Before the Romans invaded Iron Age Britain in AD 43, the area we know as Norfolk had been the territory of the Iceni people. The most famous leader of this tribe, Boudicca, led an unsuccessful revolt against the Roman occupation in around AD 60. Following her defeat, the Romans inhabited the area for more than 300 years. The local capital became Venta Icenorum, on the River Tas, just to the south of the present-day city. You can visit this site at Caister St Edmunds, three miles outside Norwich and see the earthworks around it. The town has never been fully excavated and still lies under green fields.
Most modern cities in Britain arose out of the towns that the Romans built. Not Norwich! After the Romans, Venta Icenorum became abandoned and a new town grew up on the River Wensum. There were scattered settlements, but at the centre was Tombland. (The name has nothing to do with tombs – a “tum land” was an open space.) Nowadays, Wensum Street runs from Tombland to Fye Bridge, the ancient river crossing to “Norwich over the water”. One of the settlements here on the north bank was called “Norwic”, which eventually gave the name to the city.
Into this Anglo-Saxon world came the Vikings. They were resisted by Edmund, King of East Anglia, who was killed by the Danes in 870. Edmund was made a saint and is commemorated at Bury St Edmunds. The Danes ruled the area for nearly 50 years. Although there is little now to show for their occupation, they left their imprint on the city in many street names. In 1999 a very fine Viking gold ingot was discovered in the city centre during the construction of the Forum.
East Anglia was recaptured in 917 by the Saxon king Edward the Elder, and then occupied once again by Vikings in 1004. In this year, Swein (Sven) Forkbeard, the King of Denmark, burnt much of Norwich to the ground. Over the next 50 years the Danes settled alongside the native Anglo-Saxons, creating a large prosperous town of some five to ten thousand inhabitants. This set the scene for the next major upheaval in Norwich’s history, the Norman period.
The arrival of the conquering Normans from France changed everything. They relocated the town centre from Tombland to the current market place, where it was overlooked by the new castle. The cathedral was begun in 1096, with stone being imported from Caen in northern France. The Normans also built 2.5 miles (4 km) of defensive walls around the city.
The medieval period was a prosperous one for the Norwich area and the main industry was the wool trade and weaving. (The heavy fabric called Worstead was named after the village of that name north of Norwich.) Large numbers of skilled Walloon and Flemish weavers came to Norwich from the Low Countries during this time, often to escape persecution at home.
The wealth of the city was reflected in the many buildings dating from this time that can still be seen in Norwich. From the 1400s onwards there was extensive church building and even today you can find 31 medieval churches still standing, as well as many other buildings dating from the Middle Ages.
For much of the time between 1650 and 1750, Norwich was rated as second only to London in terms of its prosperity, with textiles still being the mainstay of the economy. It was considered in 1623 as a "City in a Wood, or a Wood in the City"(1) due to the amount of land available for pleasure and planting withing the city walls. During the 1800s, newer industries began to gain prominence, for example, printing and the production of leather. The completion of the railway connection between Norwich and London in 1845, an achievement of Victorian entrepreneur Sir Morton Peto, brought transport links to the capital. A thriving boot and shoe industry was well established and new ventures, such as Colman’s Mustard, became enduring legacies of Victorian Norwich.
Through the 20th Century and to the present day, Norwich has continued to evolve. The 1930s saw the building of the revolutionary Art Deco City Hall overlooking the market place, and in 1963 the University of East Anglia admitted its first students. The UEA brought more extraordinary architecture to Norwich, in the pyramidal shape of Denys Lasdun’s “ziggurats”. This was followed by the striking structure of the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, designed in the 1970s by Sir Norman Foster. In the 1990s, in a move to protect one of the area’s greatest natural assets, the Norfolk Broads became a national park. As the 21st Century got underway, the landmark Forum building, housing the Millennium Library, was opened in the centre of Norwich.
For the full picture of the rich and fascinating local history of the area, there are a number of places to visit:
Norfolk Museums Service
(Includes Norwich Castle Museum, Strangers’ Hall, Bridewell Museum)
Venta Icenorum
(Caistor Roman town)
Diss Museum