around the city. The city is host to many artists that have achieved national and international recognition such as Cord
, Serious Drinking
, Tim Bowness
, Sennen
, Magoo
, KaitO
, Mantoid, Teknikov and The Sadtowns.
Established record labels in Norwich include; All Sorted!?! Records, NR ONE, Hungry Audio
, Burning Shed
, MQ Projects, Wilde Club Records, Mummy Where's The Milkman and zine powerhouse/label What Would Henry Rollins Do?
British artist Stella Vine
lived in Norwich during her childhood, from the age of 7, and again later in her life with her son Jamie. Vine included the city in her large painting Welcome to Norwich a fine city (2006).
The largest is Norwich Castle Museum
. This contains extensive collections of archaeological finds from the county of Norfolk, art (including a fine collection of paintings by the Norwich School of painters), ceramics (including the largest collection of British teapots), silver, and Natural History. Of particular interest are dioramas of Norfolk scenery, showing wildlife and landscape. The Museum has been extensively remodelled to enhance the display of the many collections, and also hosts frequent temporary exhibitions of art and other subjects.
The Bridewell
Museum, in Bridewell Alley, has been closed since 2010 for a major redevelopment, and is not expected to re-open until Summer 2012. Previously, it was mainly devoted to displaying exhibits connected with the historic industries of Norwich. These include weaving, shoe and boot making, iron foundries and the manufacture of metal goods, engineering, milling, brewing, chocolate making and other food manufacturing.
Strangers' Hall, at Charing Cross, is one of the oldest buildings in Norwich, and is a merchant's house dating to the early 14th century. The many rooms are furnished and equipped in the styles of different eras, from the Early Tudor
to the Late Victorian
. Exhibits include costumes and textiles, domestic objects of all sorts, and collections of children's toys and games, and of children's books. The latter two collections are considered to be of national importance.
The Royal Norfolk Regimental Museum
is housed in a part of what was the Shirehall, close to the Castle. Its exhibits illustrate the history of the Regiment from its 17th century origins to its incorporation into the Royal Anglian Regiment
in 1964. There is an extensive and representative display of medals awarded to soldiers of the Regiment, including two of the six Victoria Cross
es won. It is planned for the Regimental Museum to remain in the Shirehall until September 2011, and thereafter it will close and reopen in the Norwich Castle Museum.
The City of Norwich Aviation Museum
is located at Horsham St. Faith, on the northern edge of the City and close to Norwich Airport
. There are static displays of both military and civil aircraft, together with various collections of exhibits, including one concerned with the United States 8th Army Air Force
.
The John Jarrold Printing
Museum, at Whitefriars, is dedicated to the history of printing and contains many examples of printing machinery, presses, books, and related equipment. Exhibits range in date from the early 19th century to the present day. Many were donated by Jarrold Printing.
Dragon Hall
, in King Street, is a fine example of a medieval merchants trading hall. Mostly dating from about 1430, it is unique in Western Europe. The building has undergone a thorough restoration, re-opening in 2006. Its magnificent architecture is complemented by displays showing the history of the building and its role in the life of Norwich over the ages.
The Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service Costume
and Textiles Study Centre, at Carrow House, in King Street, contains an extensive collection of more than 20,000 items, built up over a period of some 130 years, and which were previously kept in other Norwich museums. Although not a publicly-open museum in the usual sense, the collection is accessible to the general public, students, researchers and others by prior appointment. The Study Centre will be moving from Carrow House to the Shirehall in Autumn 2011, when the latter is vacated by The Royal Norfolk Regimental Museum on its transfer to Norwich Castle.
Theatre Royal
has been on its present site for nearly 250 years, through several rebuildings and many alterations. The 1300-seat theatre, the largest in the city, hosts a mix of national touring productions including musicals, dance, drama, family shows, stand-up comedians, opera and pop.
Norwich Playhouse
is a superb venue in the heart of the city and one of the most modern performance spaces of its size in East Anglia. The theatre has a seating capacity of 300.
The Maddermarket Theatre
opened in 1921 and was the first permanent recreation of an Elizabethan Theatre. The founder was Nugent Monck who had worked with William Poel. The Theatre is a world class Shakespearean style play house and has a seating capacity of 310.
Norwich Puppet Theatre
was founded in 1979 by Ray and Joan DaSilva as a permanent base for their touring company and was first opened as a public venue in 1980, following the conversion of the medieval church of St. James in the heart of Norwich. Under subsequent artistic directors—Barry Smith and Luis Z. Boy—the theatre established its current pattern of operation. It is a nationally unique venue dedicated to puppetry, and currently houses a 185 seat raked auditorium, 50 seat Octagon Studio, workshops, an exhibition gallery, shop and licensed bar. It is the only theatre in the Eastern region with a year-round programme of family-centred entertainment.
The Garage
studio theatre can seat up to 110 people in a range of different layouts. It can also be used for standing events and can accommodate up to 180 people. The high specification of equipment and design means that it is particularly versatile, and can be adapted to a variety of layouts offering a wide choice for performances or events.
The CCN Drama Centre is in the grounds of City College Norwich (CCN), and has a massive stage. The Theatre mainly plays host to Broadway style American musicals and has, in the past, presented shows such as Bugsy Malone
and Copacabana
and in May 2010 saw the highly successful, Thirst Productions Guys and Dolls
.
The theatre is raked and seats about 220 people.
The Sewell Barn Theatre
is the smallest theatre in Norwich and has a seating capacity of just 100. The auditorium features raked seating on three sides of an open acting space. This unusual staging helps to draw the audience deeply into the performance.
The Norwich Arts Centre
theatre opened in 1977 in St. Benedict's Street, and has a capacity of 290.
Chapelfield Gardens in central Norwich became the city's first public park in November 1880. From the start of the 20th century Norwich Corporation now Norwich City Council began buying and leasing land to develop parks when funds became available. Sewell Park
and James Stuart Gardens are examples of land donated by benefactors.
After World War I the corporation took advantage of government grants and made the decision to construct a series of formal parks as a means to alleviate unemployment. Under the guidance of Parks Superintendent Captain Sandys-Winsch four parks were completed; Heigham Park (1924), Wensum Park (1925), Eaton Park (1928), Waterloo Park (1933). These parks retain many features fron Sandys-Winsch's original plans and have been placed on the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.
Currently (2011), the city has 23 parks, 95 open spaces and 59 natural areas managed by the local authority. In addition there are several privately owned gardens which are occasionally opened to the public in aid of charity with the exception of the Plantation Garden
located close to the St John the Baptist Cathedral
which opens daily.
, 12th century castle
(now a museum) and a large number of parish church
es. During the Middle Ages
, 57 churches stood within the city wall; 31 still exist today. This gave rise to the common regional saying that it had a church for every week of the year, and a pub for every day. Most of the medieval buildings are in the city centre. Notable examples of secular
medieval architecture are Dragon Hall
, built in about 1430, and The Guildhall, built 1407–1413, with later additions. From the 18th century the pre-eminent local name is Thomas Ivory
, who built the Assembly Rooms (1776), the Octagon Chapel (1756), St Helen's House (1752) in the grounds of the Great Hospital
, and innovative speculative housing in Surrey Street (c. 1761). Ivory should not be confused with the Irish architect of the same name and similar period.
The 19th century saw an explosion in Norwich's size and much of its housing stock, as well as commercial building in the city centre, dates from this period. The local architect of the Victorian
and Edwardian periods who has continued to command most critical respect was George Skipper
(1856–1948). Examples of his work include the headquarters of Norwich Union
on Surrey Street; the Art Nouveau
Royal Arcade; and the Hotel de Paris in the nearby seaside town of Cromer
. The neo-Gothic Roman Catholic cathedral
dedicated to St John the Baptist on Earlham Road
, begun in 1882, is by George Gilbert Scott Junior
and his brother, John Oldrid Scott
.
The city continued to grow through the 20th century and much housing, particularly in areas further out from the city centre, dates from that century. The first notable building post-Skipper was the City Hall
by CH James and SR Pierce, opened in 1938. Bombing during the Second World War, while resulting in relatively little loss of life, caused significant damage to housing stock in the city centre. Much of the replacement postwar stock was designed by the local authority architect, David Percival. However, the major postwar development in Norwich from an architectural point of view was the opening of the University of East Anglia
in 1964. Originally designed by Denys Lasdun
(his design was never completely executed), it has been added to over subsequent decades by major names such as Norman Foster
and Rick Mather
.
, the BBC's presence in the east of England, and BBC Radio Norfolk
, BBC Look East, Inside Out and The Politics Show
are all broadcast from the BBC studios in The Forum
in the city centre.
Independent radio
stations based in Norwich include Heart, Gold, 99.9 Radio Norwich
, as well as the University of East Anglia's Livewire 1350. A community station, Future Radio
, was launched on 6 August 2007.
ITV Anglia, formerly Anglia Television
, is based in Norwich. Although one of the smaller ITV companies, it supplied the network with some of its most popular shows such as Tales of the Unexpected
, Survival
and Sale of the Century
(1971–83), which began each edition with John Benson's enthusiastic announcement "And now from Norwich, it's the quiz of the week!" The company also had a subsidiary called Anglia Multimedia which produced educational content on CD and DVD mainly for schools, and was one of the three companies, along with Granada TV and the BBC
vying for the right to produce a digital television station for English schools and colleges.
Launched in 1959, Anglia Television lost its independence in 1994 following a takeover by MAI
and subsequent mergers have seen it reduced from a significant producer of programmes to a regional news centre. The company is still based in the former Norfolk and Norwich Agricultural Hall, on Agricultural Hall Plain, near Prince of Wales Road. However, despite the contraction of Anglia, television production in Norwich is by no means ended.
Anglia's former network production centre at Magdalen Street has been taken over by Norfolk County Council and extensively re-vamped. After total investment of £4m from EEDA—the regional development agency—it has re-opened as EPIC—the East of England Production Innovation Centre. It is now a creative industries enterprise hub, providing office space for local production companies and giving them access to state of the art production facilities, including one of the best equipped High Definition TV Studios in Europe. Degree courses in film and video are also run at the centre by NUCA (Norwich University College of the Arts, formerly Norwich School of Art and Design.) EPIC has commercial, broadcast quality post production facilities, a real-time virtual studio and a smaller HD discussion studio. The main studio opened as an HD facility in November 2008. Throughout 2008, the centre has concentrated on the development of new TV formats and has worked on pilots shows with, among others, Les Dennis, Gaby Roslin and Christopher Biggins.
The principal local football club is Norwich City
, also known as the Canaries, who play in the Premier League after being promoted in the 2010–2011 season. Majority-owned by celebrity chef Delia Smith
and her husband Michael Wynn-Jones, their ground is at Carrow Road
. They have a strong East Anglian rivalry
with Ipswich Town
. The club has enjoyed considerable success in the past, having played in the top division for a collective total of 19 seasons since 1972, their longest spell being a nine-year spell from 1986 to 1995. They have also won two Football League Cup
s, and finished third in the inaugural Premier League in 1993. Perhaps their most famous result to date came later in 1993 when they eliminated German giants Bayern Munich from the UEFA Cup
. Before emerging as a top division club, they famously eliminated Manchester United
from the FA Cup in 1959, and went on to reach the semi-finals of the competition, a run they achieved again in 1989 and most recently in 1992. In the 1980s and early 1990s, the club produced some of the most highly rated talent of that era, including striker Chris Sutton
, winger Ruel Fox
, defender Andy Linighan
, midfielder Mike Phelan
, midfielder Tim Sherwood
and striker Justin Fashanu
. The club's most successful managers have included Ken Brown, Ron Saunders
, Dave Stringer
, Mike Walker, Martin O'Neill
, Nigel Worthington
and current manager Paul Lambert
.
The city's second club, Norwich United
(who are based in Blofield
some 5 miles (8 km) east of the city) play in the Eastern Counties
league, whilst Spixworth FC (previously known as AFC Norwich) play in the Anglian Combination
. The now-defunct Gothic F.C.
were also based in Norwich. Local football clubs are served by the Norwich and District Business Houses League
.
Norwich also has an athletics club, City of Norwich AC (CoNAC), and a rugby club, the Norwich Lions.
Norwich also has five field hockey
clubs. In the 2011/12 season the club playing the highest level on the men's side will be Norwich City who won promotion to the East Hockey Premier A last season, which is one level below National League. The second highest level is Norwich Dragons in Division Two North, then the students only University of East Anglia
Men's Hockey Club in Division Three North East, then Norfolk Nomads Men's Hockey Club in Division Six North East. On the Ladies' side of the game both Norwich City Hockey Club and Norwich Dragons Hockey club play in East Hockey's Division One North, two levels below National League. Following them the students from the University of East Anglia
Women's Hockey Club play in the Norfolk Premier Division. Also in Norwich there is the veterans only side Norwich Exiles.
Outside the city boundary, the dry ski and snowboarding slopes of Norfolk Ski Club is located at Whitlingham Lane in Trowse
. Located close by in the parish of Whitlingham
is the Whitlingham Country Park home to the Outdoor Education Centre. The centre is based on the south bank of the Great Broad which is also used by scuba
divers from one of the city's three diving schools and other water and land sports.
Speedway
racing was staged in Norwich both before and after World War II at The Firs Stadium on the Holt Road, Hellesdon
. The Norwich Stars
raced in the Northern League of 1946 and the National League Division Two
between 1947 and 1951, winning it in 1951. They were subsequently elevated to the Speedway National League
and raced at the top flight until the stadium was closed at the end of the 1964 season. One meeting was staged at a venue at Hevingham
but the event, staged without an official permit, did not lead to a revival of the sport in the Norwich area.
In the world of boxing
, Norwich can boast former European
and British lightweight champion Jon Thaxton
, reigning English light heavyweight champion Danny McIntosh
and heavyweight Sam Sexton
, a former winner of the Prizefighter
tournament.
.
In November 2006 the city was voted the greenest in the UK. There is currently an initiative taking place to make it a transition town. Norwich has recently been the scene of open discussions in public spaces, known as 'meet in the street', that cover social and political issues.
According to the 2001 census, 27.8% of respondents in Norwich stated that they were of "no religion", the highest percentage in England.
There are rail links from Norwich railway station
to Peterborough
and London, and direct services to Cambridge
were added in 2004. Links are also regularly available on the Liverpool to Norwich line, providing direct access to Nottingham, Sheffield, Manchester Piccadilly and Liverpool Lime Street; and vice versa; providing strong links from/to five major cities (including London) in total. It is a commuter city, with services running on the train route between Norwich and London. Travelling by train to London from Norwich, travellers arrive at Liverpool Street Station
, in the heart of the 'City of London', the central financial district.
A large proportion of the population of Norwich are users of the Internet. A recent article has suggested that, compared with other UK cities, it is top of the league for the percentage of population who use the popular Internet auction site eBay
. The city has also unveiled the biggest free Wi-Fi
network in the UK, which opened in July 2006.
In August 2007 Norwich was shortlisted as one of nine finalists in its population group for the International Awards for Liveable Communities LivCom Awards The city eventually won a silver award in the small city category."
Norwich sits north of the A47
(bypassed to the south of the city) which connects it with Great Yarmouth
to the east and with Kings Lynn to the west, which ultimately connects to Peterborough
. At present the A47 is in the planning stages of upgrades, largely to sections which are still single-carriageway and with much focus on improving the road network in conjunction with the in-construction Great Yarmouth Outer Harbour. Norwich is linked to Cambridge
via the A11, which leads to the M11 motorway
for London and the M25
. It is linked to Ipswich
(to the south) by the A140 and to Lowestoft
(to the south-east) by the A146
.
Rail
Norwich railway station is situated to the east of Norwich city centre and is managed by National Express East Anglia. It forms the northern terminus of the Great Eastern Main Line
with half hourly services to London Liverpool Street provided by British Rail Class 90
locomotives. It is also linked to the Midlands
with hourly services to Liverpool Lime Street and are operated by East Midlands Trains
Class 158 DMU
s via Peterborough
, Nottingham
and Manchester
. These additional hourly regional services to Cambridge
, and out of Norwich as far as Ely
, are run along the Breckland Line
by National Express
who also run hourly local services to Great Yarmouth
and Lowestoft
, using the Wherry Lines
, and to Sheringham
, using the Bittern Line
. These all use either Class 156 or Class 170 DMUs. Norwich is also the site of Norwich Crown Point
Traction Maintenance Depot (TMD
).
Bus and coach
Norwich is served by several bus operators including Anglian Bus
, First Eastern Counties, Konectbus
, Norfolk Green
and Sanders. Destinations throughout Norfolk and beyond are served including Peterborough
, and Lowestoft
. National Express
run ten coaches a day to the three main London airports (Stansted Airport, Heathrow and Gatwick), five a day to London, and one a day to Birmingham
. Most bus and coach services run from Norwich bus station
or from Castle Meadow.
Norwich has six park and ride
sites run by Norfolk County Council using colour-coded buses, one of the larger UK operations. Altogether nearly 5000 parking spaces are provided and in 2006 3.4 million passengers used the service.
Air
Norwich International Airport
is a feeder to KLM's Schiphol hub. FlyBe
, Eastern Airways
, and Bristow Helicopters
all serve Norwich, in addition to a strong holiday charter flight business. The airport was originally the airfield part of the former RAF
Horsham St Faith. One of the former RAF hangars was once the home of Air UK, which grew out of Air Anglia
and was then absorbed by the Dutch airline KLM.
Bicycle
National Cycle Route 1 passes through Norwich, linking Beccles
and Fakenham
(and eventually Dover
and the Shetland Islands
).
Water
The River Yare
is navigable from the sea at Great Yarmouth
all the way to Trowse, south of the city. From there the River Wensum
is navigable into Norwich up to New Mills, and is crossed by the Novi Sad Friendship Bridge. Scheduled trips through the city and out to the nearby The Broads
are run by City Boats http://www.cityboats.co.uk from outside Norwich Station and also Elm Hill.
, linking from the A140 road
/Norwich International Airport
to the north of Norwich to the A47 road to the east of Norwich was given Program Entry status in December 2009 and an estimated completion data of 2015. The Postwick hub, an integral park of the NDR is a development of the junction between the A47 road and the A1042 road to the east of Norwich with an additional 500 parking places in the Postwick park and ride site. There is also discussion about building the section from the A140 west to the A1067 and also from the Wensum Valley to the A47 southern bypass to the west as originally proposed.
Sustrans
plans to build a bridge between the Riverside area and Whitlingham County Park as part of the Connect2
project from the National Lottery
. The country park is currently disconnected from the main residential areas by the River Yare
and River Wensum
.
Other proposals in the Norwich Transport Strategy include limiting traffic on some roads, introducing five rapid bus links into the city, and creating a 'train-tram' link to the Rackheath ecotown.
The highest temperature recorded at Coltishall was 33.1c(91.6f) during June 1976. However, go back further to 1932, and Norwich's absolute record high stands at 35.6c(96.1f). Typically the warmest day of the year should reach 28.8c(83.8f) and 9.9 days should register a temperature of 25.1c(77.2f) or higher.
The lowest temperature recorded at Coltishall was −15.3c(4.5f) during January 1979. In a typical year however, the coldest night should only fall to −7.5c(18.5f). On average 39.4 air frosts will be recorded during the course of the year. More recently, the temperature at Norwich airport fell to −14.4c(6.1f) on the 18 December 2010 with unofficial weather stations reporting localised readings of −17 or −18c(0-1f).
The nearest sunshine monitoring weather station for which records are available is Morley agricultural research centre, about 11 miles (17.7 km) south west of Norwich city centre. For the 1961–90 period, it averaged 1558 hours of sunshine a year, a relatively high total for an inland part of the British Isles outside of southern England. In reality, given Norwich's position nearer to the coast and as such suffering from less convective cloud development during summer, true totals may even be slightly higher than this.
Rainfall at around 650 mm (25.59 in) is low, although as much as 100 mm (3.94 in) higher than other, more sheltered parts of East Anglia due to Norwich being more prone to showers off the North Sea.
, the cobbled streets and museums of old Norwich, The Castle
, Cow Tower
, Colman's
Mustard Shop, Dragon Hall
and The Forum
. Norwich is also one of the UK's top ten shopping destinations, with a mix of chain retailers and independent stores as well as Norwich Market
, one of the largest outdoor markets in England. It is currently ranked the 147th biggest city in Europe.
(1460–1529) wrote of two destructive fires in his Lament for the City of Norwich.
Thomas Fuller
in his The Worthies of England described the City in 1662 as:
Celia Fiennes
(1662–1741) visited Norwich in 1698 and described it as
She also records that held in the City three times a year were:
Norwich being a rich, thriving industrious place full of weaving, knitting and dyeing.
Daniel Defoe
in his Tour of the whole Island of Great Britain (1724) wrote of the City:
John Evelyn
(1620–1706) Royalist, Traveller and Diarist wrote to Sir Thomas Browne:
He visited the City as a courtier to King Charles II
in 1671 and described it thus:
George Borrow
in his semi-autobiographical novel Lavengro
(1851) wrote of Norwich as:
Borrow wrote far less favourably of the City in his translation of Faust
:
In 1812, Andrew Robertson wrote to the painter Constable
:
In 1962, Sir Nikolaus Pevsner
stated in his North-West Norfolk and Norwich volume of The Buildings of England that:
politics, nonconformist religion, political dissent
and liberalism. It has also produced notable people in many other walks of life, particularly the Arts
. Famous past names associated with the City include:
Contemporary names associated with Norwich include:
Novi Sad
, Serbia Rouen
, France Koblenz
, Germany
Unofficially:
El Viejo
, Nicaragua.
City status in the United Kingdom
City status in the United Kingdom is granted by the British monarch to a select group of communities. The holding of city status gives a settlement no special rights other than that of calling itself a "city". Nonetheless, this appellation carries its own prestige and, consequently, competitions...
in 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 is the regional administrative centre and county town
County town
A county town is a county's administrative centre in the United Kingdom or Ireland. County towns are usually the location of administrative or judicial functions, or established over time as the de facto main town of a county. The concept of a county town eventually became detached from its...
of Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
. During the 11th century, Norwich was the largest city in England
Kingdom of England
The Kingdom of England was, from 927 to 1707, a sovereign state to the northwest of continental Europe. At its height, the Kingdom of England spanned the southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain and several smaller outlying islands; what today comprises the legal jurisdiction of England...
after London, and one of the most important places in the kingdom. Until the Industrial Revolution
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
, Norwich as the capital of England's most populous and prosperous county, vied with Bristol
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
as England's second city
Second city of the United Kingdom
The identity of the second city of the United Kingdom is a subject of some disagreement. A country's second city is the city that is thought to be the second most important, usually after the capital or first city , according to criteria such as population size, economic and commercial importance,...
