The Roman Port City of Chester

The Eastgate Clock in Chester is reputedly the second-most photographed clock in the UK, after Big Ben

In the dying days of an Indian Summer last October, I spent a very pleasant sunny day in Chester. With my new-found love of historical walking tours gained from the one down in Bath , I opted for one with Roman Tours. These excellent walking tours, complete with guide in full Roman military costume, are extremely informative, as well as opening up places which are either not obvious or accessible to the general public.

Chester was founded by the Romans in 79AD with the name Deva Victrix, after the name of the River, the River Dee. It was a Roman fort or castrum, Latin for fortified place, from which the city gets its modern name. It is hard to imagine the city as a deep water port today, since the River Dee has both silted up since Roman times and the river course meanders slightly differently today as it did back then. Historians believe the deep water port was at the location of the modern racecourse, just adjacent to the City walls:

It is hard to imagine today Chester Racecourse as the site of a deep water port.

Getting there today is relatively straightforward. Chester is very well connected by road and rail. I opted for the motorway route of M56/M53 taking around 45 minutes from Manchester without any delays (and on a Saturday morning too). Parking was straightforward too, with a large modern car park in the city centre, close to the town hall, which pedestrians exit through a very pleasant modern market with coffee shops and places to eat. Chester is also well serviced by rail, with a regular train service from Manchester Picadilly.

I last visited Chester back in 1988 and I was so pleasantly surprised by the changes in the many years since. The Roman Gardens have been beautifully restored with some recreations of Roman mosaic floors. I also noted that there were hardly any vacant stores in the shopping streets which plague some of our town centres today in the UK. There also appeared to be a vibrant, independent food scene , although on this occassion I didn't have time to sample it. It is also wonderfully clean as well and there seems to be an emphasis on restoration and conservation, evident in the preservation of its many historic buildings. Chester's architecture is a wonderful patchwork of Roman, Tudor, Georgian and Victorian, with some Victorian-created Tudor re-creations thrown in for good measure.

Chester is famous for its black and white, canopied architecture in the form of 'The Rows'. But are you looking at Tudor or Victorian architecture?

The bulk of my time in Chester was on the guided Roman tour; followed by a quick lunch and then a walk around the Roman walls, finishing with a stop in Chester Cathedral.

The Roman Tours walking tour of Chester is both informative and entertaining, complete with Roman soldier

The Roman Tours guided walking tour of Chester starts just outside the Tourist information centre, which is next door to the entrance to the magnificent Gothic Town Hall. Tickets can either be bought online or at the centre. The tour last 90 minutes, although mine was closer to three hours. Currently there are two tours , one starting at 12:00 and the other at 14:30. Group tours are also available.

The Roman Tours start just next to the magnificent Gothic town hall

The first place of interest is the Roman strongroom which is visible through glass windows in Hamilton Place, just behind the Dublin Packet pub. On display are several Roman standards. The strongroom would have been the heart of the fort, where items like the bullion and currency reserves were kept, as well as being a shrine to the Roman Gods, and it was guarded at all times. I listened itently as the guide informed us that the Romans had also invented pension schemes, since all those in the Roman legions had to participate in a pension scheme. I couldn't help thinking at this point of the Monty Python sketch "What have the Romans ever done for us?" from The Life of Brian.... the Pythons missed out "pension schemes" from their long list.

Roman Standards are on display at the Roman Strongroom, Chester

It was interesting also to discover that the Romans also invented currency tokenisation too. Julius Caesar had decreed he did not want his face turning up in the form of coins exchanged in brothels by the Roman soldiers, so they purchased tokens which were then used in the brothels...

What have the Romans ever done for us? Currency tokenisation, pension schemes....

The next stop is a very surreal experience, and only accessible via this tour to my knowledge. You are guided into Pret a Manger on Northgate street, and behind the staff tills, seemingly into the staff area. Only to discover a secret locked door, which is opened, down into their basement, where the foundation pillars of the Principia are located. This formed the administrative heart of the Roman fort and is where the Roman soldiers would have had their pay doled out to them.

