The Churches Concervation Trust guide book for St Andrew’s Church at Wroxeter provides and informative introduction to both the Wrekin and Wroxeter.

The name Wroxeter appears to mean ‘fort by the Wrekin’. This hill, which is prominent for miles around, has an Iron Age fort at its crest and the Celtic name for it is thought to have been Wreocen. When the Romans came they founded a large fortified town five miles (8km) away from the fort and close to where Watling Street crosses the River Severn. This ‘castrum’ supplies the second half of the name.

The Roman name for Wroxeter is Viroconium, also an echo of Wreocen. Their town was one of the largest they built in England, smaller only than London, St Albans and Cirencester, and became an important provincial capital. It extended to the Severn beyond the church and nearly as far in the other direction towards the present A5 road.

In his article in the June 2013 edition of the Wrekin News, George Evans refers to ‘The Wrekin’ as ‘The little mountain with many secrets’.  The article explains how he persuaded the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) that The Wrekin was worthy of being included in their 100 best walks in Britain.  His article mentions the local folk law, history and geology of the surrounding area. He explains that the hill still retains some of its secrets.

The Calendar stones are an enigma. They don’t look natural but I’m told no archaeologist has ever investigated them. Surely it’s not accidental that a shaft of light shows each equinox is it? The hill-fort was started about 3,500 years ago (we think), extended 2,500 years ago and disused after the Romans invaded. That’s 1,500 years. How was it built, who used it and for what purpose? There’s a nice little story to tell about the Magic Tree in the Druid’s Circles on the Little Hill and there are tales about the Devil’s Coach-house, where the four winds meet and King of the Wrekin.

• George’s walk – A little mountain with many secrets
• More from me on The Wrekin  - The Wrekin Hill

Just inside the front door of the church stands a huge font which is thought to be part of a Roman column. The organ was originally built by Charles Brindley in 1849, but little now remains from that date.   The knave is furnished with box pews, the pulpit is Jacobean and the altar rails are dated 1637.*

*From The Churches Conservation Trust guide book.

Some of you may recall that I have had two failed attempts at taking photographs of St Andrew’s Church.  On my first attempt I was nearly run over by a driver who had not noticed I was walking along the country lane.

Afterwards I decided to make the short walk to St Andrew’s church in the nearby village.  It has an interesting history and it is a long time since I visited.  At one stage I was in danger of getting knocked over by an oncoming vehicle whose driver only slowed the vehicle down and came to a halt when the driver of another vehicle coming in the other direction slammed his brakes on and pulled to one side.  The first driver clearly hadn’t noticed me until then!  I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and retreated back to the ruins.  I will visit the church another day by car.

My second attempt turned out to be a rescue mission, two rooks had become trapped within the church and needed releasing. The few photographs that I took of the outside of the church whilst waiting for the rooks to leave the building were overexposed because I had inadvertently pressed a button on my camera.

The church was first mentioned in the Domesday Book (1086), though it must have existed for some time before that. The building was greatly extended in the late 12th century. The tower was built in stages and carvings incorporated into it are thought to come from the nearby Haughmond Abbey after its dissolution in 1539. Further alterations and additions were made to the structure, the latest being the present porch which dates to 1870.

The main entrance to the church is through a gateway that is formed by a pair of columns from the nearby Roman site of Wroxeter. Near to the gate is a stile that also doubles as a mounting block for horses.

*Information from the Churches Conservation Trust guide book.

J.R.R. Tolkien

I am back to work tomorrow and I wonder where the weekend has gone, it didn’t feel much like Easter…

A friend was celebrating a special birthday over the Easter weekend and (he and his partner) invited friends round for a celebratory buffet at around 6pm on Easter Sunday (the traditional time my family share Easter celebrations together).  The birthday isn’t their only celebration, they are getting married next weekend and I am sooo excited for them

Now getting back to my point – Easter didn’t feel much like Easter…  Easter Sunday was celebrated on Saturday and the Sunday birthday celebrations felt like a Saturday!!  Now Easter Monday is nearly over and it FEELS like Easter Sunday…

I will be in shock when I have to go into work tomorrow!!

Now getting back to my weekend…

One of the things I did was visit St Andrew’s Church near Wroxeter after my failed attempt last year:

Afterwards I decided to make the short walk to St Andrew’s church in the nearby village.  It has an interesting history and it is a long time since I visited.  At one stage I was in danger of getting knocked over by an oncoming vehicle whose driver only slowed the vehicle down and came to a halt when the driver of another vehicle coming in the other direction slammed his brakes on and pulled to one side.  The first driver clearly hadn’t noticed me until then!  I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and retreated back to the ruins.  I will visit the church another day by car.

This time I was accompanied by Mr C, we made it to the church (by car) without any problems… But on entering the Church, we found that two birds (Rooks) had got themselves trapped inside the Church…

This caused us both distress, and doors were opened to let the birds fly free.  One did quite quickly… The birds were calling to each other from different places and the second one didn’t know how to fly free from the church…  Until the last moment, that moment was quite beautiful

I still don’t have any decent photographs of the Church because whilst I was visiting Powis Castle last week I had inadvertently pressed a button on my camera that made all my subsequent photos (over exposed) less than ideal…

I need to make the journey to St Andrew’s again ;-/

The Villa Urbana was built using only tools and materials that were known to the Romans. The building of the town house had a 6 month deadline and was filmed for a Channel 4 television series called ‘Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day’. The villa is now on display to visitors of Wroxeter Roman City.

From the English Heritage guidebook:

In Roman times, labour was plentiful and cheap. This town house, however, was built by a core team of six modern builders with a range of skills, who were sometimes supplemented by local volunteers. Surveying was done using a groma, a simple instrument the Romans used to lay out straight lines and angles, timbers and stone were both shaped by hand: and human muscle-power took the place of cranes and wheelbarrows, as it would have done in Roman times. As well as avoiding modern power tools and technologies the builders had to turn their hands to many different tasks, including the mosaic and wall-paintings, which in the Roman period would have been the work of highly skilled specialists.

In amongst my Christmas posts I will be completing my ‘100 Reasons to be Glad’ series of posts (a year late), so that I can start my new ‘100 photos’ project in the New Year.

The post count will however go to 102 because I inadvertently duplicated two themes along the way…