.
The urban area of Norwich has a population of 259,100. This area extends beyond the city boundary, with extensive suburban areas on the western, northern and eastern sides, including Costessey
Costessey
Costessey is a civil parish situated west of Norwich in Norfolk, England. The parish comprises two settlements: the long-established village of Costessey , and New Costessey , which developed during the first half of the 20th century and has become a suburb of Norwich...
, Hellesdon
Hellesdon
Hellesdon is a thriving suburb of Norwich in the District of Broadland in Norfolk, England. It lies approximately 4 miles north-west of Norwich and has 11,177 inhabitants.- History :...
, Old Catton
Old Catton
Old Catton is a suburban village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk which lies to the north-east of central Norwich. The parish is bounded by the Norwich International Airport at Hellesdon to the west and Sprowston to the east...
, Sprowston
Sprowston
Sprowston is a small town bordering Norwich in Norfolk, England. It is bounded by Heartsease to the east, Mousehold Heath and the suburb of New Sprowston to the south , Old Catton to the west, and by the open farmland of Beeston St Andrew to the north.It was the largest parish in Norfolk and the...
and Thorpe St Andrew
Thorpe St Andrew
Thorpe St Andrew is a small town and suburb of Norwich in the English county of Norfolk.It is situated about two miles east of the city centre, outside the city boundary in the district of Broadland...
. The parliamentary seats cross over into adjacent local government districts. 135,800 (2008 est.) people live in the City of Norwich and the population of the Norwich Travel to Work Area (i.e. the area of Norwich in which most people both live and work) is 367,035 (the 1991 figure was 351,340). Norwich is the fourth most densely populated local government district within the East of England
East of England
The East of England is one of the nine official regions of England. It was created in 1994 and was adopted for statistics from 1999. It includes the ceremonial counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Suffolk. Essex has the highest population in the region.Its...
with 3,480 people per square kilometre (8,993 per square mile).
Roman
The RomansRoman 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...
had their regional capital at Venta Icenorum
Venta Icenorum
Venta Icenorum, probably meaning "Market Town of the Iceni", located at modern-day Caistor St Edmund in the English county of Norfolk, was the civitas or capital of the Iceni tribe, who inhabited the flatlands and marshes of that county and earned immortality for their revolt against Roman rule...
on the River Tas
River Tas
The River Tas is a river which flows northwards through South Norfolk in England - towards Norwich. The area is named the Tas Valley after the river. The origin of the name of the river is uncertain - it may have taken it from the village of Tasburgh or vice versa.Tributaries which have their...
, about 5 miles (8 km) to the south of Norwich next to modern-day Caistor St Edmund, which fell into disuse around 450 AD. The Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
settled on the site of the modern city from around the 5th – 7th centuries founding the towns of Northwic (from which Norwich gets its name), Westwic (at Norwich-over-the-Water) and the secondary settlement at Thorpe.
Early English and Norman Conquest
There are two suggested models of development for Norwich. It is possible that three separate early Anglo-Saxon settlements, one on the north of the river and two either side on the south, joined together as they grew or that one Anglo-Saxon settlement, on the north of the river, emerged in the mid-7th century after the abandonment of the previous three. The ancient city was a thriving centre for trade and commerce in East AngliaEast Anglia
East Anglia is a traditional name for a region of eastern England, named after an ancient Anglo-Saxon kingdom, the Kingdom of the East Angles. The Angles took their name from their homeland Angeln, in northern Germany. East Anglia initially consisted of Norfolk and Suffolk, but upon the marriage of...
in 1004 AD when it was raided and burnt by Swein Forkbeard
Sweyn I of Denmark
Sweyn I Forkbeard was king of Denmark and England, as well as parts of Norway. His name appears as Swegen in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and he is also known in English as Svein, Swein, Sven the Dane, and Tuck.He was a Viking leader and the father of Cnut the Great...
the Viking
Viking
The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
. Mercia
Mercia
Mercia was one of the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was centred on the valley of the River Trent and its tributaries in the region now known as the English Midlands...
n coins and shards of pottery from the Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
dating to the 8th century suggest that long distance trade was happening long before this. Between 924–939 AD Norwich became fully established as a town because it had its own mint. The word Norvic appears on coins across Europe minted during this period, in the reign of King Athelstan. The Vikings were a strong cultural influence in Norwich for 40–50 years at the end of the 9th century, setting up an Anglo
Anglo
Anglo is a prefix indicating a relation to the Angles, England or the English people, as in the terms Anglo-Saxon, Anglo-American, Anglo-Celtic, Anglo-African and Anglo-Indian. It is often used alone, somewhat loosely, to refer to people of British Isles descent in The Americas, Australia and...
-Scandinavian district towards the north end of present day King Street.
At the time of the Norman Conquest the city was one of the largest in England. The Domesday Book
Domesday Book
Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...
states that it had approximately twenty five churches and a population of between five and ten thousand. It also records the site of an Anglo-Saxon church in Tombland, the site of the Saxon market place and the later Norman cathedral. Norwich continued to be a major centre for trade, the River Wensum
River Wensum
The River Wensum is a chalk fed river in Norfolk, England and a tributary of the River Yare despite being the larger of the two rivers. The complete river is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest and Special Area of Conservation ....
being a convenient export route to the River Yare
River Yare
The River Yare is a river in the English county of Norfolk. In its lower reaches the river connects with the navigable waterways of The Broads....
and Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
, which served as the port for Norwich. Quern stones, and other artefacts from Scandinavia and the Rhineland have been found during excavations in Norwich city centre which date from the 11th century onwards.
Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
was founded soon after the Norman Conquest. The Domesday Book
Domesday Book
Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...
records that 98 Saxon homes were demolished to make way for the castle. The Normans
Normans
The Normans were the people who gave their name to Normandy, a region in northern France. They were descended from Norse Viking conquerors of the territory and the native population of Frankish and Gallo-Roman stock...
established a new focus of settlement around the Castle and the area to the west of it: this became known as the "New" or "French" borough, centred on the Normans' own market place which survives to the present day as Norwich Market.
In 1096, Herbert de Losinga
Herbert de Losinga
Herbert de Losinga was the first Bishop of Norwich. He founded Norwich Cathedral in 1096 when he was Bishop of Thetford.-Life:...
, the Bishop of Thetford, began construction of Norwich Cathedral
Norwich Cathedral
Norwich Cathedral is a cathedral located in Norwich, Norfolk, dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Formerly a Catholic church, it has belonged to the Church of England since the English Reformation....
. The chief building material for the Cathedral was limestone, imported from Caen in Normandy. To transport the building stone to the cathedral site, a canal was cut from the river (from the site of present-day Pulls Ferry), all the way up to the east wall. Herbert de Losinga then moved his See
Episcopal See
An episcopal see is, in the original sense, the official seat of a bishop. This seat, which is also referred to as the bishop's cathedra, is placed in the bishop's principal church, which is therefore called the bishop's cathedral...
there to what became the cathedral church for the Diocese of Norwich
Anglican Diocese of Norwich
The Diocese of Norwich forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England.It traces its roots in an unbroken line to the diocese of Dunwich founded in 630. In common with many Anglo-Saxon bishoprics it moved, in this case to Elmham in 673...
. The bishop of Norwich still signs himself Norvic.
Norwich received a royal charter from Henry II
Henry II of England
Henry II ruled as King of England , Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Count of Nantes, Lord of Ireland and, at various times, controlled parts of Wales, Scotland and western France. Henry, the great-grandson of William the Conqueror, was the...
in 1158, and another one from Richard the Lionheart
Richard I of England
Richard I was King of England from 6 July 1189 until his death. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Count of Nantes, and Overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period...
in 1194. Following a riot in the city in 1274, Norwich has the distinction of being the only English city to be excommunicated by the Pope.
Middle Ages
In 1144, the Jews of Norwich were accused of ritual murder after a boy (William of NorwichWilliam of Norwich
William of Norwich was an English boy whose death was, at the time, attributed to the Jewish community of Norwich. It is the first known medieval accusation of ritual murder against Jews....
) was found dead with stab wounds. This was the first incidence of blood libel
Blood libel
Blood libel is a false accusation or claim that religious minorities, usually Jews, murder children to use their blood in certain aspects of their religious rituals and holidays...
against Jews in England. The story was turned into a cult, William acquiring the status of martyr and subsequently being canonised
Canonization
Canonization is the act by which a Christian church declares a deceased person to be a saint, upon which declaration the person is included in the canon, or list, of recognized saints. Originally, individuals were recognized as saints without any formal process...
. The cult of St William attracted large numbers of pilgrims, bringing wealth to the local church. On 6 February 1190, all the Jews of Norwich were massacred except for a few who found refuge in the castle.
At the site of a mediæval well, the bones of 17 individuals, including 11 children, were found in 2004 by workers preparing the ground for construction of a Norwich shopping centre. The remains were determined by forensic scientists to most probably be the remains of Jews murdered in the 12th century, and a DNA
Genetic genealogy
Genetic genealogy is the application of genetics to traditional genealogy. Genetic genealogy involves the use of genealogical DNA testing to determine the level of genetic relationship between individuals.-History:...
expert determined that the victims were all related, most probably coming from one Ashkenazi Jewish
Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim , are the Jews descended from the medieval Jewish communities along the Rhine in Germany from Alsace in the south to the Rhineland in the north. Ashkenaz is the medieval Hebrew name for this region and thus for Germany...
family. The study of these remains was featured in an episode of the BBC television
BBC Television
BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...
documentary series History Cold Case.
The engine of trade was wool
Wool
Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and certain other animals, including cashmere from goats, mohair from goats, qiviut from muskoxen, vicuña, alpaca, camel from animals in the camel family, and angora from rabbits....
from Norfolk's sheepwalks. Wool made England rich, and the staple port
Staple right
The staple right was a medieval right accorded to certain ports, the staple ports, that required merchant barges or ships to unload their goods at the port, and display them for sale for a certain period, often three days...
of Norwich "in her state doth stand With towns of high'st regard the fourth of all the land", as Michael Drayton
Michael Drayton
Michael Drayton was an English poet who came to prominence in the Elizabethan era.-Early life:He was born at Hartshill, near Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England. Almost nothing is known about his early life, beyond the fact that in 1580 he was in the service of Thomas Goodere of Collingham,...
noted in Poly-Olbion
Poly-Olbion
The Poly-Olbion is a topographical poem describing England and Wales. Written by Michael Drayton and published in 1612, it was reprinted with a second part in 1622. Drayton had been working on the project since at least 1598.-Content:...
(1612). The wealth generated by the wool trade throughout the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
financed the construction of many fine churches; consequently, Norwich still has more medieval churches than any other city in Western Europe north of the Alps
Alps
The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....
. Throughout this period Norwich established wide-ranging trading links with other parts of Europe, its markets stretching from Scandinavia
Scandinavia
Scandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...
to Spain and the city housing a Hanseatic
Hanseatic League
The Hanseatic League was an economic alliance of trading cities and their merchant guilds that dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe...
warehouse. To organise and control its export to the Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
, Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
, as the port for Norwich, was designated one of the staple ports under terms of the 1353 Statute of the Staple
Statute of the Staple
The Statute of the Staple was a statute passed in 1353 by the Parliament of England. It aimed to regularise the status of staple ports in England, Wales, and Ireland. In particular, it designated particular ports where specific goods could be exported or imported...
.
By the middle of the 14th century the city walls
Defensive wall
A defensive wall is a fortification used to protect a city or settlement from potential aggressors. In ancient to modern times, they were used to enclose settlements...
, about two and a half miles (4 km) long, had been completed. These, along with the river, enclosed a larger area than that of the City of London
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
. However, when the city walls were constructed it was made illegal to build outside them, inhibiting expansion of the city.
Around this time, the city was made a county corporate
County corporate
A county corporate or corporate county was a type of subnational division used for local government in England, Ireland and Wales.Counties corporate were created during the Middle Ages, and were effectively small self-governing counties...
and became capital of one of the most densely populated and prosperous counties of England.
Early Modern Period (1485–1640)
Hand-in-hand with the wool industry, this key religious centre experienced a Reformation significantly different to other parts of England. Muriel McClendon describes a Tudor Norwich whose magistracy unusually found ways of managing religious discord whilst maintaining civic harmony.The year 1549 saw an unprecedented urban rebellion, which unlike popular challenges elsewhere in the Tudor period, appears to have been Protestant in nature. For several weeks Kett's rebels took control of industrial Norwich in support of cloth workers suffering the hunger associated with a deep trade recession. Unusually in England it divided a city and appears to have linked Protestantism with the plight of the urban poor. In the case of Norwich this process was underscored by the arrival of Dutch and Flemish 'Strangers
Elizabethan Strangers
The Elizabethan Strangers, often referred to as just the Strangers, were a group of Protestant refugees seeking political asylum from the Catholic Low Countries, who settled in and around Norwich...
' fleeing Catholic persecution and eventually numbering as many as one third of the city's population. Perhaps in response to Kett, Norwich became the first provincial city to initiate compulsory payments for a civic scheme of poor relief, which Pound claims led to its wider introduction, forming the basis of the later Elizabethan Poor Law of 1597–8.
The great 'Stranger' immigration of 1567 brought a substantial Flemish
Flanders
Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...
and Walloon
Walloons
Walloons are a French-speaking people who live in Belgium, principally in Wallonia. Walloons are a distinctive community within Belgium, important historical and anthropological criteria bind Walloons to the French people. More generally, the term also refers to the inhabitants of the Walloon...
community of Protestant weavers to Norwich, where they are said to have been made welcome. Norwich has traditionally been the home of various dissident minorities, notably the French Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
and the Belgian Walloon
Walloons
Walloons are a French-speaking people who live in Belgium, principally in Wallonia. Walloons are a distinctive community within Belgium, important historical and anthropological criteria bind Walloons to the French people. More generally, the term also refers to the inhabitants of the Walloon...
communities in the 16th and 17th centuries. The merchant's house—now a museum—which was their earliest base in the city is still known as 'Strangers' Hall'. It seems that the Strangers were integrated into the local community without a great deal of animosity, at least among the business fraternity who had the most to gain from their skills. The arrival of the Strangers in Norwich bolstered trade with mainland Europe, fostering a movement toward religious reform and radical politics in the city.
The Norwich Canary
Domestic Canary
The Domestic Canary, often simply known as the canary, is a domesticated form of the wild Canary, a small songbird in the finch family originating from the Macaronesian Islands ....
was first introduced into England by Flemish refugees fleeing from Spanish persecution in the 16th century. They brought with them not only advanced techniques in textile working but also their pet canaries, which they began to breed locally, the little yellow bird eventually to become, in the 20th century, the city's most beloved mascot. The canary is the emblem of the city's football club, Norwich City F.C.
Norwich City F.C.
Norwich City Football Club is an English professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk. As of the 2011–12 season, Norwich City are again playing in the Premier League after a six-year absence, having finished as runner up in the Championship in 2010–11 and winning automatic promotion.The...
, nicknamed "The Canaries".
Printing was introduced to the city by Anthony de Solempne, one of the 'Strangers' in 1567 but did not become established and had died out by about 1572.
English Civil Wars to Victorian Era
Across the Eastern Counties Cromwell's powerful Eastern Association was eventually dominant. However, to begin with, there had been a large element of Royalist sympathy within Norwich, which seems to have experienced a continuity of its two-sided political tradition throughout the civil-war period. Bishop Matthew Wrenn was a forceful supporter of Charles I; nonetheless Parliamentary recruitment took hold, and a strong Royalist party was stifled by a lack of commitment from the aldermen, and isolation from Royalist-held regions. Serious inter-factional disturbances culminated in 'The Great Blow' of 1648 when Parliamentary forces tried to quell a Royalist riot. The latter's gunpowder was set off by accident in the city centre, causing mayhem. (According to Hopper qv, the explosion 'ranks among the largest of the century'.)Stoutly defended though East Anglia was by the parliamentary army, there are said to have been pubs in Norwich where the King's health was still drunk and the name of the Protector sung to ribald verse.At the cost of some discomfort to the Mayor, a Royalist, and the bishop, Joseph Hall, a moderate, was targeted because of his position as bishop.
Distinguishing Norwich in the period following the Restoration of 1660 and throughout the ensuing century was that it was the golden age of its cloth industry, comparable only to those of the West Country and Yorkshire. But unlike other cloth-manufacturing regions, Norwich weaving brought greater urbanisation; being substantially concentrated in the surrounds of the city itself, creating an urban society, with features such as leisure time, alehouses, and other public fora which provided opportunities for debate and argument.
Writing of the early-18th century Pound describes the city's rich cultural life, the winter-theatre season, the festivities accompanying the summer assizes, and other popular entertainments. Norwich was the wealthiest town in England with a sophisticated poor-relief system, and a large influx of foreign refugees. Despite having suffered severe episodes of plague, the city had a population of almost 30,000. Whilst this made Norwich unique in England it placed her in the company of about fifty cities in Europe. In some, like Lyon or Dresden, this was, as in the case of Norwich, linked to an important proto-industry, such as textiles or china pottery; in some, such as Vienna, Madrid or Dublin,to the city's status as an administrative capital; in others such as Antwerp, Marseilles or Cologne to its positioning on an important trade route of sea or river.
However Norwich of the late-17th century was as ever riven politically. Humphrey Prideaux, dean of the cathedral in 1681, described 'two factions, Whig and Tory...and both contend for their way with the utmost violence'. Nor did the city accept the outcome of the 1688 Glorious Revolution
Glorious Revolution
The Glorious Revolution, also called the Revolution of 1688, is the overthrow of King James II of England by a union of English Parliamentarians with the Dutch stadtholder William III of Orange-Nassau...
with a unified voice. The pre-eminent citizen, Bishop William Lloyd, would not take the oaths of allegiance to the new monarchs. One report has it that in 1704 the landlord of Fowler's alehouse 'with a glass of beer in hand, went down on his knees and drank a health to James the third, wishing the Crowne (sic) well and settled on his head' 'Never was a city in the miserable kingdom so wretchedly divided as this' said the London Post.
In 1716, at a play at the New Inn, the Pretender was cheered and the audience booed and hissed every time King George's name was mentioned. In 1722 supporters of the king were said to be 'hiss'd at and curst as they go in the streets', and in 1731 'a Tory mobb, in a great body, went through several parts of this city, in a riotous manner, cursing and abusing such as they knew to be friends of the government'. But the Whigs gradually gained control and by the 1720s they had successfully petitioned parliament to allow all adult males working in the textile industry to take up the freedom, on the correct assumption that they would vote Whig. But it had the effect of boosting the city's popular Jacobitism, says Knights (qv),and contests of the kind described continued in Norwich well into a period in which political stability had been discerned at a national level, and the city's Jacobitism perhaps only ended from 1745, well after it had ceased to be a significant movement outside of Scotland. Despite the Highlanders reaching Derby, and Norwich citizens mustering themselves into an association to protect the city, some Tories refused and the vestry of St Peter Mancroft resolved that it would not ring its bells to summon the defence. But it was the end of the road for Norwich Jacobites, and the Whigs organised a massive celebration following Culloden.
What the events of this period illustrate is that precursory to an organised radical movement Norwich had had a strong tradition of popular protest favouring Church and Stuarts and attached to the street and alehouse. Knights qv tells how in 1716 the mayoral election had ended in a riot, 'with both sides throwing 'brick-ends and great paving stones' at each other. A renowned Jacobite watering-hole, the Blue Bell Inn (nowadays The Bell Hotel), owned in the early-18th century by the high-church Helwys family, in the 1790s became the central rendez-vous point of the Norwich Revolution Society!
Britain's first provincial newspaper, the Norwich Post , had been published in 1701. By 1726 there were rival Whig and Tory presses and even in mid-century some parishes had three quarters of the males as literate. In Norwich alehouses 281 clubs and societies met in 1701, and at least 138 more were formed before 1758. The Theatre Royal had opened in 1758 adding to the city's stage productions in inns, and puppet shows in rowdy alehouses. In 1750 Norwich could boast nine booksellers and after 1780 a 'growing number of circulating and subscription libraries'. Knights says: '[All this] made for a lively political culture, in which independence from governmental lines was particularly strong, evident in campaigns against the war with America and for reform...in which trade and the impact of war with Revolutionary France were key ingredients. The open and contestable structure of local government, the press, the clubs and societies, and dissent all ensured that politics overlapped with communities bound by economics, religion, ideology and print in a world in which public opinion could not be ignored.'
Amidst this metropolitan culture the city burghers had built a sophisticated political structure. Freemen, who not only had the right to trade but to vote at elections, numbered about 2,000 in 1690, rising to over 3,300 by the mid-1730s. With growth partly the result of political manipulation, their numbers did at one point reach one third of the adult male population. This was notoriously the age of 'rotten' and 'pocket' boroughs, and Norwich was unusual in having such a high proportion of its citizens able to vote. 'Of the political centres where the Jacobin propaganda had penetrated most deeply', says E.P.Thompson, 'only Norwich and Nottingham had a franchise deep enough to allow radicals to make use of the electoral process.' 'Apart from London, Norwich was probably still the largest of those boroughs which were democratically governed', says Jewson, describing other towns under the control of a single fiefdom. In Norwich, he says, a powerful Anglican Establishment, symbolised by the Cathedral and the great church of St Peter Mancroft was matched by scarcely less powerful congeries of Dissenters headed by the wealthy literate body [of Unitarians] worshipping at the Octagon Chapel
Octagon Chapel, Norwich
The Octagon Chapel is a Unitarian Chapel located in Colegate in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It is home to a growing liberal religious community, welcoming people of all religious faiths and none. The congregation is a member of the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.The chapel...
.'
Moreover in the midst of political disorders of the late-18th century, Norwich intellectual life flourished. And it contained one, so far unmentioned, characteristic. Harriet Martineau writes of the city's literati of the period, which included such people as William Taylor, one of the first German scholars in England. The city 'boasted of her intellectual supper-parties, where, amidst a pedantry which would now make laughter hold both his sides, there was much that was pleasant and salutary: and finally she called herself The Athens of England.
Notwithstanding Norwich's hitherto industrial prosperity, by the 1790s the wool trade was experiencing intense competition. It came from both Yorkshire woollens, and increasingly from Lancashire cottons. The effects were aggravated by the loss of continental markets after Britain went to war with France in 1793. The early-19th century would see deindustrialisation accompanied by bitter squabbles. The 1820s would be marked with wage cuts and personal recrimination against owners. Thus amid the rich commercial and cultural heritage that was its recent past, there lurked in the alleys of 1790s Norwich an unwelcome stranger, incipient decline; exacerbated by a serious trade recession.