Beneath a sandwich chain lies a Roman find.

Next stop are the Roman Gardens. These contain the remains of items excavated in the 19th century and also part of the Roman Baths which were relocated here. Accompanying these are suitable Roman Cypress trees and several mosiac floors, which were created in the 2010s to celebrate the golden jubilee of the Chester Civic Trust society:

The relocated Roman Baths can be seen in part in Chester's Roman Gardens

This mosaic was created for the golden jubilee of the Chester Civic Trust

The final stop was, perhaps not surprisingly, the Roman amphitheatre, which was the largest in Roman Britain. An odd quirk of our listed building status and city planning means only half of the amphitheatre has been excavated. A large Victorian building, which sits above the remaining unseen 50% is listed and therefore cannot be demolished, hiding the rest of the amphitheatre . Here's an idea then: if we can move Captain Cook's cottage from North Yorkshire, half way around the world to Melbourne, Australia, why is it impossible to relocate the Victorian building, brick by brick down the road to a new location in Chester? This way the Victorian building would be preserved, and we'd get to see something (of far greater historical interest in my opinion) in its entirety.

Chester's Roman amphitheatre was the largest of its kind in Roman Britain

Along the way we also stopped at what is perhaps Chester's most iconic landmark: the Eastgate clock. Created in 1899 to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1897, it was beautifully restored to its former glory in 2014-15 . It is the second-most photographed clock in the UK, after Big Ben:

Chester's Eastgate Clock in the second most photographed clock in the UK, after Big Ben

After an al fresco lunch in the hot sunshine, I then walked this off with a full circuit of the Roman Walls. Chester's Roman walls are the most complete walls in Britain today, with a diammeter of 2miles. They have been in the news recently with repairs to a small section which collapsed in January 2020 due to start in days. They are a great way to see the city for free and the elevated position affords some great photogenic opportunites:

Chester's city walls are the most complete in Britain at 2 miles in diammeter

Chester Castle, seen from the city walls circuit

Last but by no means least, was a visit to Chester's Cathedral, something I did not have time to see back in 1988. Entry is free, except for summer and Christmas, when a small entrance fee is charged. The current structure dates from mid 13th century, although there is evidence to suggest that there was a place of religous worship on this site as far back as the late Roman period with a basilica dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul (the late Romans having converted to Christianity). The oldest part of the current Cathedral is thought to be the undercroft:

The undercroft of Chester Cathedral is thought to be it's oldest part

Chester cathedral today is an impressive Gothic church and its interior made all the more stunning by the use of modern lighting. Tours of this cathedral are also available. I recommend at least an hour in this stunning cathedral, perhaps longer if you want to take part in one of the guided tours.

Chester Cathedral is made even more impressive through the stunning use of modern lighting

Restoration in Chester is not something new, although perhaps we are not quite as ambitious today as were the Victorians. Chester is famous for its black and white, timber-framed canopied architecture, providing shopping with shelter from the rain; but in Victorian times there was a black and white revival movement, centred around Chester which resulted in many buildings either being restored or re-created. You have to look closely at them, since the Victorians did such a great job of recreating architecture from some three centuries earlier, that it is hard to differentiate the Tudor from the Victorian. Tell-tale signs are the condition of the timber: warped and rustic is usually Tudor, whereas the Victorian recreations, being much newer, look much neater. Also many of the buildings do have dates on them, revealing their year of construction.

Tudor or Victorian?

In closing Chester is a city full of character and history, complimented by wonderful indepedent shops and restaurants. It is a success story to celebrate in terms of its historical preservation and I strongly recommend the Roman-themed tour from Roman Tours as a way to discover the history and access some places of interest not usually open to the public. The city walls are also another great way to explore the city; whilst the cathedral is surely one of the best examples of its kind in the UK today.

You can see more images from this day trip to Chester on Instagram.