As early in the war as 1793 a major city manufacturer and government supporter, Robert Harvey, had complained of low order books, languid trade and a doubling of the poor rate. As with many generations of their Norwich forbears, the hungry poor took their complaints on to the streets. Hayes describes a meeting of 200 people in a Norwich public house, at which 'Citizen Stanhope' spoke. The gathering is said to have '[roared its] applause at Stanhope's declaration that the Ministers, unless they changed their policy ' deserved to have their heads brought to the block; – and if there was a people still in England, the event might turn out to be so.' Hayes says that 'the outbreak of war, in bringing the worsted manufacture almost to a standstill and so plunging the mass of the Norwich weavers into sudden distress made it almost inevitable that a crude appeal to working-class resentment should take the place of a temperate process of education which the earliest reformers had intended'.
However by 1795 it was not just the Norwich rabble which was causing the government concern. In April that year the Norwich Patriotic Society was established, its manifesto declaring 'that the great end of civil society was general happiness; that every individual...had a right to share in the government...' In December the price of bread reached its highest yet, and in May 1796, when William Windham was forced to seek re-election following his appointment as war secretary, he only just held his seat. Amid the same disorder and violence as was often the case with Norwich elections, it was only by the narrowest of margins that the radical Bartlett Gurney, campaigning on the platform of: 'Peace and Gurney – No More War – No more Barley Bread'failed to unseat him.
Though informed by issues of recent national importance, the vibrant two-sided political culture of Norwich in the 1790s cannot be totally disconnected from local tradition.Two features stand out from a political continuum of three centuries. The first is the dichotomous power balance. From at least the time of the Reformation, there is a record of Norwich as a 'two-party city'. In the mid-16th century the weaving parishes actually fell under the control of opposition forces, as Kett's rebels held the north of the river, in support of poor cloth workers.
Secondly there does seem to be some case for saying that with this tradition of two-sided disputation, the city had over a long period of time developed an infrastructure, evident in her many cultural and institutional networks of politics, religion, society, news media and the arts, whereby argument could be managed short of outright confrontation. indeed at a time of hunger and tension on the Norwich streets, with the alehouse crowds ready to have 'a Minister's head brought to the block', that, unusually in England, the Anglican and Dissenting clergy were doing their best to conduct a collegiate dialogue, seeking common ground, and reinforcing the same well-mannered civic tradition of consensus as that illustrated by historians of earlier periods.
In 1797 Thomas Bignold
Thomas Bignold
Thomas Bignold was the founder of Norwich Union, now known as Aviva plc, one of the United Kingdom's largest insurance businesses.-Career:...
, a 36-year-old wine merchant and banker, founded the first Norwich Union Society
Norwich Union
Norwich Union was the name given to insurance company Aviva's British arm before June 2009. It was originally established in 1797. It is the biggest life insurance provider in the United Kingdom, and has a strong position in motor insurance...
. Some years earlier, when he moved from Kent to Norwich, Bignold had been unable to find anyone willing to insure him against the threat from highwaymen. With the entrepreneurial thought that nothing was impossible, and aware that in a city built largely of wood the threat of fire was uppermost in people's minds, Bignold formed the "Norwich Union Society for the Insurance of Houses, Stock and Merchandise from Fire". The new business, which became known as the Norwich Union Fire Insurance Office, was a "mutual" enterprise. Norwich Union was later to become the country's largest insurance giant.
From earliest times, Norwich was a centre of textile manufacture. Towards the end of the 18th century, in the 1780s, the manufacture of Norwich shawl
Shawl
A shawl is a simple item of clothing, loosely worn over the shoulders, upper body and arms, and sometimes also over the head. It is usually a rectangular or square piece of cloth, that is often folded to make a triangle but can also be triangular in shape...
s became an important industry and remained so for nearly one hundred years. The shawls were a high-quality fashion product and rivalled those made in other towns such as Paisley
Paisley
Paisley is the largest town in the historic county of Renfrewshire in the west central Lowlands of Scotland and serves as the administrative centre for the Renfrewshire council area...
(which entered shawl manufacture in about 1805, some 20 or more years after Norwich). With changes in women's fashion in the later Victorian period, the popularity of shawls declined and eventually manufacture ceased. Examples of Norwich shawls are now highly sought after by collectors of textiles.
Norwich's geographical isolation was such that until 1845 when a railway connection was established, it was often quicker to travel to Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
by boat than to London.
Samuel Morton Peto
Sir Samuel Morton Peto, 1st Baronet was an English entrepreneur and civil engineer in the 19th century. A partner in Grissell and Peto, he managed construction firms that built many major buildings and monuments in London...
, who also built the line to Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
.
From 1808 to 1814 Norwich hosted a station in the shutter telegraph chain which connected the Admiralty
Admiralty
The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the Kingdom of England, and later in the United Kingdom, responsible for the command of the Royal Navy...
in London to its naval ships in the port of Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
.
20th century
In the early part of the 20th century Norwich still had several major manufacturing industries. Among these were the manufacture of shoes (for example the Start-riteStart-rite
Start-rite is a brand of children's footwear.The shoemaker, purportedly Britain's oldest and one of the first manufacturers in Norfolk, was established in 1792 in Norwich, England, by James Smith....
or Van Dal brands), clothing, joinery, and structural engineering as well as aircraft design and manufacture. Important employers included Boulton & Paul, Barnards (inventors of machine produced wire netting), and electrical engineers Laurence Scott and Electromotors.
Norwich also has a long association with chocolate manufacture, primarily through the local firm of Caley's, which began as a manufacturer and bottler of mineral water and later diversified into making chocolate and Christmas crackers. The Caley's cracker-manufacturing business was taken over by Tom Smith in 1953, and the Norwich factory in Salhouse Road eventually closed down in 1998. Caley's was acquired by Mackintosh in the 1930s, and merged with Rowntree's
Rowntree's
Rowntree's was a confectionery business based in York, England. It is now a historic brand owned by Nestlé, used to market a range of fruit gums and pastilles formerly owned by Rowntree's. Following a merger with John Mackintosh & Co., the Company became known as Rowntree Mackintosh, was listed on...
in 1969 to become Rowntree-Mackintosh. Finally, it was bought by Nestlé
Nestlé
Nestlé S.A. is the world's largest food and nutrition company. Founded and headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland, Nestlé originated in a 1905 merger of the Anglo-Swiss Milk Company, established in 1867 by brothers George Page and Charles Page, and Farine Lactée Henri Nestlé, founded in 1866 by Henri...
and closed down in 1996 with all operations moved to York
York
York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...
; ending a 120-year association with Norwich. The demolished factory stood on the site of what is now the Chapelfield development. Caley's chocolate has since made a reappearance as a brand in the city, although it is no longer made in Norwich.
HMSO, once the official publishing and stationery arm of the British government and one of the largest print buyers, printers and suppliers of office equipment in the UK, moved most of its operations from London to Norwich in the 1970s.
Jarrolds
Jarrolds
Jarrolds is a large, family run department store in Norwich, England. It is situated at the corner of Exchange Street and London Street. The business was founded in 1770 in Woodbridge in Suffolk, moving to Norwich in 1823. The current building was designed by George John Skipper between 1903-5...
, established in 1810, was a nationally well-known printer and publisher. In 2004, after nearly 200 years, it passed out of family ownership. Today, the Jarrold name is now best-known and recognised as being that of Norwich's only independent department store
Department store
A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...
.
The city was home to a long-established tradition of brewing, with several large breweries
Brewery
A brewery is a dedicated building for the making of beer, though beer can be made at home, and has been for much of beer's history. A company which makes beer is called either a brewery or a brewing company....
continuing in business into the second half of the century. The main brewers were Morgans, Steward and Patteson, Youngs Crawshay and Youngs, Bullard and Son, and the Norwich Brewery. Despite takeovers and consolidation in the 1950s and 1960s in attempts to remain viable, by the 1970s only the Norwich Brewery (owned by Watney Mann
Watney Combe & Reid
Watney Combe & Reid was a leading brewing business in London. At its peak in the 1930s it was a constituent of the FT30 index of leading companies on the London Stock Exchange. It produced the beer brand Watney's Red Barrel.-The Stag Brewery:...
and on the site of Morgans) remained. In 1985 the Norwich Brewery closed, and was subsequently demolished. Small-scale brewing continues in Norwich in "microbreweries"
Microbrewery
A microbrewery or craft brewer is a brewery which produces a limited amount of beer, and is associated by consumers with innovation and uniqueness....
.
Norwich suffered extensive bomb damage during World War II, affecting large parts of the old city centre and Victorian terrace housing around the centre. Industry and the rail infrastructure also suffered. The heaviest raids occurred on the nights of 27/28th and 29/30 April 1942; as part of the Baedeker raids (so called because Baedeker's series of tourist guides to the British Isles
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...
were used to select propaganda-rich targets of cultural and historic significance rather than strategic importance). Lord Haw-Haw
Lord Haw-Haw
Lord Haw-Haw was the nickname of several announcers on the English-language propaganda radio programme Germany Calling, broadcast by Nazi German radio to audiences in Great Britain on the medium wave station Reichssender Hamburg and by shortwave to the United States...
made reference to the imminent destruction of Norwich's new City Hall
City Hall, Norwich
Norwich City Hall is an Art Deco building completed in 1938 which houses the city hall for the city of Norwich, East Anglia, in Eastern England. It is one of the Norwich 12, a collection of twelve heritage buildings in Norwich deemed of particular historical and cultural importance.Norwich City...
(completed in 1938), although in the event it survived unscathed. Significant targets hit included the Morgan's Brewery building, Coleman's Wincarnis works, City Station
Norwich City railway station
Norwich City railway station was located in Norwich, England and is now closed.-History:The station was opened in 1882 by the Lynn and Fakenham Railway, and later became the southern terminus of the Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway line from Melton Constable...
, the Mackintosh chocolate factory, and shopping areas including St. Stephen's Street, St. Benedict's Street, the site of Bond's department store
Department store
A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...
(now John Lewis
John Lewis (department store)
-Recent developments:In June 2004, John Lewis announced plans to open its first store in Northern Ireland at the Sprucefield Park development, the province's largest out of town shopping centre, located outside Lisburn and from Belfast. The application was approved in June 2005 and the opening of...
) and Curl's department store (now Debenhams
Debenhams
Debenhams plc is a British retailer operating under a department store format in the UK, Ireland and Denmark, and franchise stores in other countries. The Company was founded in the eighteenth century as a single store in London and has now grown to around 160 shops...
).
In 1976 the city's pioneering spirit was on show when Motum Road in Norwich, allegedly the scene of "a number of accidents over the years", became the third road in Britain to be equipped with "speed bumps", intended to encourage adherence to the road's 30 mph (48 km/h) speed limit. The humps, installed at intervals of 50 and 150 yards, stretched twelve feet across the width of the road and their curved profile was, at its highest point, 4 inches (10 cm) high. The responsible quango
Transport Research Laboratory
TRL is a British transport consultancy and research organisation based at Wokingham Berkshire with approximately 500 staff. TRL is owned by the Transport Research Foundation , which is overseen by 80 sector members from the transport industry. TRL also own small UK regional offices situated in...
gave an assurance that the experimental devices would be removed not more than one year following installation.
Governance
Since 1974Local Government Act 1972
The Local Government Act 1972 is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974....
, Norwich has had two tiers of local government
Local government in the United Kingdom
The pattern of local government in England is complex, with the distribution of functions varying according to the local arrangements. Legislation concerning local government in England is decided by the Parliament and Government of the United Kingdom, because England does not have a devolved...
. The upper tier is Norfolk County Council, which provides "wide area" strategic services such as education, social services and libraries. The lower tier is Norwich City Council, which provides more local services such as housing, planning and leisure facilities.
County council
Norwich returns 13 county councillors to the eighty-four member county council. The city is divided into single-member electoral divisions, with all county councillors elected every four years. The most recent county elections in 2009United Kingdom local elections, 2009
The 2009 United Kingdom local elections were elections held to all 27 County Councils, three existing Unitary Authorities and five new Unitary Authorities, all in England, on 4 June 2009...
saw the election of 6 Green Party
Green Party of England and Wales
The Green Party of England and Wales is a political party in England and Wales which follows the traditions of Green politics and maintains a strong commitment to social progressivism. It is the largest Green party in the United Kingdom, containing within it various regional divisions including...
, 3 Liberal Democrat
Liberal Democrats
The Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform, progressive taxation, wealth taxation, human rights laws, cultural liberalism, banking reform and civil liberties .The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the...
, 2 Labour Party
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
and 2 Conservative
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
councillors. The county council has a large Conservative majority.
City council
Norwich City Council consists of 39 councillors, 3 representing each of 13 wards. Elections are held by thirds, with one councillor in each ward being elected annually (for a four year term) except in the year of county council elections. As of February 2010 the strength of parties on the council was: Labour Party 15, Green Party 13, Liberal Democrats 6 and Conservatives 5. The Labour Party forms a minority administration, holding all seats on the eight-member executive. Following the High Court decision that the order for a unitary council was unlawful, the 13 councillors who should have stood at the May election were told that they were no longer councillors. An election for these 13 seats was held on 9 September 2010. The Conservatives lost one seat to Labour, and the Liberal Democrats lost one seat to the Greens, resulting a new council composition of 16 Labour, 14 Green, five Liberal Democrat and four Conservative.The current composition, as of the 5 May 2011 council elections, is:
| Party | Seats | |
|---|---|---|
| 18 | ||
| 15 | ||
| 4 | ||
| 2 | ||
Lord mayoralty and shrievalty
The civic head of Norwich City Council is the Lord Mayor. The office of mayor of Norwich dates from 1403. The office was raised to the dignity of lord mayor in 1910 by Edward VIIEdward VII of the United Kingdom
Edward VII was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910...
"in view of the position occupied by that city as the chief city of East Anglia and of its close association with His Majesty" The title was regranted on local government reorganisation in 1974.
From 1404 the citizens of Norwich, as a county corporate
County corporate
A county corporate or corporate county was a type of subnational division used for local government in England, Ireland and Wales.Counties corporate were created during the Middle Ages, and were effectively small self-governing counties...
, had the privilege of electing two sheriffs. Under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835
Municipal Corporations Act 1835
The Municipal Corporations Act 1835 – sometimes known as the Municipal Reform Act, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in the incorporated boroughs of England and Wales...
this number of sheriffs was reduced to one, and it became an entirely ceremonial post. Both lord mayor and sheriff are elected at the council's annual meeting.
Coat of arms
The city council's arms consist of a red shield on which is placed a silver domed castle above a royal lion. The blazonBlazon
In heraldry and heraldic vexillology, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct the appropriate image...
of the arms is:
Gules, a castle triple-towered and domed Argent; in base a lion passant guardant Or.
The arms appeared on a 15th century seal, and were confirmed during a heraldic visitation
Heraldic visitation
Heraldic Visitations were tours of inspection undertaken by Kings of Arms in England, Wales and Ireland in order to regulate and register the coats of arms of nobility and gentry and boroughs, and to record pedigrees...
in 1562 by William Harvey
William Harvey (officer of arms)
William Harvey was born June 1510 to Turner and Mary Harvey in Ashill, Somerset. He was an only child. According to the Dictionary of National Biography vol 1-20, 22, William Harvey became a junior officer of the college of arms and was appointed the Bluemantle Pursuivant in ordinary on 18th June...
, Clarenceux King of Arms
Clarenceux King of Arms
Clarenceux King of Arms is an officer of arms at the College of Arms in London. Clarenceux is the senior of the two provincial kings of arms and his jurisdiction is that part of England south of the River Trent. The office almost certainly existed in 1420, and there is a fair degree of...
. The royal lion was, according to Wilfrid Scott-Giles
Wilfrid Scott-Giles
Charles Wilfred Scott-Giles was an English officer of arms.Charles Wilfrid Giles was educated at Emanuel School and Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, where he read history between 1919 and 1922...
, "said to have been granted by Edward III
Edward II of England
Edward II , called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed by his wife Isabella in January 1327. He was the sixth Plantagenet king, in a line that began with the reign of Henry II...
". By the 19th century the city corporation had added supporters, two angels, to the arms, which were surmounted by a fur cap. These apparently originated in a carving of about 1534 outside Norwich Guildhall. A C Fox Davies
Arthur Charles Fox-Davies
Arthur Charles Fox-Davies was a British author on heraldry. By profession, he was a barrister but he also worked as a journalist and novelist.Born in Bristol, he was the second son of T...
noted that "whether or not these figures were then intended for heraldic supporters is a matter for dispute. At any rate there is no official authority for their use".
Local government reform in 1974 saw the abolition of the county borough
County borough
County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland , to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control. They were abolished by the Local Government Act 1972 in England and Wales, but continue in use for lieutenancy and shrievalty in...
of Norwich and its replacement by a new Norwich City Council. An Order in Council transferred the ancient coat of arms (the shield alone) to the present authority. The city council has also received the grant of an heraldic badge
Heraldic badge
A heraldic badge is an emblem or personal device worn as a badge to indicate allegiance to or the property of an individual or family. Medieval forms are usually called a livery badge, and also a cognizance...
, depicting the seal of 1404 encircled by the lord mayor's chain.
Unitary status – proposal and failure
In October 2006, the Department for Communities and Local GovernmentDepartment for Communities and Local Government
The Department for Communities and Local Government is the UK Government department for communities and local government in England. It was established in May 2006 and is the successor to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, established in 2001...
produced a Local Government White Paper
White paper
A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that helps solve a problem. White papers are used to educate readers and help people make decisions, and are often requested and used in politics, policy, business, and technical fields. In commercial use, the term has also come to refer to...
inviting councils to submit proposals for unitary restructuring. Norwich submitted its proposal in January 2007, which was rejected in December 2007, as it did not meet all the rigorous criteria for acceptance. In February 2008, the Boundary Committee for England
Boundary Committee for England
The Boundary Committee for England was a statutory committee of the Electoral Commission, an independent body set up by the UK Parliament. The Committee’s aim was to conduct thorough, consultative and robust reviews of local government areas in England, and for its recommendations to be...
, (from 1 April 2010 incorporated in the Local Government Boundary Commission for England
Local Government Boundary Commission for England
The Local Government Boundary Commission for England a body established to review boundaries of local government areas in England and their electoral arrangements.-History and establishment:...
), was then asked to consider alternative proposals for the whole or part of Norfolk, including whether Norwich should become a unitary authority
Unitary authority
A unitary authority is a type of local authority that has a single tier and is responsible for all local government functions within its area or performs additional functions which elsewhere in the relevant country are usually performed by national government or a higher level of sub-national...
, separate from Norfolk County Council. In December 2009, the Boundary Committee recommended a single unitary authority covering all of Norfolk, including Norwich.
However, on 10 February 2010, it was announced that, contrary to the December 2009 recommendation of the Boundary Committee, Norwich would be given separate unitary status. The proposed change was strongly resisted, principally by Norfolk County Council and the Conservative opposition in Parliament. Reacting to the announcement, Norfolk County Council issued a statement that it would seek leave to challenge the decision in the courts. A letter was leaked to the local media, in which the Permanent Secretary for the Department for Communities and Local Government noted that the decision did not meet all the criteria and that the risk of it "being successfully challenged in judicial review proceedings is very high". The Shadow Local Government and Planning Minister, Bob Neill
Bob Neill
Robert James MacGillivray "Bob" Neill is a British barrister and Conservative Party politician. He has served as the Member of Parliament for Bromley and Chislehurst since a by-election on 29 June 2006...
, stated that should the Conservative Party
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
win the 2010 general election, they would reverse the decision.
Following the 2010 general election, Eric Pickles was appointed Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government
Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government
The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, is a Cabinet position heading the UK's Department for Communities and Local Government....
on 12 May 2010 in a Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition government
Cameron Ministry
David Cameron is Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, after being invited by Queen Elizabeth II to form a new government after the resignation as Prime Minister of Gordon Brown on 11 May 2010. Leading a coalition government formed by the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats, the coalition...
. According to press reports, he instructed his department to take urgent steps to reverse the decision and maintain the status quo in line with the Conservative Party manifesto. However, the unitary plans were supported by the Liberal Democrat group on the city council, and by Simon Wright
Simon Wright
Simon Wright is an English drummer best known for his stints with rock n' roll bands AC/DC and Dio. He first started playing drums at the age of 13 and cites Cozy Powell, Tommy Aldridge and John Bonham as his greatest influences...
, LibDem MP for Norwich South, who intended to lobby the party leadership to allow the changes to go ahead.
The Local Government Act 2010
Local Government Act 2010
-External links:* – official page on UK Parliament website...
to reverse the unitary decision for Norwich (and Exeter and Suffolk) received Royal Assent on 16 December 2010. The disputed award of unitary status had meanwhile been referred to the High Court
High Court of Justice
The High Court of Justice is, together with the Court of Appeal and the Crown Court, one of the Senior Courts of England and Wales...
, and on 21 June 2010 the court (Mr. Justice Ouseley, judge) ruled it unlawful, and revoked it. The city has therefore failed to attain permanent unitary status.
Parliamentary representation
Since 1298, Norwich has been represented in the parliamentParliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...
by two members of parliament. Until 1950
Representation of the People Act 1948
The Representation of the People Act 1948 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that altered the law relating to parliamentary and local elections...
the city was an undivided constituency
Norwich (UK Parliament constituency)
Norwich was a borough constituency which was represented in the House of Commons of England from 1298 to 1707, in the House of Commons of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800, and in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom from 1801 until it was abolished for the 1950 general election...
, returning two MPs. Since that date the area has been divided between two single-member constituencies: Norwich North and Norwich South.
Both constituencies have proved to be marginal seats in recent elections; until 2010 switching between the Labour
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
and Conservative
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
parties:
- Norwich North, which includes some rural wards of BroadlandBroadlandBroadland is a local government district in Norfolk, England, named after the Norfolk Broads. Its council is based in Thorpe St Andrew, which is a suburb of the City of Norwich.-History:The district was formed on April 1, 1974 by the merger of St...
District, was held by Labour from 1966 to 1983 when it was gained by the Conservatives. Labour regained the seat in 1997, holding it until a by-election in 2009Norwich North by-election, 2009The 2009 Norwich North by-election was a by-election for the United Kingdom Parliament's House of Commons constituency of Norwich North. The by-election took place due to the resignation of Ian Gibson after being banned from standing as a Labour candidate for the next general election...
. The current MP is the Conservative, Chloe SmithChloe SmithChloe Rebecca Smith is a British politician and the Conservative Member of Parliament for Norwich North. She was elected to the seat in a by-election on 23 July 2009 following the resignation of Labour MP Ian Gibson after the MPs' expenses scandal.-Early life:Born in Ashford, Kent, she was aged 3...
. - Norwich South, which includes part of South NorfolkSouth NorfolkSouth Norfolk is a local government district in Norfolk, England. Its council is based in Long Stratton.-History:The district was formed on April 1, 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972, as a merger of Diss Urban District, Wymondham Urban District, Depwade Rural District, Forehoe and Henstead...
District, was held by Labour from 1966 to 1983 when it was gained by the Conservatives. Labour regained the seat in 1992, with Charles ClarkeCharles ClarkeCharles Rodway Clarke is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Norwich South from 1997 until 2010, and served as Home Secretary from December 2004 until May 2006.-Early life:...
as the incumbent MP. In the 2010 General ElectionUnited Kingdom general electionsThis is a list of United Kingdom general elections since the first in 1802. The members of the 1801–1802 Parliament had been elected to the former Parliament of Great Britain and Parliament of Ireland, before being co-opted to serve in the first Parliament of the United Kingdom, so that Parliament...
, Labour lost the seat to the Liberal DemocratsLiberal DemocratsThe Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform, progressive taxation, wealth taxation, human rights laws, cultural liberalism, banking reform and civil liberties .The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the...
, with Simon WrightSimon Wright (politician)Simon James Wright is a British Liberal Democrat politician, who was elected at the 2010 general election as the Member of Parliament for Norwich South, defeating incumbent Charles Clarke winning 29.7% of the votes cast....
becoming MP.
Economy
Norwich Union
Norwich Union was the name given to insurance company Aviva's British arm before June 2009. It was originally established in 1797. It is the biggest life insurance provider in the United Kingdom, and has a strong position in motor insurance...
) still dominates these, but has been joined by other insurance and financial services companies.
New developments on the former Boulton and Paul site include the Riverside entertainment complex with nightclubs and other venues featuring the usual national leisure brands. Nearby, the football stadium is being upgraded with more residential property development alongside the river Wensum.
Archant
Archant
Archant is a publishing company, based in Norwich, England, United Kingdom. The group publishes four daily newspapers, around 75 weekly newspapers, and 75 consumer and contract magazines....
, formerly known as Eastern Counties Newspapers (ECN) is a national publishing group that has grown out of the city's local newspaper, the Norwich Evening News
Norwich Evening News
The Norwich Evening News is a daily local newspaper published in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It covers the city and the surrounding suburbs, and is published by Archant. It is the best-selling newspaper in Norwich. As of 28 February 2011 this paper will be out for 6 am, as the stories are written...
and the regional Eastern Daily Press
Eastern Daily Press
The Eastern Daily Press, commonly referred to as the EDP, is a regional newspaper covering Norfolk, and northern parts of Suffolk and eastern Cambridgeshire, and is published daily in Norwich, UK....
(EDP).
Norwich has long been associated with the manufacture of mustard
Mustard (condiment)
Mustard is a condiment made from the seeds of a mustard plant...
. The world famous Colman's
Colman's
Colman's is a UK manufacturer of mustard and various other sauces, based at Carrow, in Norwich, Norfolk. Presently an operational division of the multinational Unilever company, Colman's is one of the oldest existing food brands, famous for a limited range of products, almost all varieties of...
brand, with its yellow packaging, was founded in 1814 and continues to operate from its factory at Carrow. Colman's is now being exported world wide by its parent company Unilever
Unilever
Unilever is a British-Dutch multinational corporation that owns many of the world's consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products....
(Unilever UK Export) putting Norwich on the map of British heritage brands. The Colman's Mustard Shop, which sells Colman's products and related gifts, is located in the Royal Arcade in the centre of Norwich.
Norwich's night-time economy of bars and nightclubs is mainly located in Tombland, Prince of Wales Road and the Riverside area adjacent to Norwich railway station.
Retail
Norwich was the eighth most prosperous shopping destination in the UK in 2006. Norwich has an ancient market place, established by the Normans between 1071 and 1074, which is today the largest six-days-a-week open-air market in England. The market has recently been downsized and undergone redevelopment, and the new market stalls have proved controversial: with 20% less floorspace than the original stalls, higher rental and other charges, and inadequate rainwater handling, they have been unpopular with many stallholders and customers alike. Indeed, the local Norwich Evening NewsNorwich Evening News
The Norwich Evening News is a daily local newspaper published in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It covers the city and the surrounding suburbs, and is published by Archant. It is the best-selling newspaper in Norwich. As of 28 February 2011 this paper will be out for 6 am, as the stories are written...
characterises Norwich Market as an ongoing conflict between the market traders and Norwich City Council
City council
A city council or town council is the legislative body that governs a city, town, municipality or local government area.-Australia & NZ:Because of the differences in legislation between the States, the exact definition of a City Council varies...
, which operates the market.
The Mall Norwich (Castle Mall until 2007), a shopping mall designed by local practice Lambert, Scott & Innes and opened in 1993, presents an ingenious solution to the problem of sensitively accommodating new retail space in a historic city-centre environment—the building is largely concealed underground and built into the side of a hill, with a public park created on its roof in the area south of the Castle.
The new Chapelfield
Chapelfield
Chapelfield is a large indoor shopping mall located on the edge of Norwich city centre, on the site previously occupied by the Caleys chocolate factory....
shopping mall has been built on the site where the Caleys (later Rowntree Mackintosh and Nestlé
Nestlé
Nestlé S.A. is the world's largest food and nutrition company. Founded and headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland, Nestlé originated in a 1905 merger of the Anglo-Swiss Milk Company, established in 1867 by brothers George Page and Charles Page, and Farine Lactée Henri Nestlé, founded in 1866 by Henri...
) chocolate factory once stood. Chapelfield opened in September 2005, featuring as its flagship department store House of Fraser
House of Fraser
House of Fraser is a British department store group with over 60 stores across the United Kingdom and Ireland. It was established in Glasgow, Scotland in 1849 as Arthur and Fraser. By 1891 it was known as Fraser & Sons. The company grew steadily during the early 20th century, but after the Second...
. Detractors have criticised Chapelfield as unnecessary and damaging to local businesses; its presence has prompted smaller retailers to band together to promote the virtues of independent shops. Despite this in August 2006 it was reported by the Javelin Group that Norwich was one of the top five retail destinations in the UK, and in October 2006 the city centre was voted the best in the UK, in a shopping satisfaction survey run by Goldfish Credit Card.
To the north of the city centre is the Anglia Square
Anglia Square Shopping Centre, Norwich
The Anglia Square shopping centre is located to the north of Norwich city centre. It is bounded by historic Magdalen and St Augustine's streets.- History :...
shopping centre. The centre and the surrounding area is to be redeveloped; demolition work was due to commence in 2010 after an archaeological dig (conducted in 2009 and due to the centre being located around the site of a Saxon fortified settlement). The new development is planned to be a mixture of shops and housing, unlike the original which consisted of offices, shops and a cinema. In February, 2009, it was announced that, due to the economic climate, plans for the area have been delayed and the developers are unable to say for certain when work will commence.
Culture
The University of East AngliaUniversity of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
on the outskirts of Norwich is, contrary to popular belief, not one of the so-called plate glass universities. The UEA along with Sussex University were both founded before Robbins Report
Robbins Report
The Robbins Report was commissioned by the British government and published in 1963. The Committee met from 1961 to 1963...
. UEA was founded in 1963, before the Robbins Report
Robbins Report
The Robbins Report was commissioned by the British government and published in 1963. The Committee met from 1961 to 1963...
. UEA adopted the city's motto of independence Do different and is especially well-known for its creative writing programme; established by Malcolm Bradbury
Malcolm Bradbury
Sir Malcolm Stanley Bradbury CBE was an English author and academic.-Life:Bradbury was the son of a railwayman. His family moved to London in 1935, but returned to Sheffield in 1941 with his brother and mother...
and Angus Wilson
Angus Wilson
Sir Angus Frank Johnstone Wilson, CBE was an English novelist and short story writer. He was awarded the 1958 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot and later received a knighthood for his services to literature.-Biography:Wilson was born in Bexhill, Sussex, England, to...
, its graduates include Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro OBE or ; born 8 November 1954) is a Japanese–English novelist. He was born in Nagasaki, Japan, and his family moved to England in 1960. Ishiguro obtained his Bachelor's degree from University of Kent in 1978 and his Master's from the University of East Anglia's creative writing...
and Ian McEwan
Ian McEwan
Ian Russell McEwan CBE, FRSA, FRSL is a British novelist and screenwriter, and one of Britain's most highly regarded writers. In 2008, The Times named him among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945"....
. The university campus is the home of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts
Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts
The Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts is an art gallery and museum located on the campus of the University of East Anglia, Norwich in the United Kingdom...
which houses a number of important art collections in many media. It is also well known for staging exhibitions of work on a wide range of diverse themes. The city also has a long-established (since 1845) art college, the Norwich University College of the Arts (formerly Norwich School of Art and Design), which is situated in the city centre. Additionally, the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital
Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital
The Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital is a National Health Service academic teaching hospital located on the off the A11 road and the Watton Road on the southern outskirts of Norwich, England....
on the city's periphery at Colney
Colney
Colney is a village in the western outskirts of Norwich in Norfolk, England. It is in the administrative district of South Norfolk. It covers an area of and had a population of 124 in 35 households at the 2001 census....
was opened in 2001.
The Forum, Norwich
The Forum is a community building in Norwich, Norfolk. It stands opposite from the St. Peter Mancroft Church. Designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners, the Forum was built as a millennium project for the East of England and finished in October 2001...
, designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners and opened in 2002 is a building designed to house the Millennium Library, a replacement for the Norwich Central Library building which burned down in 1994, and the regional headquarters and television centre for BBC East
BBC East
BBC East is the BBC English Region serving Norfolk, Suffolk, north Essex, Cambridgeshire, northern and central Hertfordshire, most of Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, and parts of Buckinghamshire.-Television:...
. The building provides a venue for exhibitions, concerts and events, although the city still lacks a dedicated concert venue.
The Millennium Library contains the 2nd Air Division
2nd Air Division
The 2d Air Division is an inactive United States Air Force organization. Its last assignment was with Military Airlift Command, assigned to Twenty-Third Air Force, being stationed at Hurlburt Field, Florida...
Memorial Library, a collection of material about American culture and the American relationship with East Anglia, especially the role of the United States Air Force
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
on UK air bases throughout the Second World War and Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. Much of the collection was lost in the 1994 fire, but the collection has been restored by contributions from many veterans of the war, both European and American.
Recent attempts to shed the backwater image of Norwich and market it as a popular tourist destination, as well as a centre for science, commerce, culture and the arts, have included the refurbishment of the Norwich Castle Museum
Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
and the opening of the Forum. The proposed new slogan for Norwich, England's Other City, has been the subject of much discussion and controversy—and it remains to be seen whether it will be finally adopted. A number of signs at the approaches to the city still display the traditional phrase—"Norwich—a fine city".
As part of ambitious aims to promote Norwich's heritage internationally, Norwich 12
Norwich 12
Norwich 12 is an initiative by Norwich Heritage Economic and Regeneration Trust to develop 12 of Norwich's most iconic buildings into an integrated family of heritage attractions which act as an internationally important showcase of English urban and cultural development over the last 1,000...
has been launched—a collection of listed buildings in Norwich. The group consists of: Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
, Norwich Cathedral, The Great Hospital
Great Hospital
The Great Hospital is a medieval hospital that has been serving the people of Norwich, Norfolk, England, since the 13th century. It is situated on a site in a bend of the River Wensum to the north-east of Norwich Cathedral. Bishop Walter de Suffield founded St. Giles's Hospital, as the hospital...
, The Halls – St Andrew's and Blackfriars'
St. Andrew's Hall, Norwich
St. Andrew's Hall and the adjoining Blackfriars' Hall is a Grade I listed building in Norwich, Norfolk, dating back to the 14th century. It has been used regularly for civic occasions since 1544, when the first Mayor's feast was held for the inauguration of Henry Fuller...
, The Guildhall, Dragon Hall
Dragon Hall, Norwich
Dragon Hall is a Grade 1 listed medieval merchant's trading hall located in King Street, Norwich, Norfolk close to the River Wensum. The Great Hall dates from around 1430 but some parts of the site, such as undercroft, are older. Archaeological research has shown evidence of 1,000 years of human...
, The Assembly House
The Assembly House
The Assembly House is a Georgian Grade I listed building located in Norwich, United Kingdom.Today, the Assembly House is used for weddings, conferences and exhibitions and is owned by a registered arts charity which supports a range of visual and performing arts activities...
, St James Mill, St John the Baptist RC Cathedral
St John the Baptist Cathedral, Norwich
The Cathedral Church of St John the Baptist is the Roman Catholic cathedral of the city of Norwich, Norfolk, England.The Cathedral, located on Earlham Road, was constructed between 1882 and 1910 to designs by George Gilbert Scott, Jr...
, Surrey House, City Hall
City Hall, Norwich
Norwich City Hall is an Art Deco building completed in 1938 which houses the city hall for the city of Norwich, East Anglia, in Eastern England. It is one of the Norwich 12, a collection of twelve heritage buildings in Norwich deemed of particular historical and cultural importance.Norwich City...
and The Forum
The Forum, Norwich
The Forum is a community building in Norwich, Norfolk. It stands opposite from the St. Peter Mancroft Church. Designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners, the Forum was built as a millennium project for the East of England and finished in October 2001...
.
In February 2010, it was announced that Norwich was among four finalists for the prestigious title of UK City of Culture
UK City of Culture
UK City of Culture is a designation given to a city in the United Kingdom for a period of one year. The aim of the initiative, which is administered by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, is to "build on the success of Liverpool's year as European Capital of Culture 2008, which had...
(a new designation), in 2013. However, on 15 July 2010, the city of Londonderry
Derry
Derry or Londonderry is the second-biggest city in Northern Ireland and the fourth-biggest city on the island of Ireland. The name Derry is an anglicisation of the Irish name Doire or Doire Cholmcille meaning "oak-wood of Colmcille"...
was pronounced the winner.
Art and music
Each year the Norfolk and Norwich FestivalNorfolk and Norwich Festival
Norfolk & Norwich Festival is an arts organisation based in Norwich, England which is primarily responsible for the eponymous international arts festival held in annually every May, with events also held throughout the wider county of Norfolk....
celebrates the arts, drawing many visitors into the city from all over eastern England. The Norwich Twenty Group
Norwich Twenty Group
The Norwich Twenty Group is a group of artists based in Norwich, England. The organization was formed in 1944 after a touring modern art exhibition came to Norwich Castle Museum. Spurred by the public outcry, twenty local young artists created the group to promote understanding of modern art in...
, founded in 1944, presents exhibitions of its members to promote awareness of modern art. Norwich was home to the first arts festival in Britain in 1772.
Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre is a live music venue, concert hall and theatre located in St. Benedict's Street in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has a capacity of 290 for standing music concerts and 120 for seated events. The centre also includes visual art galleries and multi media teaching facilities.The...
is a notable live music venue, concert hall and theatre located in St. Benedict's Street. The King of Hearts in Fye Bridge Street is another centre for art and music; although, as at April 2010, it is threatened with closure through lack of funding.
Norwich has a thriving music scene based around local venues such as the University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
, Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre is a live music venue, concert hall and theatre located in St. Benedict's Street in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has a capacity of 290 for standing music concerts and 120 for seated events. The centre also includes visual art galleries and multi media teaching facilities.The...
, The Waterfront, The Queen Charlotte (closed March 2010) and the Marquee. "Live" music, mostly contemporary musical genres, is also to be heard at a number of other public house
Public house
A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...
and club venues around the city. The city is host to many artists that have achieved national and international recognition such as Cord
Cord (band)
Cord are a four-piece band from Norfolk, UK. Originally signed by Island Records on a five album deal they were released from their contract in March 2007. The band's song "Go Either Way" is featured on the soundtrack for EA's video game Madden NFL 07...
, Serious Drinking
Serious Drinking
Serious Drinking were a humorous punk rock band from Norwich, England whose lyrical themes often covered football and drinking.-History:The band formed in February 1981, taking their name from a Sounds headline to an interview with The Cockney Rejects, with most members having met at the University...
, Tim Bowness
Tim Bowness
Tim Bowness is a singer/songwriter primarily known for his work as part of the band No-Man, a long-term project formed in 1987 with Porcupine Tree's Steven Wilson.-Music career:...
, Sennen
Sennen (band)
Sennen are a shoegazing band from Norwich, UK. They currently release records on the Hungry Audio label in the UK. They have also appeared on compilations on the Club AC30 and NROne record labels.-Biography:...
, Magoo
Magoo (band)
Magoo are an indie rock band who formed in Norfolk, England in 1992.-Biography:The band give their influences as Guided by Voices, Stereolab, Pavement, The Flaming Lips, and John Peel, and spent their early years playing local venues in the Norwich area....
, KaitO
KaitO
KaitO was an English indie rock band from Norwich, formed in 1996. Their music consisted of loud, pop-punk melodies combined with a unique mix of guitar effects...
, Mantoid, Teknikov and The Sadtowns.
Established record labels in Norwich include; All Sorted!?! Records, NR ONE, Hungry Audio
Hungry Audio
Hungry Audio is a Norwich/London based independent record label whose roster includes The Telescopes, Sennen, The Walk Off, The Aprons, Stuffy / The Fuses, My favorite, Mia Vigar and Master Solo....
, Burning Shed
Burning Shed
Burning Shed is an independent record label established in April 2001 by musicians Tim Bowness and Peter Chilvers, in association with duplication company manager and former Noisebox Records boss, Pete Morgan....
, MQ Projects, Wilde Club Records, Mummy Where's The Milkman and zine powerhouse/label What Would Henry Rollins Do?
British artist Stella Vine
Stella Vine
Stella Vine is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting with subject matter drawn from either her personal life of family, friends and school, or rock stars, royalty and celebrities.After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she left home and in...
lived in Norwich during her childhood, from the age of 7, and again later in her life with her son Jamie. Vine included the city in her large painting Welcome to Norwich a fine city (2006).
Museums
Norwich has a number of important museums which reflect both the rich history of the City and of Norfolk, as well as wider interests.The largest is Norwich Castle Museum
Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
. This contains extensive collections of archaeological finds from the county of Norfolk, art (including a fine collection of paintings by the Norwich School of painters), ceramics (including the largest collection of British teapots), silver, and Natural History. Of particular interest are dioramas of Norfolk scenery, showing wildlife and landscape. The Museum has been extensively remodelled to enhance the display of the many collections, and also hosts frequent temporary exhibitions of art and other subjects.
The Bridewell
Bridewell Palace
Bridewell Palace in London, originally a residence of King Henry VIII, later became a poorhouse and prison. The name "Bridewell" subsequently became synonymous with police stations and detention facilities in England and in Ireland...
Museum, in Bridewell Alley, has been closed since 2010 for a major redevelopment, and is not expected to re-open until Summer 2012. Previously, it was mainly devoted to displaying exhibits connected with the historic industries of Norwich. These include weaving, shoe and boot making, iron foundries and the manufacture of metal goods, engineering, milling, brewing, chocolate making and other food manufacturing.
Strangers' Hall, at Charing Cross, is one of the oldest buildings in Norwich, and is a merchant's house dating to the early 14th century. The many rooms are furnished and equipped in the styles of different eras, from the Early Tudor
Tudor period
The Tudor period usually refers to the period between 1485 and 1603, specifically in relation to the history of England. This coincides with the rule of the Tudor dynasty in England whose first monarch was Henry VII...
to the Late Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
. Exhibits include costumes and textiles, domestic objects of all sorts, and collections of children's toys and games, and of children's books. The latter two collections are considered to be of national importance.
The Royal Norfolk Regimental Museum
Royal Norfolk Regiment
The Royal Norfolk Regiment, originally formed as the Norfolk Regiment, was an infantry regiment of the British Army. The Norfolk Regiment was created on 1 July 1881 as the county regiment of Norfolk...
is housed in a part of what was the Shirehall, close to the Castle. Its exhibits illustrate the history of the Regiment from its 17th century origins to its incorporation into the Royal Anglian Regiment
Royal Anglian Regiment
The Royal Anglian Regiment is an infantry regiment of the British Army, part of the Queen's Division.The regiment was formed on 1 September 1964 as the first of the new large infantry regiments, through the amalgamation of the four regiments of the East Anglian Brigade.* 1st Battalion from the...
in 1964. There is an extensive and representative display of medals awarded to soldiers of the Regiment, including two of the six Victoria Cross
Victoria Cross
The Victoria Cross is the highest military decoration awarded for valour "in the face of the enemy" to members of the armed forces of various Commonwealth countries, and previous British Empire territories....
es won. It is planned for the Regimental Museum to remain in the Shirehall until September 2011, and thereafter it will close and reopen in the Norwich Castle Museum.
The City of Norwich Aviation Museum
City of Norwich Aviation Museum
The City of Norwich Aviation Museum is a volunteer run museum and charitable trust dedicated to the preservation of the aviation history of the county of Norfolk, England. The museum is located on the northern edge of Norwich International Airport and is reached by road through the village of...
is located at Horsham St. Faith, on the northern edge of the City and close to Norwich Airport
Norwich International Airport
Norwich International Airport , also known as Norwich Airport, is an airport in the City of Norwich within Norfolk, England north of the city centre and on the edge of the city's suburbs....
. There are static displays of both military and civil aircraft, together with various collections of exhibits, including one concerned with the United States 8th Army Air Force
Eighth Air Force
The Eighth Air Force is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Global Strike Command . It is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana....
.
The John Jarrold Printing
Printing
Printing is a process for reproducing text and image, typically with ink on paper using a printing press. It is often carried out as a large-scale industrial process, and is an essential part of publishing and transaction printing....
Museum, at Whitefriars, is dedicated to the history of printing and contains many examples of printing machinery, presses, books, and related equipment. Exhibits range in date from the early 19th century to the present day. Many were donated by Jarrold Printing.
Dragon Hall
Dragon Hall, Norwich
Dragon Hall is a Grade 1 listed medieval merchant's trading hall located in King Street, Norwich, Norfolk close to the River Wensum. The Great Hall dates from around 1430 but some parts of the site, such as undercroft, are older. Archaeological research has shown evidence of 1,000 years of human...
, in King Street, is a fine example of a medieval merchants trading hall. Mostly dating from about 1430, it is unique in Western Europe. The building has undergone a thorough restoration, re-opening in 2006. Its magnificent architecture is complemented by displays showing the history of the building and its role in the life of Norwich over the ages.
The Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service Costume
Costume
The term costume can refer to wardrobe and dress in general, or to the distinctive style of dress of a particular people, class, or period. Costume may also refer to the artistic arrangement of accessories in a picture, statue, poem, or play, appropriate to the time, place, or other circumstances...
and Textiles Study Centre, at Carrow House, in King Street, contains an extensive collection of more than 20,000 items, built up over a period of some 130 years, and which were previously kept in other Norwich museums. Although not a publicly-open museum in the usual sense, the collection is accessible to the general public, students, researchers and others by prior appointment. The Study Centre will be moving from Carrow House to the Shirehall in Autumn 2011, when the latter is vacated by The Royal Norfolk Regimental Museum on its transfer to Norwich Castle.
Theatres
Norwich has several theatres, ranging in seating capacity from 100 to 1300, and offering a wide variety of programmes.Theatre Royal, Norwich
The Theatre Royal is the largest theatre in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It presents a large range of drama, dance, comedy, music and other entertainment...
has been on its present site for nearly 250 years, through several rebuildings and many alterations. The 1300-seat theatre, the largest in the city, hosts a mix of national touring productions including musicals, dance, drama, family shows, stand-up comedians, opera and pop.
Norwich Playhouse
Norwich Playhouse
The Norwich Playhouse is a theatre in St George's Street, Norwich, Norfolk, England. It opened in 1995 in a nineteenth century building that was once a maltings, and is a venue for theatre, comedy, music and other performing arts. It seats 300. It has as its patron actor and comedian Stephen...
is a superb venue in the heart of the city and one of the most modern performance spaces of its size in East Anglia. The theatre has a seating capacity of 300.
The Maddermarket Theatre
Maddermarket Theatre
The Maddermarket Theatre is a British theatre located in St. John's Alley in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It was founded in 1921 by Nugent Monck.-Early history and conversion:...
opened in 1921 and was the first permanent recreation of an Elizabethan Theatre. The founder was Nugent Monck who had worked with William Poel. The Theatre is a world class Shakespearean style play house and has a seating capacity of 310.
Norwich Puppet Theatre
Norwich Puppet Theatre
The Norwich Puppet Theatre is a nationally unique venue dedicated to puppetry housed in the Medieval church of Saint James a Grade 1 listed building, in the city of Norwich, England....
was founded in 1979 by Ray and Joan DaSilva as a permanent base for their touring company and was first opened as a public venue in 1980, following the conversion of the medieval church of St. James in the heart of Norwich. Under subsequent artistic directors—Barry Smith and Luis Z. Boy—the theatre established its current pattern of operation. It is a nationally unique venue dedicated to puppetry, and currently houses a 185 seat raked auditorium, 50 seat Octagon Studio, workshops, an exhibition gallery, shop and licensed bar. It is the only theatre in the Eastern region with a year-round programme of family-centred entertainment.
The Garage
The Garage
The Garage may refer to:Places*The Garage , a small shopping center located in Harvard Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts*The Garage , a large night club located in Glasgow, Scotland...
studio theatre can seat up to 110 people in a range of different layouts. It can also be used for standing events and can accommodate up to 180 people. The high specification of equipment and design means that it is particularly versatile, and can be adapted to a variety of layouts offering a wide choice for performances or events.
The CCN Drama Centre is in the grounds of City College Norwich (CCN), and has a massive stage. The Theatre mainly plays host to Broadway style American musicals and has, in the past, presented shows such as Bugsy Malone
Bugsy Malone
Bugsy Malone is a 1976 musical film, very loosely based on events in New York City in the Prohibition era, specifically the exploits of gangsters like Al Capone and Bugs Moran, as dramatized in cinema...
and Copacabana
Copacabana (musical)
Copacabana is a TV-musical, stage musical, and nightclub show written by Barry Manilow, based on the song of the same name. The show toured the United States and, as of 2006, became available to license to performing companies and schools for the first time....
and in May 2010 saw the highly successful, Thirst Productions Guys and Dolls
Guys and Dolls
Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" and "Blood Pressure", two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, most notably...
.
The theatre is raked and seats about 220 people.
The Sewell Barn Theatre
Sewell Barn Theatre
Sewell Barn Theatre is located in the grounds of Sewell Park College on Constitution Hill in Norwich, England...
is the smallest theatre in Norwich and has a seating capacity of just 100. The auditorium features raked seating on three sides of an open acting space. This unusual staging helps to draw the audience deeply into the performance.
The Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre
Norwich Arts Centre is a live music venue, concert hall and theatre located in St. Benedict's Street in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has a capacity of 290 for standing music concerts and 120 for seated events. The centre also includes visual art galleries and multi media teaching facilities.The...
theatre opened in 1977 in St. Benedict's Street, and has a capacity of 290.
Parks, gardens and open spaces
See also List of parks, gardens and open spaces in NorwichChapelfield Gardens in central Norwich became the city's first public park in November 1880. From the start of the 20th century Norwich Corporation now Norwich City Council began buying and leasing land to develop parks when funds became available. Sewell Park
Sewell Park, Norwich
Sewell Park is a triangular-shaped park which lies between Constitution Hill and St. Clement's Hill in Norwich, Norfolk, England. The park was given to the Norwich Corporation and Norwich City Council as an open space by members of the Sewell family and former mayor E. G Buxton in 1908...
and James Stuart Gardens are examples of land donated by benefactors.
After World War I the corporation took advantage of government grants and made the decision to construct a series of formal parks as a means to alleviate unemployment. Under the guidance of Parks Superintendent Captain Sandys-Winsch four parks were completed; Heigham Park (1924), Wensum Park (1925), Eaton Park (1928), Waterloo Park (1933). These parks retain many features fron Sandys-Winsch's original plans and have been placed on the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.
Currently (2011), the city has 23 parks, 95 open spaces and 59 natural areas managed by the local authority. In addition there are several privately owned gardens which are occasionally opened to the public in aid of charity with the exception of the Plantation Garden
Plantation Garden, Norwich
The Plantation Garden is a restored Victorian town garden located in Earlham Road, Norwich, Norfolk.The Plantation Garden includes, a huge gothic fountain, flower beds, lawns, woodland walkways, rustic bridge, Italianate terrace, ‘Medieval’ terrace wall; and hundreds of architectural details...
located close to the St John the Baptist Cathedral
St John the Baptist Cathedral, Norwich
The Cathedral Church of St John the Baptist is the Roman Catholic cathedral of the city of Norwich, Norfolk, England.The Cathedral, located on Earlham Road, was constructed between 1882 and 1910 to designs by George Gilbert Scott, Jr...
which opens daily.
Architecture
Norwich has a wealth of historical architecture. The medieval period is represented by the 11th century Norwich CathedralNorwich Cathedral
Norwich Cathedral is a cathedral located in Norwich, Norfolk, dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Formerly a Catholic church, it has belonged to the Church of England since the English Reformation....
, 12th century castle
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
(now a museum) and a large number of parish church
Parish church
A parish church , in Christianity, is the church which acts as the religious centre of a parish, the basic administrative unit of episcopal churches....
es. During the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, 57 churches stood within the city wall; 31 still exist today. This gave rise to the common regional saying that it had a church for every week of the year, and a pub for every day. Most of the medieval buildings are in the city centre. Notable examples of secular
Secularity
Secularity is the state of being separate from religion.For instance, eating and bathing may be regarded as examples of secular activities, because there may not be anything inherently religious about them...
medieval architecture are Dragon Hall
Dragon Hall, Norwich
Dragon Hall is a Grade 1 listed medieval merchant's trading hall located in King Street, Norwich, Norfolk close to the River Wensum. The Great Hall dates from around 1430 but some parts of the site, such as undercroft, are older. Archaeological research has shown evidence of 1,000 years of human...
, built in about 1430, and The Guildhall, built 1407–1413, with later additions. From the 18th century the pre-eminent local name is Thomas Ivory
Thomas Ivory
-Life:He was admitted a freeman of Norwich as a carpenter 21 September 1745, and lived in the parish of St. Helen.He obtained a license for his company of actors, the Norwich Company of Comedians, to perform in Norwich in 1768, and in the same year sent competition drawings for the erection of the...
, who built the Assembly Rooms (1776), the Octagon Chapel (1756), St Helen's House (1752) in the grounds of the Great Hospital
Great Hospital
The Great Hospital is a medieval hospital that has been serving the people of Norwich, Norfolk, England, since the 13th century. It is situated on a site in a bend of the River Wensum to the north-east of Norwich Cathedral. Bishop Walter de Suffield founded St. Giles's Hospital, as the hospital...
, and innovative speculative housing in Surrey Street (c. 1761). Ivory should not be confused with the Irish architect of the same name and similar period.
The 19th century saw an explosion in Norwich's size and much of its housing stock, as well as commercial building in the city centre, dates from this period. The local architect of the Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
and Edwardian periods who has continued to command most critical respect was George Skipper
George Skipper
George John Skipper was a leading Norwich based architect of the late Victorian and Edwardian period. Writer and poet, John Betjeman gave this description of him "he is altogether remarkable and original. He is to Norwich rather what Gaudi was to Barcelona" Skipper was born in the Norfolk market...
(1856–1948). Examples of his work include the headquarters of Norwich Union
Norwich Union
Norwich Union was the name given to insurance company Aviva's British arm before June 2009. It was originally established in 1797. It is the biggest life insurance provider in the United Kingdom, and has a strong position in motor insurance...
on Surrey Street; the Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...
Royal Arcade; and the Hotel de Paris in the nearby seaside town of Cromer
Cromer
Cromer is a coastal town and civil parish in north Norfolk, England. The local government authority is North Norfolk District Council, whose headquarters is in Holt Road in the town. The town is situated 23 miles north of the county town, Norwich, and is 4 miles east of Sheringham...
. The neo-Gothic Roman Catholic cathedral
St John the Baptist Cathedral, Norwich
The Cathedral Church of St John the Baptist is the Roman Catholic cathedral of the city of Norwich, Norfolk, England.The Cathedral, located on Earlham Road, was constructed between 1882 and 1910 to designs by George Gilbert Scott, Jr...
dedicated to St John the Baptist on Earlham Road
Earlham Road
Earlham Road is a road in Norwich, England linking the city centre to the area of Earlham to the west of the city and the Norwich southern bypass beyond.-Details:...
, begun in 1882, is by George Gilbert Scott Junior
George Gilbert Scott Junior
George Gilbert Scott, Jr. was an English architect. He was the son of Sir George Gilbert Scott, brother of John Oldrid Scott and father of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott and Adrian Gilbert Scott, all also architects....
and his brother, John Oldrid Scott
John Oldrid Scott
John Oldrid Scott was an English architect.He was the son of Sir George Gilbert Scott and Caroline née Oldrid. His brother George Gilbert Scott Junior and nephew Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, were also prominent architects. He married Mary Ann Stevens in 1868, eldest daughter of the Reverend Thomas...
.
The city continued to grow through the 20th century and much housing, particularly in areas further out from the city centre, dates from that century. The first notable building post-Skipper was the City Hall
City Hall, Norwich
Norwich City Hall is an Art Deco building completed in 1938 which houses the city hall for the city of Norwich, East Anglia, in Eastern England. It is one of the Norwich 12, a collection of twelve heritage buildings in Norwich deemed of particular historical and cultural importance.Norwich City...
by CH James and SR Pierce, opened in 1938. Bombing during the Second World War, while resulting in relatively little loss of life, caused significant damage to housing stock in the city centre. Much of the replacement postwar stock was designed by the local authority architect, David Percival. However, the major postwar development in Norwich from an architectural point of view was the opening of the University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
in 1964. Originally designed by Denys Lasdun
Denys Lasdun
Sir Denys Lasdun CH was an eminent English architect. Probably his best known work is the Royal National Theatre, on London's South Bank of the Thames, which is a Grade II* listed building and one of the most notable examples of Brutalist design in the United Kingdom.Lasdun studied at the...
(his design was never completely executed), it has been added to over subsequent decades by major names such as Norman Foster
Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank
Norman Robert Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank, OM is a British architect whose company maintains an international design practice, Foster + Partners....
and Rick Mather
Rick Mather
Rick Mather is an American-born architect working in England. Born in Portland, Oregon and awarded a B.arch. at the University of Oregon in 1961, he came to London in 1963 where he founded his own practice, Rick Mather Architects, a decade later....
.
Media
Norwich is the headquarters of BBC EastBBC East
BBC East is the BBC English Region serving Norfolk, Suffolk, north Essex, Cambridgeshire, northern and central Hertfordshire, most of Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, and parts of Buckinghamshire.-Television:...
, the BBC's presence in the east of England, and BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Norfolk
BBC Radio Norfolk is the BBC Local Radio service for the English county of Norfolk, broadcasting since 11 September 1980. It broadcasts from the studios of BBC East in The Forum, Norwich on 95.1 FM , 104.4 FM , 95.6 FM , 855 kHz AM/MW , 873 kHz AM/MW BBC Radio Norfolk is the BBC Local...
, BBC Look East, Inside Out and The Politics Show
The Politics Show
The Politics Show is an hour long BBC One television political programme broadcast in the United Kingdom on Sundays. The programme usually starts at midday, but is often earlier or later when sporting events clash in the schedules. It was launched in 2003 and was originally presented by Jeremy...
are all broadcast from the BBC studios in The Forum
The Forum, Norwich
The Forum is a community building in Norwich, Norfolk. It stands opposite from the St. Peter Mancroft Church. Designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners, the Forum was built as a millennium project for the East of England and finished in October 2001...
in the city centre.
Independent radio
Independent Radio
Independent radio indicates a radio station that is run in a manner different from usual for the country it broadcasts in. In countries where there exist government-run radio stations that served as the primary or only the variety of licensed broadcaster, the term independent radio generally means...
stations based in Norwich include Heart, Gold, 99.9 Radio Norwich
99.9 Radio Norwich
Norwich 99.9 is a British radio station in Norwich, Norfolk.-History:The station is part of Tindle Radio Group, owner of neighbouring North Norfolk Radio and 103.4 The Beach...
, as well as the University of East Anglia's Livewire 1350. A community station, Future Radio
Future Radio
Future Radio is a local community radio station serving the City of Norwich in Norfolk and based in the West Norwich suburb of Earlham. The station is part of Future Projects a local development and educational charity...
, was launched on 6 August 2007.
ITV Anglia, formerly Anglia Television
Anglia Television
Anglia Television is the ITV franchise holder for the East Anglia franchise region. Although Anglia Television takes its name from East Anglia, its transmission coverage extends beyond the generally accepted boundaries of that region. The station is based at Anglia House in Norwich, with regional...
, is based in Norwich. Although one of the smaller ITV companies, it supplied the network with some of its most popular shows such as Tales of the Unexpected
Tales of the Unexpected (TV series)
Tales of the Unexpected is a British television series originally aired between 1979 and 1988, made by Anglia Television for ITV. Filming began in 1978.The series was an anthology of different tales...
, Survival
Survival (TV series)
Survival is one of television's longest-running and most successful nature documentary series. Originally produced by Anglia Television for ITV in the United Kingdom, it was created by Aubrey Buxton , a founder director of Anglia TV, and first broadcast in 1961...
and Sale of the Century
Sale of the Century (UK game show)
Sale of the Century was a UK game show based on a US game show of the same name. It was first shown on ITV from 1972 to 1983, hosted by Nicholas Parsons...
(1971–83), which began each edition with John Benson's enthusiastic announcement "And now from Norwich, it's the quiz of the week!" The company also had a subsidiary called Anglia Multimedia which produced educational content on CD and DVD mainly for schools, and was one of the three companies, along with Granada TV and the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
vying for the right to produce a digital television station for English schools and colleges.
Launched in 1959, Anglia Television lost its independence in 1994 following a takeover by MAI
Meridian Broadcasting
Meridian Broadcasting is the holder of the ITV franchise for the South and South East of England. The station is owned and operated by ITV plc, under the licensee of ITV Broadcasting Limited....
and subsequent mergers have seen it reduced from a significant producer of programmes to a regional news centre. The company is still based in the former Norfolk and Norwich Agricultural Hall, on Agricultural Hall Plain, near Prince of Wales Road. However, despite the contraction of Anglia, television production in Norwich is by no means ended.
Anglia's former network production centre at Magdalen Street has been taken over by Norfolk County Council and extensively re-vamped. After total investment of £4m from EEDA—the regional development agency—it has re-opened as EPIC—the East of England Production Innovation Centre. It is now a creative industries enterprise hub, providing office space for local production companies and giving them access to state of the art production facilities, including one of the best equipped High Definition TV Studios in Europe. Degree courses in film and video are also run at the centre by NUCA (Norwich University College of the Arts, formerly Norwich School of Art and Design.) EPIC has commercial, broadcast quality post production facilities, a real-time virtual studio and a smaller HD discussion studio. The main studio opened as an HD facility in November 2008. Throughout 2008, the centre has concentrated on the development of new TV formats and has worked on pilots shows with, among others, Les Dennis, Gaby Roslin and Christopher Biggins.
Sport
The principal local football club is Norwich City
Norwich City F.C.
Norwich City Football Club is an English professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk. As of the 2011–12 season, Norwich City are again playing in the Premier League after a six-year absence, having finished as runner up in the Championship in 2010–11 and winning automatic promotion.The...
, also known as the Canaries, who play in the Premier League after being promoted in the 2010–2011 season. Majority-owned by celebrity chef Delia Smith
Delia Smith
Delia Smith CBE is an English cook and television presenter, known for teaching basic cookery skills. She is the UK's best-selling cookery author, with more than 21 million copies sold....
and her husband Michael Wynn-Jones, their ground is at Carrow Road
Carrow Road
Carrow Road is a football stadium in Norwich, England, and is the home of Norwich City Football Club. The stadium is located toward the easterly end of the city, not far from Norwich railway station and the River Wensum....
. They have a strong East Anglian rivalry
East Anglian Derby
The East Anglian derby is a sobriquet used to describe football matches held between Ipswich Town and Norwich City. In recent years it has sometimes been described humorously as the Old Farm derby, a reference to the Old Firm derby played between Celtic and Rangers...
with Ipswich Town
Ipswich Town F.C.
Ipswich Town Football Club are an English professional football team based in Ipswich, Suffolk. As of 2011, they play in the Football League Championship, having last appeared in the Premier League in 2001–02....
. The club has enjoyed considerable success in the past, having played in the top division for a collective total of 19 seasons since 1972, their longest spell being a nine-year spell from 1986 to 1995. They have also won two Football League Cup
Football League Cup
The Football League Cup, commonly known as the League Cup or, from current sponsorship, the Carling Cup, is an English association football competition. Like the FA Cup, it is played on a knockout basis...
s, and finished third in the inaugural Premier League in 1993. Perhaps their most famous result to date came later in 1993 when they eliminated German giants Bayern Munich from the UEFA Cup
UEFA Cup
The UEFA Europa League is an annual association football cup competition organised by UEFA since 1971 for eligible European football clubs. It is the second most prestigious European club football contest after the UEFA Champions League...
. Before emerging as a top division club, they famously eliminated Manchester United
Manchester United F.C.
Manchester United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, that plays in the Premier League. Founded as Newton Heath LYR Football Club in 1878, the club changed its name to Manchester United in 1902 and moved to Old Trafford in 1910.The 1958...
from the FA Cup in 1959, and went on to reach the semi-finals of the competition, a run they achieved again in 1989 and most recently in 1992. In the 1980s and early 1990s, the club produced some of the most highly rated talent of that era, including striker Chris Sutton
Chris Sutton
Christopher Roy "Chris" Sutton is an English football manager and former player.In his career, Sutton played for Norwich City, Blackburn Rovers, Chelsea, Celtic, Birmingham City and Aston Villa. Sutton scored over 150 career goals in over 400 league appearances spanning 16 years in the English...
, winger Ruel Fox
Ruel Fox
Ruel Adrian Fox is an English former professional football player of Montserratian and Antiguan descent who played for Norwich City, Newcastle United, Tottenham Hotspur, and West Bromwich Albion from 1986 to 2002...
, defender Andy Linighan
Andy Linighan
Andrew "Andy" Linighan is a former English football player.Linighan was born in Hartlepool into a footballing family – his brothers David and Brian were also professional footballers. He first played for his local side, Hartlepool United, before spells at Leeds United , Oldham Athletic and...
, midfielder Mike Phelan
Mike Phelan
Michael Christopher "Mike" Phelan , also known as Mick Phelan or Micky Phelan, is an English football coach, former player, and current assistant manager of Manchester United under Sir Alex Ferguson....
, midfielder Tim Sherwood
Tim Sherwood
Timothy "Tim" Sherwood is an English former professional footballer who was captain of Blackburn Rovers' Premiership title-winning side...
and striker Justin Fashanu
Justin Fashanu
Justinus Soni "Justin" Fashanu was an English footballer who played for a variety of clubs between 1978 and 1997. He was known by his early clubs to be homosexual, and came out to the press later in his career, to become the first professional footballer to be openly gay...
. The club's most successful managers have included Ken Brown, Ron Saunders
Ron Saunders
Ron Saunders is a retired English football player and former successful manager. He remains the only manager to have taken charge of Aston Villa, Birmingham City and West Bromwich Albion, normally bitter rivals....
, Dave Stringer
Dave Stringer
Dave Stringer , is a former player and manager of Norwich City football club.As a player, he won the fans' vote to be Norwich City player of the year in 1972 and made a total of 499 appearances for the club. He ended his playing career with Cambridge United before returning to Norwich city to coach...
, Mike Walker, Martin O'Neill
Martin O'Neill
Martin Hugh Michael O'Neill, OBE, is a Northern Irish football manager and former player.Until resigning the post on 9 August 2010, he was manager of Aston Villa. Starting his career in his native Northern Ireland, O'Neill moved to England where he spent most of his playing career with Nottingham...
, Nigel Worthington
Nigel Worthington
Nigel Worthington is a former Northern Ireland international footballer and manager.He was manager of the Northern Ireland national team from 2007 until after their final Euro 2012 qualifying campaign match against Italy in October 2011.As a player, he was a left full back and occasional left...
and current manager Paul Lambert
Paul Lambert
Paul Christopher Lambert is a Scottish football manager and former player who is the manager of Norwich City. He won numerous trophies as a player, winning the Scottish Cup with St...
.
The city's second club, Norwich United
Norwich United F.C.
Norwich United F.C. is an English football club based in Blofield, Norfolk. The club are currently members of the Eastern Counties League Premier Division and play at Plantation Park.The club is affiliated to the Norfolk County FA.-History:...
(who are based in Blofield
Blofield
Blofield is the village and civil parish in the Broadland district of Norfolk, England. The parish includes Blofield and the hamlets of Blofield Heath and Blofield Corner and, according to the 2001 census, had a population of 3,221. It is on the A47, five miles east of Norwich and west of Great...
some 5 miles (8 km) east of the city) play in the Eastern Counties
Eastern Counties Football League
The Eastern Counties Football League is an English football league at levels 9 and 10 of the English football league system. It currently contains clubs from Norfolk, Suffolk, northern Essex and eastern Cambridgeshire, and is a feeder to the regional divisions of the Isthmian League and Southern...
league, whilst Spixworth FC (previously known as AFC Norwich) play in the Anglian Combination
Anglian Combination
The Anglian Combination Football League is an English football league that operates in the East Anglia area. The league specifically covers Norfolk and northern Suffolk and is also known as the Dolphin Autos Anglian Combination Football League after its principal sponsor...
. The now-defunct Gothic F.C.
Gothic F.C.
Gothic F.C. was an English football club based in Norwich. They were members of the Eastern Counties League between 1963 and 1978.The club was affiliated to the Norfolk County FA.-History:...
were also based in Norwich. Local football clubs are served by the Norwich and District Business Houses League
Norwich and District Business Houses League
The Norwich and District Business Houses League is a football competition based in England. It has a total of 3 divisions catering for 32 teams. At the present time the league is not part of the English football league system as it is not a feeder league within the football pyramid.The league is...
.
Norwich also has an athletics club, City of Norwich AC (CoNAC), and a rugby club, the Norwich Lions.
Norwich also has five field hockey
Field hockey
Field Hockey, or Hockey, is a team sport in which a team of players attempts to score goals by hitting, pushing or flicking a ball into an opposing team's goal using sticks...
clubs. In the 2011/12 season the club playing the highest level on the men's side will be Norwich City who won promotion to the East Hockey Premier A last season, which is one level below National League. The second highest level is Norwich Dragons in Division Two North, then the students only University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
Men's Hockey Club in Division Three North East, then Norfolk Nomads Men's Hockey Club in Division Six North East. On the Ladies' side of the game both Norwich City Hockey Club and Norwich Dragons Hockey club play in East Hockey's Division One North, two levels below National League. Following them the students from the University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
Women's Hockey Club play in the Norfolk Premier Division. Also in Norwich there is the veterans only side Norwich Exiles.
Outside the city boundary, the dry ski and snowboarding slopes of Norfolk Ski Club is located at Whitlingham Lane in Trowse
Trowse
Trowse, also called Trowse with Newton, is a village in South Norfolk which lies about south-east of Norwich city centre on the banks of the River Yare. It covers an area of and had a population of 479 in 233 households as of the 2001 census....
. Located close by in the parish of Whitlingham
Whitlingham
Whitlingham is a small churchless parish, 3 miles east of Norwich, on the south bank of the River Yare, reached from Trowse along Whitlingham Lane.-Church:...
is the Whitlingham Country Park home to the Outdoor Education Centre. The centre is based on the south bank of the Great Broad which is also used by scuba
Scuba diving
Scuba diving is a form of underwater diving in which a diver uses a scuba set to breathe underwater....
divers from one of the city's three diving schools and other water and land sports.
Speedway
Motorcycle speedway
Motorcycle speedway, usually referred to as speedway, is a motorcycle sport involving four and sometimes up to six riders competing over four anti-clockwise laps of an oval circuit. Speedway motorcycles use only one gear and have no brakes and racing takes place on a flat oval track usually...
racing was staged in Norwich both before and after World War II at The Firs Stadium on the Holt Road, Hellesdon
Hellesdon
Hellesdon is a thriving suburb of Norwich in the District of Broadland in Norfolk, England. It lies approximately 4 miles north-west of Norwich and has 11,177 inhabitants.- History :...
. The Norwich Stars
Norwich Stars
Norwich Stars were a motorcycle speedway team based in Norwich, England which operated from 1930 until their closure in 1964.-History:Speedway racing was staged in Norwich both before and after World War II at The Firs Stadium in Aylsham Road, Hellesdon. Pre-War Norwich were members of the National...
raced in the Northern League of 1946 and the National League Division Two
Speedway National League Division Two
The National League Division Two was the second tier of Speedway league competition in the United Kingdom. The competition was founded in 1938 following a competition named "The National Provincial League". Following World War II the second tier of racing was entitled "The Northern League" in 1946...
between 1947 and 1951, winning it in 1951. They were subsequently elevated to the Speedway National League
Speedway National League
The National League was the top division of Speedway in the United Kingdom from 1932 until 1965 when it became known as the British League. Prior to 1932 there were only small regional leagues competing within the sport in the UK. The National League was re-incarnated in 1975 as the second division...
and raced at the top flight until the stadium was closed at the end of the 1964 season. One meeting was staged at a venue at Hevingham
Hevingham
Hevingham is a Norfolk village and civil parish situated between the A140 road Norwich to Cromer road and the B1149 road Norwich to Holt road. It is north from the city of Norwich and south from the market town of Aylsham....
but the event, staged without an official permit, did not lead to a revival of the sport in the Norwich area.
In the world of boxing
Boxing
Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
, Norwich can boast former European
European Boxing Union
The European Boxing Union is an organization that oversees competition in that sport over the continent of Europe.-History:The EBU started life as the International Boxing Union in Paris in 1910...
and British lightweight champion Jon Thaxton
Jon Thaxton
Jonathan Thaxton is a former English professional lightweight boxer. He held European and British lightweight boxing titles in a 17-year career...
, reigning English light heavyweight champion Danny McIntosh
Danny McIntosh
Danny McIntosh is a British light heavyweight boxer based in Norfolk. He is a former holder of both the English and European light heavyweight titles and a former challenger for the British and Commonwealth titles.-Professional Career:...
and heavyweight Sam Sexton
Sam Sexton
Sam Sexton is a British heavyweight boxer based in Norwich, Norfolk, England. He was the winner of the second Prizefighter tournament held in Newcastle and is the current holder of the British Commonwealth and BBBofC Southern Area heavyweight titles.-Early professional career:Sexton started his...
, a former winner of the Prizefighter
Prizefighter series
The Prizefighter series is a knock out boxing tournament created by boxing promoter Barry Hearn and aired on Sky Sports. The format has an initial eight fighters, who compete in four quarter-finals of 3 x 3 minute rounds followed by two semi-finals and one final all on the same night...
tournament.
Statistics
Norwich was the second city of England (after London) for several centuries before industrialisation, which came late to Norwich due to its isolation and lack of raw materials. This is open to some debate, for further discussion go hereSecond city of the United Kingdom
The identity of the second city of the United Kingdom is a subject of some disagreement. A country's second city is the city that is thought to be the second most important, usually after the capital or first city , according to criteria such as population size, economic and commercial importance,...
.
In November 2006 the city was voted the greenest in the UK. There is currently an initiative taking place to make it a transition town. Norwich has recently been the scene of open discussions in public spaces, known as 'meet in the street', that cover social and political issues.
According to the 2001 census, 27.8% of respondents in Norwich stated that they were of "no religion", the highest percentage in England.
There are rail links from Norwich railway station
Norwich railway station
Norwich is a railway station serving the city of Norwich in the English county of Norfolk. The station is the northern terminus of the Great Eastern Main Line from London Liverpool Street. It is also the terminus of railway lines from Ely, Sheringham, Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft.-History:At one...
to Peterborough
Peterborough
Peterborough is a cathedral city and unitary authority area in the East of England, with an estimated population of in June 2007. For ceremonial purposes it is in the county of Cambridgeshire. Situated north of London, the city stands on the River Nene which flows into the North Sea...
and London, and direct services to Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...
were added in 2004. Links are also regularly available on the Liverpool to Norwich line, providing direct access to Nottingham, Sheffield, Manchester Piccadilly and Liverpool Lime Street; and vice versa; providing strong links from/to five major cities (including London) in total. It is a commuter city, with services running on the train route between Norwich and London. Travelling by train to London from Norwich, travellers arrive at Liverpool Street Station
Liverpool Street station
Liverpool Street railway station, also known as London Liverpool Street or simply Liverpool Street, is both a central London railway terminus and a connected London Underground station in the north-eastern corner of the City of London, England...
, in the heart of the 'City of London', the central financial district.
A large proportion of the population of Norwich are users of the Internet. A recent article has suggested that, compared with other UK cities, it is top of the league for the percentage of population who use the popular Internet auction site eBay
EBay
eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...
. The city has also unveiled the biggest free Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi or Wifi, is a mechanism for wirelessly connecting electronic devices. A device enabled with Wi-Fi, such as a personal computer, video game console, smartphone, or digital audio player, can connect to the Internet via a wireless network access point. An access point has a range of about 20...
network in the UK, which opened in July 2006.
In August 2007 Norwich was shortlisted as one of nine finalists in its population group for the International Awards for Liveable Communities LivCom Awards The city eventually won a silver award in the small city category."
Transport
RoadNorwich sits north of the A47
A47 road
The A47 is a trunk road in England originally linking Birmingham to Great Yarmouth. Most of the section between Birmingham and Nuneaton is now classified as the B4114.-Route:...
(bypassed to the south of the city) which connects it with Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
to the east and with Kings Lynn to the west, which ultimately connects to Peterborough
Peterborough
Peterborough is a cathedral city and unitary authority area in the East of England, with an estimated population of in June 2007. For ceremonial purposes it is in the county of Cambridgeshire. Situated north of London, the city stands on the River Nene which flows into the North Sea...
. At present the A47 is in the planning stages of upgrades, largely to sections which are still single-carriageway and with much focus on improving the road network in conjunction with the in-construction Great Yarmouth Outer Harbour. Norwich is linked to Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...
via the A11, which leads to the M11 motorway
M11 motorway
The M11 motorway in England is a major road running approximately north from the North Circular Road in South Woodford in north-east London to the A14, north-west of Cambridge.-Route:...
for London and the M25
M25 motorway
The M25 motorway, or London Orbital, is a orbital motorway that almost encircles Greater London, England, in the United Kingdom. The motorway was first mooted early in the 20th century. A few sections, based on the now abandoned London Ringways plan, were constructed in the early 1970s and it ...
. It is linked to Ipswich
Ipswich
Ipswich is a large town and a non-metropolitan district. It is the county town of Suffolk, England. Ipswich is located on the estuary of the River Orwell...
(to the south) by the A140 and to Lowestoft
Lowestoft
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk. The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom. It is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and south-east of Norwich...
(to the south-east) by the A146
A146 road
The A146 is a road that runs between two of East Anglia's largest population centres - Norwich in Norfolk and Lowestoft in Suffolk.The entire route has primary classification and as such has been improved over the years, although traffic levels can lead to delays.- Norwich :Before the construction...
.
Rail
Great Eastern Main Line
The Great Eastern Main Line is a 212 Kilometre major railway line of the British railway system, which connects Liverpool Street in the City of London with destinations in east London and the East of England, including Chelmsford, Colchester, Ipswich, Norwich and several coastal resorts such as...
with half hourly services to London Liverpool Street provided by British Rail Class 90
British Rail Class 90
The British Rail Class 90 electric locomotives were built by BREL at Crewe from 1987-1990. Each locomotive weighs 84.5 tonnes and has a top speed of . They operate from 25 kV AC overhead wires and produce...
locomotives. It is also linked to the Midlands
English Midlands
The Midlands, or the English Midlands, is the traditional name for the area comprising central England that broadly corresponds to the early medieval Kingdom of Mercia. It borders Southern England, Northern England, East Anglia and Wales. Its largest city is Birmingham, and it was an important...
with hourly services to Liverpool Lime Street and are operated by East Midlands Trains
East Midlands Trains
East Midlands Trains is a British passenger train operating company. Based in Derby, it provides train services in the East Midlands, chiefly in the counties of Lincolnshire, South Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Derbyshire and Northamptonshire, and between the East Midlands and London...
Class 158 DMU
Diesel multiple unit
A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple unit train consisting of multiple carriages powered by one or more on-board diesel engines. They may also be referred to as a railcar or railmotor, depending on country.-Design:...
s via Peterborough
Peterborough
Peterborough is a cathedral city and unitary authority area in the East of England, with an estimated population of in June 2007. For ceremonial purposes it is in the county of Cambridgeshire. Situated north of London, the city stands on the River Nene which flows into the North Sea...
, Nottingham
Nottingham
Nottingham is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands of England. It is located in the ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire and represents one of eight members of the English Core Cities Group...
and Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
. These additional hourly regional services to Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...
, and out of Norwich as far as Ely
Ely, Cambridgeshire
Ely is a cathedral city in Cambridgeshire, England, 14 miles north-northeast of Cambridge and about by road from London. It is built on a Lower Greensand island, which at a maximum elevation of is the highest land in the Fens...
, are run along the Breckland Line
Breckland Line
The Breckland Line runs from Cambridge in Cambridgeshire to Norwich in Norfolk, in East Anglia, England. It is so called because it runs through the Breckland region of Norfolk. The line also passes through Thetford Forest. The line is part of the Network Rail Strategic Route 5, SRS 05.09 and part...
by National Express
National Express
National Express Coaches, more commonly known as National Express, is a brand and company, owned by the National Express Group, under which the majority of long distance bus and coach services in Great Britain are operated,...
who also run hourly local services to Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
and Lowestoft
Lowestoft
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk. The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom. It is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and south-east of Norwich...
, using the Wherry Lines
Wherry Lines
The Wherry Lines are railway lines in England, from Norwich to Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft. These lines pass through The Broads. The line is part of the Network Rail Strategic Route 7, SRS 07.11 and is classified as a rural line...
, and to Sheringham
Sheringham
Sheringham is a seaside town in Norfolk, England, west of Cromer.The motto of the town, granted in 1953 to the Sheringham Urban District Council, is Mare Ditat Pinusque Decorat, Latin for "The sea enriches and the pine adorns"....
, using the Bittern Line
Bittern Line
The Bittern Line is a railway line from Norwich to Cromer then Sheringham in Norfolk, England. It is one of the most scenic in the East of England traversing the Norfolk Broads on its route to the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty on the North Norfolk Coast. The line is part of the Network Rail...
. These all use either Class 156 or Class 170 DMUs. Norwich is also the site of Norwich Crown Point
Norwich Crown Point
Crown Point was originally the name given to an area within the city of Norwich in the United Kingdom.The name is now more commonly associated with the Crown Point Traction Maintenance Depot operated by National Express East Anglia. Intercity and Diesel Multiple Unit trains are serviced and...
Traction Maintenance Depot (TMD
TMD
TMD may refer to:Medicine and science* Temporomandibular joint disorder* Transmembrane domain* Tuned mass damperOther* The Medic Droid, a band...
).
Bus and coach
Norwich is served by several bus operators including Anglian Bus
Anglian Bus
Anglian Bus is a large independent bus operator based in Beccles in Suffolk, England. The company operates services over a wide area in both Norfolk and Suffolk, running a fleet of around 63 buses and coaches...
, First Eastern Counties, Konectbus
Konectbus
Konectbus is a bus operator based in Dereham in Norfolk, England. From 11 March 2010, it became a part of the Go-Ahead Group. It currently operates 27 services including three of the Norwich Park and Ride routes, Costessey, Harford and Thickthorn. They have a fleet of almost 50 buses, the majority...
, Norfolk Green
Norfolk Green
-About Norfolk Green:Norfolk Green is a bus operator based in King's Lynn in Norfolk, England.It operates 31 public bus services across Norfolk, Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire as well as numerous school and collage services with a fleet of 73 low floor easy access buses, services include the...
and Sanders. Destinations throughout Norfolk and beyond are served including Peterborough
Peterborough
Peterborough is a cathedral city and unitary authority area in the East of England, with an estimated population of in June 2007. For ceremonial purposes it is in the county of Cambridgeshire. Situated north of London, the city stands on the River Nene which flows into the North Sea...
, and Lowestoft
Lowestoft
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk. The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom. It is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and south-east of Norwich...
. National Express
National Express
National Express Coaches, more commonly known as National Express, is a brand and company, owned by the National Express Group, under which the majority of long distance bus and coach services in Great Britain are operated,...
run ten coaches a day to the three main London airports (Stansted Airport, Heathrow and Gatwick), five a day to London, and one a day to Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
. Most bus and coach services run from Norwich bus station
Norwich bus station
Norwich Bus Station is situated in Surrey Street, Norwich, Norfolk, England. It is served by a number of bus companies as well as National Express and the open top Norwich Tour bus.-Statistics:It was opened on 30 August 2005 at a cost of £5 million and two months later than planned...
or from Castle Meadow.
Norwich has six park and ride
Park and ride
Park and ride facilities are car parks with connections to public transport that allow commuters and other people wishing to travel into city centres to leave their vehicles and transfer to a bus, rail system , or carpool for the rest of their trip...
sites run by Norfolk County Council using colour-coded buses, one of the larger UK operations. Altogether nearly 5000 parking spaces are provided and in 2006 3.4 million passengers used the service.
Air
Norwich International Airport
Norwich International Airport
Norwich International Airport , also known as Norwich Airport, is an airport in the City of Norwich within Norfolk, England north of the city centre and on the edge of the city's suburbs....
is a feeder to KLM's Schiphol hub. FlyBe
Flybe
Flybe Group PLC is a British low-cost regional airline headquartered at the Jack Walker House at Exeter International Airport in Devon, England...
, Eastern Airways
Eastern Airways
Eastern Airways is an airline with its head office at Humberside Airport in Kirmington, North Lincolnshire, England. It operates scheduled domestic and international services and private charter services...
, and Bristow Helicopters
Bristow Helicopters
Bristow Helicopters is a British helicopter airline originally based at Aberdeen Airport, Scotland, part of the Bristow Group based in Houston, Texas, USA....
all serve Norwich, in addition to a strong holiday charter flight business. The airport was originally the airfield part of the former RAF
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
Horsham St Faith. One of the former RAF hangars was once the home of Air UK, which grew out of Air Anglia
Air Anglia
Air Anglia was a wholly privately owned, independentindependent from government-owned corporations British regional airline formed at Norwich Airport in 1970. Created as a result of a merger of three smaller operators, the new entity became an important regional scheduled carrier during the 1970s,...
and was then absorbed by the Dutch airline KLM.
Bicycle
National Cycle Route 1 passes through Norwich, linking Beccles
Beccles
Beccles is a market town and civil parish in the Waveney District of the English county of Suffolk. The town is shown on the milestone as from London via the A145 Blythburgh and A12 road, northeast of London as the crow flies, southeast of Norwich, and north northeast of the county town of...
and Fakenham
Fakenham
Fakenham is a town and civil parish in Norfolk, England. It is situated on the River Wensum, some north east of King's Lynn, south west of Cromer, and north west of Norwich....
(and eventually 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 the Shetland Islands
Shetland Islands
Shetland is a subarctic archipelago of Scotland that lies north and east of mainland Great Britain. The islands lie some to the northeast of Orkney and southeast of the Faroe Islands and form part of the division between the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the North Sea to the east. The total...
).
Water
The River Yare
River Yare
The River Yare is a river in the English county of Norfolk. In its lower reaches the river connects with the navigable waterways of The Broads....
is navigable from the sea at Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
all the way to Trowse, south of the city. From there the River Wensum
River Wensum
The River Wensum is a chalk fed river in Norfolk, England and a tributary of the River Yare despite being the larger of the two rivers. The complete river is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest and Special Area of Conservation ....
is navigable into Norwich up to New Mills, and is crossed by the Novi Sad Friendship Bridge. Scheduled trips through the city and out to the nearby The Broads
The Broads
The Broads are a network of mostly navigable rivers and lakes in the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. The Broads, and some surrounding land were constituted as a special area with a level of protection similar to a UK National Park by The Norfolk and Suffolk Broads Act of 1988...
are run by City Boats http://www.cityboats.co.uk from outside Norwich Station and also Elm Hill.
Proposed developments
A controversial new 8.7 miles (14 km) road, the Norwich Northern Distributor RoadNorwich Northern Distributor Road
The Norwich Northern Distributor Road is a proposed 8.7 mile dual-carriageway linking the A47 to the south east of the city to the proposed Rackheath Eco-town and to Norwich International Airport to the north of Norwich...
, linking from the A140 road
A140 road
The A140 is an 'A-class' road in Norfolk and Suffolk, East Anglia, England partly following the route of the Roman Pye Road. It runs from the A14 near Needham Market to the A149 south of Cromer. It is of primary status for the entirety of its route. It is approximately 56 miles in length...
/Norwich International Airport
Norwich International Airport
Norwich International Airport , also known as Norwich Airport, is an airport in the City of Norwich within Norfolk, England north of the city centre and on the edge of the city's suburbs....
to the north of Norwich to the A47 road to the east of Norwich was given Program Entry status in December 2009 and an estimated completion data of 2015. The Postwick hub, an integral park of the NDR is a development of the junction between the A47 road and the A1042 road to the east of Norwich with an additional 500 parking places in the Postwick park and ride site. There is also discussion about building the section from the A140 west to the A1067 and also from the Wensum Valley to the A47 southern bypass to the west as originally proposed.
Sustrans
Sustrans
Sustrans is a British charity to promote sustainable transport. The charity is currently working on a number of practical projects to encourage people to walk, cycle and use public transport, to give people the choice of "travelling in ways that benefit their health and the environment"...
plans to build a bridge between the Riverside area and Whitlingham County Park as part of the Connect2
Connect2
Connect2 is a project run by Sustrans to develop new walking and cycle routes in 79 communities around the UK.- Project :Connect2 is a five year project run by Sustrans. It involves the creation of new cycle and walking routes, bridges and other facilities in 79 locations around the UK...
project from the National Lottery
National Lottery (United Kingdom)
The National Lottery is the state-franchised national lottery in the United Kingdom and the Isle of Man.It is operated by Camelot Group, to whom the licence was granted in 1994, 2001 and again in 2007. The lottery is regulated by the National Lottery Commission, and was established by the then...
. The country park is currently disconnected from the main residential areas by the River Yare
River Yare
The River Yare is a river in the English county of Norfolk. In its lower reaches the river connects with the navigable waterways of The Broads....
and River Wensum
River Wensum
The River Wensum is a chalk fed river in Norfolk, England and a tributary of the River Yare despite being the larger of the two rivers. The complete river is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest and Special Area of Conservation ....
.
Other proposals in the Norwich Transport Strategy include limiting traffic on some roads, introducing five rapid bus links into the city, and creating a 'train-tram' link to the Rackheath ecotown.
Climate
Norwich, alongside the rest of the British Isles, experiences a temperate maritime climate, and as such does not endure extreme temperatures, and benefits from fairly evenly spread rainfall throughout the year. Coltishall, about 7 miles (11.3 km) to the north east, was the nearest official met-office weather station for which records are available, although it ceased reporting in early 2006 – now Norwich airport provides readings. Norwich's position in East Anglia, jutting out into the North Sea can produce weather conditions that have less effect on other parts of the country, such as snow or sleet showers during the winter months on a Northerly or Easterly wind, or Sea Fog/Haar during the summer half of the year. An example of Norwich being afflicted by Sea fog is shown in the image to the right.The highest temperature recorded at Coltishall was 33.1c(91.6f) during June 1976. However, go back further to 1932, and Norwich's absolute record high stands at 35.6c(96.1f). Typically the warmest day of the year should reach 28.8c(83.8f) and 9.9 days should register a temperature of 25.1c(77.2f) or higher.
The lowest temperature recorded at Coltishall was −15.3c(4.5f) during January 1979. In a typical year however, the coldest night should only fall to −7.5c(18.5f). On average 39.4 air frosts will be recorded during the course of the year. More recently, the temperature at Norwich airport fell to −14.4c(6.1f) on the 18 December 2010 with unofficial weather stations reporting localised readings of −17 or −18c(0-1f).
The nearest sunshine monitoring weather station for which records are available is Morley agricultural research centre, about 11 miles (17.7 km) south west of Norwich city centre. For the 1961–90 period, it averaged 1558 hours of sunshine a year, a relatively high total for an inland part of the British Isles outside of southern England. In reality, given Norwich's position nearer to the coast and as such suffering from less convective cloud development during summer, true totals may even be slightly higher than this.
Rainfall at around 650 mm (25.59 in) is low, although as much as 100 mm (3.94 in) higher than other, more sheltered parts of East Anglia due to Norwich being more prone to showers off the North Sea.
Tourism
Norwich is a popular destination for a city break; attractions include Norwich CathedralNorwich Cathedral
Norwich Cathedral is a cathedral located in Norwich, Norfolk, dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Formerly a Catholic church, it has belonged to the Church of England since the English Reformation....
, the cobbled streets and museums of old Norwich, The Castle
Norwich Castle
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
, Cow Tower
Cow Tower, Norwich
Cow Tower is an historic military tower that stands by the River Wensum in Norwich, Norfolk. It gets its name from the water meadow, once known as Cowholme, in which it stands. It is about 15.2m high, with an internal diameter of 7.3m...
, Colman's
Colman's
Colman's is a UK manufacturer of mustard and various other sauces, based at Carrow, in Norwich, Norfolk. Presently an operational division of the multinational Unilever company, Colman's is one of the oldest existing food brands, famous for a limited range of products, almost all varieties of...
Mustard Shop, Dragon Hall
Dragon Hall, Norwich
Dragon Hall is a Grade 1 listed medieval merchant's trading hall located in King Street, Norwich, Norfolk close to the River Wensum. The Great Hall dates from around 1430 but some parts of the site, such as undercroft, are older. Archaeological research has shown evidence of 1,000 years of human...
and The Forum
The Forum, Norwich
The Forum is a community building in Norwich, Norfolk. It stands opposite from the St. Peter Mancroft Church. Designed by Michael Hopkins and Partners, the Forum was built as a millennium project for the East of England and finished in October 2001...
. Norwich is also one of the UK's top ten shopping destinations, with a mix of chain retailers and independent stores as well as Norwich Market
Norwich Market
Norwich Market is an outdoor market consisting of around 200 stalls in central Norwich, England. Founded in the latter part of the 11th century to supply Norman merchants and settlers moving to the area following the Norman conquest of England, it replaced an earlier market a short distance...
, one of the largest outdoor markets in England. It is currently ranked the 147th biggest city in Europe.
Travellers' comments
In 1507 the poet John SkeltonJohn Skelton
John Skelton, also known as John Shelton , possibly born in Diss, Norfolk, was an English poet.-Education:...
(1460–1529) wrote of two destructive fires in his Lament for the City of Norwich.
- All life is brief, and frail all man's estate. City, farewell: I mourn thy cruel fate.
Thomas Fuller
Thomas Fuller
Thomas Fuller was an English churchman and historian. He is now remembered for his writings, particularly his Worthies of England, published after his death...
in his The Worthies of England described the City in 1662 as:
- Either a city in an orchard or an orchard in a city, so equally are houses and trees blended in it, so that the pleasure of the country and the populousness of the city meet here together. Yet in this mixture, the inhabitants participate nothing of the rusticalness of the one, but altogether the urbanity and civility of the other.
Celia Fiennes
Celia Fiennes
Celia Fiennes was an English traveller. Born in Wiltshire, she was the daughter of an English Civil War Parliamentarian Colonel, who was in turn the second son of the William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele. Celia Fiennes died in Hackney in 1741.-Pioneering Female Traveller:Fiennes never married...
(1662–1741) visited Norwich in 1698 and described it as
- a city walled full round of towers, except on the river side which serves as a wall; they seem the best in repair of any walled city I know.
She also records that held in the City three times a year were:
- great fairs...to which resort a vast concourse of people and wares a full trade.
Norwich being a rich, thriving industrious place full of weaving, knitting and dyeing.
Daniel Defoe
Daniel Defoe
Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...
in his Tour of the whole Island of Great Britain (1724) wrote of the City:
- the inhabitants being all busy at their manufactures, dwell in their garrets at their looms, in their combing-shops, so they all them, twisting-mills, and other work-houses; almost all the works they are employed in being done within doors.
John Evelyn
John Evelyn
John Evelyn was an English writer, gardener and diarist.Evelyn's diaries or Memoirs are largely contemporaneous with those of the other noted diarist of the time, Samuel Pepys, and cast considerable light on the art, culture and politics of the time John Evelyn (31 October 1620 – 27 February...
(1620–1706) Royalist, Traveller and Diarist wrote to Sir Thomas Browne:
- I hear Norwich is a place very much addicted to the flowery part.
He visited the City as a courtier to King Charles II
Charles II of England
Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
in 1671 and described it thus:
- The suburbs are large, the prospect sweet, and other amenities, not omitting the flower-garden, which all the Inhabitants excel in of this City, the fabric of stuffs, which affords the Merchants, and brings a vast trade to this populous Town.
George Borrow
George Borrow
George Henry Borrow was an English author who wrote novels and travelogues based on his own experiences around Europe. Over the course of his wanderings, he developed a close affinity with the Romani people of Europe. They figure prominently in his work...
in his semi-autobiographical novel Lavengro
Lavengro
Lavengro: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest is a work by George Borrow, falling somewhere between the genres of memoir and novel, which has long been considered a classic of 19th century English literature. According to the author lav-engro is a Romany word meaning "word master". The historian...
(1851) wrote of Norwich as:
- A fine old city, perhaps the most curious specimen at present extant of the genuine old English Town. ..There it spreads from north to south, with its venerable houses, its numerous gardens, its thrice twelve churches, its mighty mound....There is an old grey castle on top of that mighty mound: and yonder rising three hundred feet above the soil, from amongst those noble forest trees, behold that old Norman master-work, that cloud-enriched cathedral spire ...Now who can wonder that the children of that fine old city are proud, and offer up prayers for her prosperity?
Borrow wrote far less favourably of the City in his translation of Faust
Faust
Faust is the protagonist of a classic German legend; a highly successful scholar, but also dissatisfied with his life, and so makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. Faust's tale is the basis for many literary, artistic, cinematic, and musical...
:
- They found the people of the place modelled after so unsightly a pattern, with such ugly figures and flat features that the devil owned he had never seen them equalled, except by the inhabitants of an English town, called Norwich, when dressed in their Sunday's best.
In 1812, Andrew Robertson wrote to the painter Constable
Constable
A constable is a person holding a particular office, most commonly in law enforcement. The office of constable can vary significantly in different jurisdictions.-Etymology:...
:
- I arrived here a week ago and find it a place where the arts are very much cultivated....some branches of knowledge, chemistry, botany, etc. are carried to a great length. General literature seems to be pursued with an ardour which is astonishing when we consider that it does not contain a university, as is merely a manufacturing town.
In 1962, Sir Nikolaus Pevsner
Nikolaus Pevsner
Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner, CBE, FBA was a German-born British scholar of history of art and, especially, of history of architecture...
stated in his North-West Norfolk and Norwich volume of The Buildings of England that:
- Norwich is distinguished by a prouder sense of civic responsibility than any other town of about the same size in Britain.
Notable people
Throughout its history, Norwich has been associated with radicalRadicalization
Radicalization is the process in which an individual changes from passiveness or activism to become more revolutionary, militant or extremist. Radicalization is often associated with youth, adversity, alienation, social exclusion, poverty, or the perception of injustice to self or others.-...
politics, nonconformist religion, political dissent
Political dissent
Political dissent refers to any expression designed to convey dissatisfaction with or opposition to the policies of a governing body. Such expression may take forms from vocal disagreement to civil disobedience to the use of violence. Historically, repressive governments have sought to punish...
and liberalism. It has also produced notable people in many other walks of life, particularly the Arts
The arts
The arts are a vast subdivision of culture, composed of many creative endeavors and disciplines. It is a broader term than "art", which as a description of a field usually means only the visual arts. The arts encompass visual arts, literary arts and the performing arts – music, theatre, dance and...
. Famous past names associated with the City include:
- Rev. John Abbs (1810 - 1888) MissionaryMissionaryA missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
and the author of "Twenty-two years' Missionary Experience in Travancore". - Louisa Sewell AbbsLouisa Sewell AbbsLouisa Sewell Abbs was the wife of English missionary Rev. John Abbs who helped establish the lace and embroidery industry in Travancore, Southern India. She also founded and taught at girls boarding schools during her time in India....
(née Skipper) (1811 - 1872) Founded girls' boarding schools in TravancoreTravancoreKingdom of Travancore was a former Hindu feudal kingdom and Indian Princely State with its capital at Padmanabhapuram or Trivandrum ruled by the Travancore Royal Family. The Kingdom of Travancore comprised most of modern day southern Kerala, Kanyakumari district, and the southernmost parts of...
, IndiaIndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
and established the lace-making, embroideryEmbroideryEmbroidery is the art or handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins....
industries during her time in Travancore. - Michael AndrewsMichael Andrews (artist)Michael Andrews was a British painter.-Life and work:Michael Andrews was born in Norwich, England, the second child of Thomas Victor Andrews and his wife Gertrude Emma Green. He completed his two years' National service between 1947 and 1949, nineteen months of which was spent in Egypt...
(1928–1995), 20th century British painter. - Elizabeth BentleyElizabeth Bentley (writer)-Biography:She was born in Norwich to Elizabeth Lawrence and Daniel Bentley. The latter, a journeyman cordwainer who had himself received a good education, educated Elizabeth, his only child. The family faced financial difficulties after he had a stroke in 1777 and was unable to work at his usual...
(1767–1839), author of "Tales for Children in Verse", lived at 45 St Stephen's Square, Norwich. - Billy BluelightBilly BluelightBilly Bluelight pseudonym of William Cullum. . A much loved legendary figure in Norwich and well known for his races against steam pleasure boats in the 1920/30s along the River Wensum and River Yare....
(1859/1863?–1949). Pseudonym of William Cullum, legendary folk-hero, well known for his races against steam pleasure boats. - George BorrowGeorge BorrowGeorge Henry Borrow was an English author who wrote novels and travelogues based on his own experiences around Europe. Over the course of his wanderings, he developed a close affinity with the Romani people of Europe. They figure prominently in his work...
(1803–1881), writer and traveller. In his youth Borrow was resident at Willow Lane. He attended the Norwich King Edward VI's Grammar SchoolNorwich School (educational institution)Norwich School is an independent school located in Norwich, United Kingdom. It is one of the oldest schools in the world, with a traceable history to 1096, and is a member of The Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference.It is a fee-paying, co-educational day school and has one of the best...
. Borrow recollects his youth in the city and conversations with the philologist and translator of German Romantic literature, William Taylor in his semi-autobiographical novel LavengroLavengroLavengro: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest is a work by George Borrow, falling somewhere between the genres of memoir and novel, which has long been considered a classic of 19th century English literature. According to the author lav-engro is a Romany word meaning "word master". The historian...
. - Sir Thomas BrowneThomas BrowneSir Thomas Browne was an English author of varied works which reveal his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric....
(1605–1682), medical doctor, polymathPolymathA polymath is a person whose expertise spans a significant number of different subject areas. In less formal terms, a polymath may simply be someone who is very knowledgeable...
scholar, encyclopedist and philosopher with interests in BiblicalBibleThe Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
scholarship and the esoteric. The stylistic purity and stupendous learning displayed in Browne's varied prose in the spheres of religion, science and art are minor classics of World literature. - Edith CavellEdith CavellEdith Louisa Cavell was a British nurse and spy. She is celebrated for saving the lives of soldiers from all sides without distinction and in helping some 200 Allied soldiers escape from German-occupied Belgium during World War I, for which she was arrested...
(1865–1915) was born in SwardestonSwardestonSwardeston is a village four miles south of Norwich in Norfolk, England, on high ground above the Tas valley. It covers an area of and had a population of 540 in 246 households as of the 2001 census.-History:...
, 4 miles (6.4 km) south of Norwich. She was a World War I nurse who was executed by firing squadExecution by firing squadExecution by firing squad, sometimes called fusillading , is a method of capital punishment, particularly common in the military and in times of war.Execution by shooting is a fairly old practice...
by the GermansGermansThe Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
for helping allied prisoners escape in violation of military law. She is buried on Life's Green, on the east side of Norwich Cathedral. - William CalthorpeWilliam CalthorpeSir William Calthorpe, , Knight of the Bath, and Lord of the Manors of Burnham Thorpe, and Ludham, in Norfolk. He is on record as High Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk in 1442, 1458 and 1464 and 1476....
who purchased Erpingham manor in St.Martin's at the Palace, Norwich in 1447. - John CromeJohn CromeJohn Crome was an English landscape artist of the Romantic era, one of the principal artists of the "Norwich school". He is known as Old Crome to distinguish him from his son, John Berney Crome, who was also a well-known artist.-Life and work:Crome was born in Norwich in Norfolk, the son of a weaver...
(1768–1821) and Joseph StannardJoseph StannardJoseph Stannard was an English marine and landscape painter, and etcher, a prominent member of the Norwich School of artists , which also included John Crome and John Sell Cotman.-Life:...
(1797–1830), along with John Sell CotmanJohn Sell CotmanJohn Sell Cotman was an English marine and landscape painter, etcher, illustrator and author, one of the leading lights of the Norwich school of artists.-Early life and work:...
(1782–1842), established the first British art movement outside of London. The Norwich school of painters were influenced by the achievements of Dutch landscape painting and the beauty of the rural hinterland surrounding Norwich. - William CrotchWilliam CrotchWilliam Crotch was an English composer, organist and artist.Born in Norwich to a master carpenter he showed early musical talent . The three and a half year old Master William Crotch was taken to London by his ambitious mother, where he not only played on the organ of the Chapel Royal in St....
(1775–1847). Composer, artist and teacher. Norwich's MozartWolfgang Amadeus MozartWolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
. He gave daily public organ recitals aged two and a half. Crotch played God Save the King before the King aged three. He had performed at every major town in England and Scotland by the age of seven. Crotch became Organist of Christ ChurchChrist Church, OxfordChrist Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...
, Oxford and for fifty years he was Oxford's Professor of Music. Unlike Mozart, however, his precocious musical talents failed to mature to genius. - Sir Thomas Erpingham (1357–1428), officer in the Battle of AgincourtBattle of AgincourtThe Battle of Agincourt was a major English victory against a numerically superior French army in the Hundred Years' War. The battle occurred on Friday, 25 October 1415 , near modern-day Azincourt, in northern France...
and Knight of the Garter - Pablo FanquePablo FanquePablo Fanque was the first black circus proprietor in Britain. His circus, in which he himself was a performer, was the most popular circus in Victorian Britain for 30 years, a period that is regarded as the golden age of the circus...
(1796–1871). The first blackBlack peopleThe term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
circusCircusA circus is commonly a travelling company of performers that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, unicyclists and other stunt-oriented artists...
proprietor in Britain was born in the city. - Elizabeth FryElizabeth FryElizabeth Fry , née Gurney, was an English prison reformer, social reformer and, as a Quaker, a Christian philanthropist...
(1780–1845). The prison reformPrison reformPrison reform is the attempt to improve conditions inside prisons, aiming at a more effective penal system.-History:Prisons have only been used as the primary punishment for criminal acts in the last couple of centuries...
er and leading QuakerReligious Society of FriendsThe Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
was born in Gurney Court in Magdalen Street and was one of several philanthropists associated with the city. Her portrait is upon the Series E (2005) Bank of EnglandBank of EnglandThe Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694, it is the second oldest central bank in the world...
£5 note. - Charles Suckling Gilman (1807–1888). Businessman, philanthropist. Founder, General Hailstorm Insurance Society, Norwich Mutual Marine Assurance Society, founder (with Joseph John Gurney) Norwich District Visiting Society.
- Sir Charles Rackham Gilman (1833–c1910). Businessman, politician, philanthropist. Son of Charles Suckling Gilman. Mayor of Norwich, 1882; founder of the Norwich and London Accident Insurance Association, chairman of the conservators of Mousehold Heath. (Norwich's Gilman Road named for this family.)
- Joseph John GurneyJoseph John GurneyJoseph John Gurney was a banker in Norwich, England and an evangelical Minister of the Religious Society of Friends , whose views and actions led, ultimately, to a schism among American Quakers.-Biography:...
(1788–1847) was a banker and philanthropist who worked with his sister Elizabeth Fry (see above) in prison reformPrison reformPrison reform is the attempt to improve conditions inside prisons, aiming at a more effective penal system.-History:Prisons have only been used as the primary punishment for criminal acts in the last couple of centuries...
. He was also active in the movement to abolish the slave trade and a member of the temperance movementTemperance movementA temperance movement is a social movement urging reduced use of alcoholic beverages. Temperance movements may criticize excessive alcohol use, promote complete abstinence , or pressure the government to enact anti-alcohol legislation or complete prohibition of alcohol.-Temperance movement by...
. - Richard Lewis Hearne (Mr Pastry)Richard HearneRichard Lewis Hearne, OBE was an English actor, comedian, producer and writer. He was famous for his stage and television character Mr Pastry.-Career:...
, (1908–1979), born in Norwich,actor, comedian,producer and writer. - Louisa Gurney HoareLouisa Gurney Hoare-Early life:Louisa Gurney, born on 25 September 1784, was the seventh of the eleven children of John Gurney of Earlham Hall near Norwich, a Quaker, and of Catherine Bell . Her father inherited ownership of Gurney's Bank in Norwich...
, (1784–1836), diarist and writer on education. - William Jackson HookerWilliam Jackson HookerSir William Jackson Hooker, FRS was an English systematic botanist and organiser. He held the post of Regius Professor of Botany at Glasgow University, and was the first Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He enjoyed the friendship and support of Sir Joseph Banks for his exploring,...
(1785–1865) botanist and Fellow of the Royal Society. - Robert William Bilton HornbyRobert William Bilton HornbyRobert William Bilton Hornby was an antiquarian, priest and Lord of the Manor of Heworth York, England.- Ancestry :...
(1821–1884) was a noted local antiquarian, priest and lord of the manor from the City of York. He was ordained a deaconDeaconDeacon is a ministry in the Christian Church that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions...
at Norwich in 1844. - Julian of NorwichJulian of NorwichJulian of Norwich is regarded as one of the most important English mystics. She is venerated in the Anglican and Lutheran churches, but has never been canonized, or officially beatified, by the Catholic Church, probably because so little is known of her life aside from her writings, including the...
. Medieval Christian mysticMysticismMysticism is the knowledge of, and especially the personal experience of, states of consciousness, i.e. levels of being, beyond normal human perception, including experience and even communion with a supreme being.-Classical origins:...
and contemporary of Chaucer. Julian is the author of The revelations of Divine Love the first book written by a woman in the English languageEnglish literatureEnglish literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
. - Robert Kett. Norwich's very own Robin HoodRobin HoodRobin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....
or Wat TylerWat TylerWalter "Wat" Tyler was a leader of the English Peasants' Revolt of 1381.-Early life:Knowledge of Tyler's early life is very limited, and derives mostly through the records of his enemies. Historians believe he was born in Essex, but are not sure why he crossed the Thames Estuary to Kent...
. Kett was a Norfolk landowner from WymondhamWymondhamWymondham is a historic market town and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It lies 9.5 miles to the south west of the city of Norwich, on the A11 road to Thetford and London.- Before The Great Fire :...
who led the Kett's RebellionKett's RebellionKett's Rebellion was a revolt in Norfolk, England during the reign of Edward VI. The rebellion was in response to the enclosure of land. It began in July 1549 but was eventually crushed by forces loyal to the English crown....
in 1549 in the name of the common man against the corrupt Norfolk landowners. This eventually led to the Battle of Dussindale against the King's forces on 27 August 1549 in which 3000 of Kett's men were killed. He was hanged for treason at Norwich CastleNorwich CastleNorwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. It was founded in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England when William the Conqueror ordered its construction because he wished to have a fortified place in the important city of...
on 7 December 1549. - Alfred LungleyAlfred LungleyAlfred Herbert Lungley, GC was a British soldier of the Royal Artillery who distinguished himself during rescue efforts after the Quetta earthquake of 1935.Lungley was born in Colchester, Essex, on 20 October 1905...
(1905–1989), awarded the George CrossGeorge CrossThe George Cross is the highest civil decoration of the United Kingdom, and also holds, or has held, that status in many of the other countries of the Commonwealth of Nations...
after the Quetta earthquake of 19351935 Balochistan earthquakeThe 1935 Balochistan Earthquake occurred on May 31, 1935 at 3:02am at Quetta, Balochistan, British India . The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.7 Mw and anywhere between 30,000 and 60,000 people died from the impact. This ranks as one of the deadliest earthquakes that hit South Asia...
. - Louis MarchesiLouis MarchesiEminio William Louis Marchesi founded the Round Table, an international fellowship and community charitable organisation for young businessmen....
(1898–1968) Founder of the Round TableRound Table (club)Round Table is a social networking and charitable organisation for men in their 20s, 30s and early 40s, founded in Norwich, England, in 1927. It is open to all men aged between 18 and 45...
, a fellowship and community charitable organisation for young businessmen. - James MartineauJames MartineauJames Martineau was an English religious philosopher influential in the history of Unitarianism. For 45 years he was Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy and Political Economy in Manchester New College, the principal training college for British Unitarianism.-Early life:He was born in Norwich,...
(1805–1900) Philosopher and brother to Harriet. - Harriet MartineauHarriet MartineauHarriet Martineau was an English social theorist and Whig writer, often cited as the first female sociologist....
(1802–1876). The daughter of a Norwich manufacturer of HuguenotHuguenotThe Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
descent, she suffered from ill-health and deafness throughout her life. A devout UnitarianUnitarianismUnitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....
, her writings include Illustrations of political economy (1832–34). Harriet Martineau supported the abolitionist campaign in the United States writing Society in America (1837). She translated writings by Auguste ComteAuguste ComteIsidore Auguste Marie François Xavier Comte , better known as Auguste Comte , was a French philosopher, a founder of the discipline of sociology and of the doctrine of positivism...
. Her first novel was entitled Deerbrook (1839). A radical in religion she published the anti-theological Laws of Man's Social Nature (1851) and Biographical sketches (1869). - Bernard MatthewsBernard MatthewsBernard Matthews Farms Ltd is a British farming and food products business, which specialises in the farming of turkeys. Founded by Bernard Matthews in 1950, as Bernard Matthews Foods Ltd, the company is headquartered in Norwich, Norfolk, England, and has 56 farms throughout Norfolk, Suffolk and...
, (1930–2010), founder of the eponymous meat company. - Bernard MeadowsBernard MeadowsBernard Meadows was a British modernist sculptor. He was part of the 'Geometry of fear school', a loose-knit group of British sculptors whose prominence was established at the 1952 Venice Biennale.- Early life :...
, (1915–2005), modernistModernismModernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
sculptorSculptureSculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
. - Sir John Mills, (1908–2005), was born in North ElmhamNorth ElmhamNorth Elmham is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk.It covers an area of and had a population of 1,428 in 624 households as of the 2001 census. For the purposes of local government, it falls within the district of Breckland....
in Norfolk. Mills was educated at the Norwich High School for BoysNorwich High School for BoysNorwich High School for Boys was an independent school in Norwich, England. Founded in 1910, it became the Langley School shortly after World War II.-History:...
. He also had Football (Soccer)Football (soccer)Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a sport played between two teams of eleven players with a spherical ball...
trials with Norwich City F.C. in the 1920s before moving into acting. - Thomas MorleyThomas MorleyThomas Morley was an English composer, theorist, editor and organist of the Renaissance, and the foremost member of the English Madrigal School. He was the most famous composer of secular music in Elizabethan England and an organist at St Paul's Cathedral...
(1558–1602) Taught by William ByrdWilliam ByrdWilliam Byrd was an English composer of the Renaissance. He wrote in many of the forms current in England at the time, including various types of sacred and secular polyphony, keyboard and consort music.-Provenance:Knowledge of Byrd's biography expanded in the late 20th century, thanks largely...
Composer of Madrigals, Organist at Saint Paul's,Music teacher and theorist. - R. H. Mottram (1883–1971), novelist and Lord MayorLord MayorThe Lord Mayor is the title of the Mayor of a major city, with special recognition.-Commonwealth of Nations:* In Australia it is a political position. Australian cities with Lord Mayors: Adelaide, Brisbane, Darwin, Hobart, Melbourne, Newcastle, Parramatta, Perth, Sydney, and Wollongong...
of Norwich. - Admiral Horatio NelsonHoratio Nelson, 1st Viscount NelsonHoratio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronté, KB was a flag officer famous for his service in the Royal Navy, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars. He was noted for his inspirational leadership and superb grasp of strategy and unconventional tactics, which resulted in a number of...
attended the Norwich SchoolNorwich School (educational institution)Norwich School is an independent school located in Norwich, United Kingdom. It is one of the oldest schools in the world, with a traceable history to 1096, and is a member of The Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference.It is a fee-paying, co-educational day school and has one of the best...
from 1767 to 1768. He was born in nearby Burnham ThorpeBurnham ThorpeBurnham Thorpe is a small village and civil parish on the River Burn and near the coast of Norfolk in the United Kingdom. It is famous for being the birthplace of Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson, victor at the Battle of Trafalgar and one of Britain's greatest heroes...
. - Amelia OpieAmelia OpieAmelia Opie, née Alderson , was an English author who published numerous novels in the Romantic Period of the early 19th century, through 1828.-Life and work:...
(1769–1853), Norwich author and QuakerReligious Society of FriendsThe Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
. In 1825 she drastically changed her life as a socialite, party-goer and attendant at literary soirées, to become a Quaker. - Matthew ParkerMatthew ParkerMatthew Parker was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1559 until his death in 1575. He was also an influential theologian and arguably the co-founder of Anglican theological thought....
(1504–1575), Archbishop of CanterburyArchbishop of CanterburyThe Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. In his role as head of the Anglican Communion, the archbishop leads the third largest group...
. - William H. Scott (1863–1938), electrical engineer and founder of the Norwich-based firm Lawrence Scott & Electromotors Ltd.
- Edmund Sheffield, 1st Baron Sheffield (1521–1549), murdered near the Adam & Eve Pub off the Cathedral Close during Kett's RebellionKett's RebellionKett's Rebellion was a revolt in Norfolk, England during the reign of Edward VI. The rebellion was in response to the enclosure of land. It began in July 1549 but was eventually crushed by forces loyal to the English crown....
- John Palgrave SimpsonJohn Palgrave SimpsonJohn Palgrave Simpson was a Victorian playwright. He wrote more than fifty pieces in a variety of genres, including dramas, comedies, operas, and spectacles, between 1850 and 1885. Simpson also published novels, travel books and journalistic commentaries...
, (1807–1887), born in Norwich, became a prolific and successful playwright. - George SkipperGeorge SkipperGeorge John Skipper was a leading Norwich based architect of the late Victorian and Edwardian period. Writer and poet, John Betjeman gave this description of him "he is altogether remarkable and original. He is to Norwich rather what Gaudi was to Barcelona" Skipper was born in the Norfolk market...
(1856–1948), architect of many fine buildings in the city and further afield. - Sir James Edward Smith botanist, natural historian and one-time owner of the Linnean collection of Carolus LinnaeusCarolus LinnaeusCarl Linnaeus , also known after his ennoblement as , was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who laid the foundations for the modern scheme of binomial nomenclature. He is known as the father of modern taxonomy, and is also considered one of the fathers of modern ecology...
- William SmithWilliam Smith (abolitionist)William Smith was a leading independent British politician, sitting as Member of Parliament for more than one constituency. He was an English Dissenter and was instrumental in bringing political rights to that religious minority...
(1756–1835), WhigBritish Whig PartyThe Whigs were a party in the Parliament of England, Parliament of Great Britain, and Parliament of the United Kingdom, who contested power with the rival Tories from the 1680s to the 1850s. The Whigs' origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute rule...
politician, dissenterDissenterThe term dissenter , labels one who disagrees in matters of opinion, belief, etc. In the social and religious history of England and Wales, however, it refers particularly to a member of a religious body who has, for one reason or another, separated from the Established Church.Originally, the term...
and abolitionist, M.P.Member of ParliamentA Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Norwich from 1807.
Contemporary names associated with Norwich include:
- Stuart Ashen, Internet critic who recently began starring in his own show on the BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, Ashen's Tech Dump. - Ed BallsEd BallsEdward Michael Balls, known as Ed Balls, is a British Labour politician, who has been a Member of Parliament since 2005, currently for Morley and Outwood, and is the current Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer....
, Labour Party MP, born in Norwich. - Diana BurrellDiana BurrellDiana Burrell is an English composer.-Life and career:She was born in Norwich and attended Norwich High School for Girls before studying music at Cambridge University. She began her career as a viola player, but soon became well known for her compositions and became a full-time composer.Her first...
, Composer, born in Norwich. - Martin BurgessMartin BurgessEdward Martin Burgess FSA FBHI, born 21 November 1931, known as Martin Burgess, is an English horologist and master clockmaker.-Early life:Burgess was educated at Gresham's School, Holt, between 1944 and 1949, where he was a member of Farfield...
, builder of the famous Gurney Clock in the Castle Mall - Charles ClarkeCharles ClarkeCharles Rodway Clarke is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Norwich South from 1997 until 2010, and served as Home Secretary from December 2004 until May 2006.-Early life:...
, a former Labour MP and Home Secretary, lives in Norwich. - Cathy DennisCathy DennisCathy Dennis is a British dance-oriented pop singer-songwriter, record producer and actress...
, Singer/Songwriter who was born in Norwich in 1969. - Ralph FirmanRalph FirmanRalph David Firman Jr. is an English-born racing driver who races under Irish citizenship and an Irish-issued racing licence. Earlier in his career he raced under a British licence...
, former Formula OneFormula OneFormula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1 and referred to officially as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of single seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" designation in the name refers to a set of rules with which...
Driver was born in Norwich in 1975. He and his family live in nearby AttleboroughAttleboroughAttleborough is a market town and civil parish in Norfolk, England situated between Norwich and Thetford. The parish falls within the district of Breckland and has an area of 21.90 km² with a Mainline to both Norwich and Cambridge....
, and he was educated at Gresham's SchoolGresham's SchoolGresham’s School is an independent coeducational boarding school in Holt in North Norfolk, England, a member of the HMC.The school was founded in 1555 by Sir John Gresham as a free grammar school for forty boys, following King Henry VIII's dissolution of the Augustinian priory at Beeston Regis...
. Currently racing in the A1 Grand PrixA1 Grand PrixA1 Grand Prix was a 'single make' open-wheel auto racing series. It was unique in its field in that competitors solely represented their nation as opposed to themselves or a team, the usual format in most formula racing series. As such, it was often promoted as the "World Cup of Motorsport"...
series for Ireland, for which he qualifies through his Mother's Irish nationality. - Stephen FryStephen FryStephen John Fry is an English actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director, and a director of Norwich City Football Club. He first came to attention in the 1981 Cambridge Footlights Revue presentation "The Cellar Tapes", which also...
, comedian, author, actor and filmmaker, studied at City College NorwichCity College NorwichCity College Norwich is a college of further and higher education which is located on Ipswich Road, in Norwich, Norfolk, England. The college has a second site at St Andrews House in Norwich city centre, which is also home to the National Skills Academy for Financial Services. Founded in 1891,...
, and is a Norwich City F.C. fan and director. - Mike GascoyneMike GascoyneMichael "Mike" Gascoyne is a designer of Formula One cars. He is currently the Chief Technical Officer of Team Lotus....
, automotive engineer who is currently Technical Director of the Lotus Racing Formula OneFormula OneFormula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1 and referred to officially as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of single seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" designation in the name refers to a set of rules with which...
team. - Andy GreenAndy GreenWing Commander Andy D. Green OBE BA RAF is a British Royal Air Force pilot and World Land Speed Record holder.-RAF career:...
OBEOrder of the British EmpireThe Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
, a Wing Commander in the Royal Air ForceRoyal Air ForceThe Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
, is the current holder of the world land speed record, having piloted the ThrustSSCThrustSSCThrustSSC, also spelt Thrust SSC by secondary sources, is a British jet-propelled car developed by Richard Noble, Glynne Bowsher, Ron Ayers and Jeremy Bliss....
to the first ever supersonicSupersonicSupersonic speed is a rate of travel of an object that exceeds the speed of sound . For objects traveling in dry air of a temperature of 20 °C this speed is approximately 343 m/s, 1,125 ft/s, 768 mph or 1,235 km/h. Speeds greater than five times the speed of sound are often...
speed on land in the Black Rock DesertBlack Rock DesertThe Black Rock Desert is an arid region in the northern Nevada section of the Great Basin with a lakebed that is a dry remnant of Pleistocene Lake Lahontan...
, USA on 25 September 1997. - Jake HumphreyJake HumphreyJacob John "Jake" Humphrey is an English television presenter, currently best known for his work with BBC Sport, being the youngest ever presenter to host Football Focus, Match of the Day and Final Score. He currently presents the BBC's Formula One coverage and BBC Sports Personality of the Year...
, TV presenter for CBBCCBBCCBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
and the BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
coverage of Formula OneFormula OneFormula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1 and referred to officially as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of single seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" designation in the name refers to a set of rules with which...
, moved to Norwich at the age of nine and attended The Hewett SchoolThe Hewett School, NorwichThe Hewett School is a secondary school based on a 64 acre site in Norwich, England. The school has Artsmark Gold, Eco School Silver and is a Creative Partnership School....
. He also supports Norwich City F.C. - Myleene KlassMyleene KlassMyleene Angela Quinn is an English singer, pianist, media personality and occasional model. She was formerly a member of the defunct British pop band Hear'Say.-Early life:...
singer, model, designer, presenter, and classical music DJ, formerly a member of pop band Hear'Say; went to school in Norwich - Marek LarwoodMarek LarwoodMarek Larwood is an English comedian and actor in television, radio and theatre. He is best known for the BBC Three sitcom/sketch show, Rush Hour and for being one third of the comedy trio We Are Klang....
, actor and comedian, born in Norwich. - Ian McEwanIan McEwanIan Russell McEwan CBE, FRSA, FRSL is a British novelist and screenwriter, and one of Britain's most highly regarded writers. In 2008, The Times named him among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945"....
Author, Booker Prize-winning English novelist and screenwriter, perhaps best known for his novel "AtonementAtonement (novel)Atonement is a 2001 novel by British author Ian McEwan.On a fateful day, a young girl makes a terrible mistake that has life-changing effects for many people...
". McEwan was educated at the University of East AngliaUniversity of East AngliaThe University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
, located in Norwich, and was the first graduate of its pioneering Creative Writing course. - Jane ManningJane ManningJane Manning OBE is an English concert and opera soprano, writer on music, and Visiting Professor at the Royal College of Music. She has been described by one critic as "the irrepressible, incomparable, unstoppable Ms...
, opera sopranoSopranoA soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
, was born and brought up in Norwich and attended Norwich High SchoolNorwich High School for GirlsNorwich High School for Girls is an independent fee-charging school with selective entry in Norwich, Norfolk, England. It was founded in 1875 and is now one of the twenty-nine schools of the Girls' Day School Trust. The school has one of the best academic records in Norfolk... - Professor Sir Paul NursePaul NurseSir Paul Maxime Nurse, PRS is a British geneticist and cell biologist. He was awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Leland H. Hartwell and R...
, winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or MedicineNobel Prize in Physiology or MedicineThe Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine administered by the Nobel Foundation, is awarded once a year for outstanding discoveries in the field of life science and medicine. It is one of five Nobel Prizes established in 1895 by Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, in his will...
, became President of the Royal SocietyRoyal SocietyThe Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
in 2010, was born in Norwich, and educated at the University of East AngliaUniversity of East AngliaThe University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
. - Beth OrtonBeth OrtonBeth Orton is a BRIT Award–winning English singer-songwriter, known for her 'folktronica' sound, which mixes elements of folk and electronica. She was initially recognised for her collaborations with William Orbit and the Chemical Brothers in the mid 1990s. However, these were not Orton's first...
, award-winning singer/songwriter was born in DerehamDerehamDereham, also known as East Dereham, is a town and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It is situated on the A47 road, some 15 miles west of the city of Norwich and 25 miles east of King's Lynn. The civil parish has an area of and in the 2001 census had a population of...
, spent much of her childhood in Norwich and attended The Hewett SchoolThe Hewett School, NorwichThe Hewett School is a secondary school based on a 64 acre site in Norwich, England. The school has Artsmark Gold, Eco School Silver and is a Creative Partnership School....
. - Steve OsborneSteve OsborneSteve Osborne is a multi-platinum selling British record producer. He has worked with a wide variety of musicians, such as New Order, Doves, U2 and KT Tunstall. During the 1990s, Osborne was half of the Perfecto Records team, a production and remix collaboration with Paul Oakenfold; the artists...
, musician and record producer—grew up in Norwich, left in 1986 to join Trident StudiosTrident StudiosTrident Studios was a British recording facility, originally located at 17 St. Anne's Court in London's Soho district. It was constructed in 1967 by Norman Sheffield a drummer of former 1960's group The Hunters and his Brother Barry....
—now lives near Bath and has produced both KT TunstallKT TunstallKate Victoria "KT" Tunstall is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist from St Andrews, Scotland. She broke into the public eye with a 2004 live solo performance of her song "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" on Later... with Jools Holland...
albums amongst many others. - Ronan ParkeRonan ParkeRonan David Parke is an English singer from Poringland, Norfolk, UK who came runner-up in the fifth series of ITV show Britain's Got Talent, despite being the bookies' favorite to win. After the show, it was reported that Ronan had signed a joint record deal with Sony Music...
Came 2nd in Britain's Got TalentBritain's Got TalentBritain's Got Talent is a British television talent show competition which started in June 2007 and originated from the Got Talent series. The show is produced by FremantleMedia's TalkbackThames and Simon Cowell's production company SYCOtv. The show is broadcast on ITV in Britain and TV3 in Ireland...
2011. - David PerryNorwich Puppet ManDavid Perry , commonly known as the Norwich Puppet Man, is a street entertainer from Norwich, Norfolk, England, who now resides in Great Yarmouth, whose performance consists of dancing with a range of puppets while singing along to pop songs played on a portable karaoke machine...
, the so-called Norwich Puppet Man, street entertainer. - Emma PooleyEmma PooleyEmma Jane Pooley is an English professional cyclist and Olympic silver medallist currently riding for . Pooley was the 2010 World Time Trial Champion and is a former British Road Race and Time Trial Champion.-Biography:...
, British Olympic silver medal winning cyclist and winner of the 2009 Woman's Tour de France, attended The Norwich SchoolNorwich School (educational institution)Norwich School is an independent school located in Norwich, United Kingdom. It is one of the oldest schools in the world, with a traceable history to 1096, and is a member of The Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference.It is a fee-paying, co-educational day school and has one of the best...
and her family are from Norfolk. - Philip PullmanPhilip PullmanPhilip Pullman CBE, FRSL is an English writer from Norwich. He is the best-selling author of several books, most notably his trilogy of fantasy novels, His Dark Materials, and his fictionalised biography of Jesus, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ...
, British writer was born in Norwich on 19 October 1946. Best-selling author of the His Dark MaterialsHis Dark MaterialsHis Dark Materials is a trilogy of fantasy novels by Philip Pullman comprising Northern Lights , The Subtle Knife , and The Amber Spyglass...
trilogy of fantasy novels and a number of other books. - Delia SmithDelia SmithDelia Smith CBE is an English cook and television presenter, known for teaching basic cookery skills. She is the UK's best-selling cookery author, with more than 21 million copies sold....
, celebrity chef and joint majority owner of Norwich City F.C. - Chris SuttonChris SuttonChristopher Roy "Chris" Sutton is an English football manager and former player.In his career, Sutton played for Norwich City, Blackburn Rovers, Chelsea, Celtic, Birmingham City and Aston Villa. Sutton scored over 150 career goals in over 400 league appearances spanning 16 years in the English...
, football player (striker); joint top scorer for the Premier League in 1997/8; formerly the record English transfer (at £5 million from Norwich to Blackburn in 1994); was brought up in Norwich, attending HellesdonHellesdonHellesdon is a thriving suburb of Norwich in the District of Broadland in Norfolk, England. It lies approximately 4 miles north-west of Norwich and has 11,177 inhabitants.- History :...
High School where his father, Mike Sutton (footballer)Mike Sutton (footballer)Mike Sutton is a former English professional footballer. He played in The Football League for three clubs. Two of his sons, Chris and John, have also played professionally.-Playing career:...
, was also a teacher. - Stella VineStella VineStella Vine is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting with subject matter drawn from either her personal life of family, friends and school, or rock stars, royalty and celebrities.After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she left home and in...
lived in Norwich during her childhood, from the age of 7, during which time she performed at the Norwich Theatre Royal. Vine moved back to live in Norwich again later in her life with her son. Vine painted a large painting Welcome to Norwich a fine city (2006) which depicts Vine with her son and family cat in Norwich, against a clear blue sky. Her first job was at age 14 in a local Norwich cake shop. - Tim WestwoodTim WestwoodTimothy Westwood is an English DJ and presenter of radio and television. He also presents the UK version of the MTV show Pimp My Ride...
, BBC Radio 1 Rap DJ and presenter of popular MTV show "Pimp My Ride (UK)". Grew up in and around Norwich (his father was the bishop of Peterborough, in the nearby county of CambridgeshireCambridgeshireCambridgeshire is a county in England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the northeast, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to the west...
) and attended Norwich SchoolNorwich School (educational institution)Norwich School is an independent school located in Norwich, United Kingdom. It is one of the oldest schools in the world, with a traceable history to 1096, and is a member of The Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference.It is a fee-paying, co-educational day school and has one of the best...
and The Hewett SchoolThe Hewett School, NorwichThe Hewett School is a secondary school based on a 64 acre site in Norwich, England. The school has Artsmark Gold, Eco School Silver and is a Creative Partnership School....
. - Jackson WilliamsJackson Williams (boxer)For the American baseball player see Jackson WilliamsJackson 'Action' Williams in Norwich is a retired English professional boxer. The sports and exercise lecturer is also a charity fund raiser through his ultra marathon running challenges.- Early life :One of four brothers, he was born in Norwich...
, Professional boxerBoxingBoxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
, ultramarathonUltramarathonAn ultramarathon is any sporting event involving running longer than the traditional marathon length of .There are two types of ultramarathon events: those that cover a specified distance, and events that take place during specified time...
runner and charity fund raiser.
Twinned cities
Officially:Novi Sad
Novi Sad
Novi Sad is the capital of the northern Serbian province of Vojvodina, and the administrative centre of the South Bačka District. The city is located in the southern part of Pannonian Plain on the Danube river....
, Serbia Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
, France Koblenz
Koblenz
Koblenz is a German city situated on both banks of the Rhine at its confluence with the Moselle, where the Deutsches Eck and its monument are situated.As Koblenz was one of the military posts established by Drusus about 8 BC, the...
, Germany
Unofficially:
El Viejo
El Viejo
El Viejo is a municipality in the Chinandega department of Nicaragua.El Viejo is a small city near the city of Chinandega, noted for its particular gastronomic specialties, which include rosquillas , cajetas , bollitos de leche , and a fruit particular to the region called the toncua, which is...
, Nicaragua.
See also
- St Augustine's Church, NorwichSt Augustine's Church, NorwichSt Augustine's Church, Norwich, is a redundant Anglican church in the city of Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building, and is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust...
- Church of St John MaddermarketChurch of St John MaddermarketThe Church of St John Maddermarket, is a redundant Anglican church in the city of Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building, and is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.-History:...
- St Laurence's Church, NorwichSt Laurence's Church, NorwichSt Laurence's Church, Norwich, or St Lawrence's Church, is a redundant Anglican church in St Benedict's Street, Norwich, Norfolk, England. It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building, and is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust...