[edit]
Toponymy[edit]
The modern name of Exeter is a development of the Old English Escanceaster, from the anglicised form of the river now known as the Exe and the Old English suffix -ceaster (as in Dorchester and Gloucester), used to mark important fortresses or fortified towns (from Latin castrum, meaning fortress, or castra, military camp). (Similarly, the city's Cornish name Karesk and its Welsh name Caerwysg both mean "caer or fortress on the Exe".) The name "Exe" is a separate development of the Brittonic name—meaning "water" or, more exactly, "full of fish" (cf. Welsh pysg, pl. "fish")—that also appears in the English Axe and Esk and the Welsh Usk (Wysg).
Prehistory[edit]
Further information: Timeline of Exeter
See also: Dumnonii and British Iron Age
Exeter began as settlements on a dry ridge ending in a spur overlooking a navigable river teeming with fish, with fertile land nearby. Although there have been no major prehistoric finds, these advantages suggest the site was occupied early.
Coins have been discovered from the Hellenistic kingdoms, suggesting the existence of a settlement trading with the Mediterranean as early as 250 BC. Such early towns had been a feature of pre-Roman Gaul as described by Julius Caesar in his Commentaries and it is possible that they existed in Britannia as well.
The source Geoffrey of Monmouth stated that when Vespasian besieged the city in 49 AD its Celtic name was Kaerpenhuelgoit, meaning 'town on the hill under the high wood'.
A portion of Exeter's city wall, formed of both Roman and medieval stones
Roman times[edit]
Main articles: Isca Dumnoniorum, Legio II Augusta, and Roman Britain
The Romans established a 42-acre (17 ha) 'playing-card' shaped (rectangle with round corners and two short and two long sides - "stadium") fort (Latin: castrum) named Isca around AD 55. The fort was the southwest terminus of the Fosse Way (Route 15 of the Antonine Itinerary) and served as the base of the 5,000-man Second Augustan Legion (Legio II Augusta) at some time led by Vespasian, later Roman Emperor, for the next 20 years before they moved to Caerleon in Wales, which was also known as Isca. To distinguish the two, the Romans also referred to Exeter as Isca Dumnoniorum, "Watertown of the Dumnonii", and Caerleon as Isca Augusta. A small fort was also maintained at Topsham; a supply depot on the route between the two was excavated at St Loyes near Topsham Road in 2010.
The presence of the fort built up an unplanned civilian community (vicus or canabae) of natives and the soldiers' families, mostly to the northeast of the fort. This settlement served as the tribal capital (civitas) of the Dumnonii and was listed as one of their four cities (Ancient Greek: poleis) by Ptolemy in his Geography (it also appeared in the 7th-century Ravenna Cosmography, where it appears as an apparently confused entry for Scadu Namorum). When the fortress was abandoned around AD 75, its grounds were converted to civilian purposes: its very large bathhouse was demolished to make way for a forum and a basilica, and a smaller-scale bath was erected to the southeast. This area was excavated in the 1970s, but uncertainty about how to handle the site (now in front of the present-day cathedral) and a lack of funds led to it being reburied. Plans to restore and open the site were made by Exeter Cathedral in 2015 but abandoned after failing to secure funds.
In the late 2nd century, the ditch and rampart defences around the old fortress were replaced by a bank and wall enclosing a much larger area, some 92 acres (37 hectares). Although most of the visible structure is older, the course of the Roman wall was used for the subsequent Exeter city walls. Thus about 70% of the Roman wall remains, and most of its route can be traced on foot. The Devonian Isca seems to have been most prosperous in the first half of the 4th century: more than a thousand Roman coins have been found around the city and there is evidence for copper and bronze working, a stock-yard, and markets for the livestock, crops, and pottery produced in the surrounding countryside. The dating of the coins so far discovered, however, suggests a rapid decline: virtually none have been discovered dated after 380.
Medieval times[edit]
See also: Sub-Roman Britain, Saxon England, and Norman England
Bishop Ussher identified the Cair Pensa vel Coyt, listed among the 28 cities of Britain by the History of the Britons, as Isca, although David Nash Ford read it as a reference to Penselwood and thought it more likely to be Lindinis (modern Ilchester). Nothing is certainly known of Exeter from the time of the Roman withdrawal from Britain around the year 410 until the seventh century. By that time, the city was held by the Saxons, who had arrived in Exeter after defeating the British Dumnonians at Peonnum in Somerset in 658. It seems likely that the Saxons maintained a quarter of the city for the Britons under their own laws around present-day Bartholomew Street, which was known as "Britayne" Street until 1637 in memory of its former occupants.
Exeter was known to the Saxons as Escanceaster. In 876, it was attacked and briefly captured by Danish Vikings. Alfred the Great drove them out the next summer. Over the next few years, he elevated Exeter to one of the four burhs in Devon, rebuilding its walls on the Roman lines. These permitted the city to fend off another attack and siege by the Danes in 893. King Athelstan again strengthened the walls around 928, and at the same time drove out the remaining Britons from the city. (It is uncertain, though, whether they had lived in the city continuously since the Roman period or returned from the countryside when Alfred strengthened its defences.) According to William of Malmesbury, they were sent beyond the River Tamar, which was fixed as the boundary of Devon. (This may, however, have served as a territorial boundary within the former kingdom of Dumnonia as well.) Other references suggest that the British simply moved to what is now the St David's area, not far outside Exeter's walls. The quarter vacated by the Britons was apparently adapted as "the earl's burh" and was still named Irlesberi in the 12th century. In 1001, the Danes again failed to get into the city, but they were able to plunder it in 1003 because they were let in, for unknown reasons, by the French reeve of Emma of Normandy, who had been given the city as part of her dowry on her marriage to Æthelred the Unready the previous year.
The gatehouse of Rougemont Castle
Two years after the Norman conquest of England, Exeter rebelled against King William. Gytha Thorkelsdóttir, the mother of the slain King Harold, was living in the city at the time, and William promptly marched west and initiated a siege. After 18 days, William accepted the city's honourable surrender, swearing an oath not to harm the city or increase its ancient tribute. However, William quickly arranged for the building of Rougemont Castle to strengthen Norman control over the area. Properties owned by Saxon landlords were transferred into Norman hands and, on the death of Bishop Leofric in 1072, the Norman Osbern FitzOsbern was appointed his successor.
In 1136, early in the Anarchy, Rougemont Castle was held against King Stephen by Baldwin de Redvers. Redvers submitted only after a three-month siege, not when the three wells in the castle ran dry, but only after the exhaustion of the large supplies of wine that the garrison was using for drinking, baking, cooking, and putting out fires set by the besiegers. During the siege, King Stephen built an earthen fortification at the site now known (erroneously) as Danes Castle.
Remains of the medieval Exe Bridge, built around 1200
Oil on canvas painting by an unknown artist c.1870. These houses were later demolished to make way for St Edmund's Church. The painting depicts the edge of the River Exe flowing under three arches of the Old Exe Bridge, with houses on the bridge and on the river bank, St Edmund's Church can be seen in the top left.
The city held a weekly market for the benefit of its citizens from at least 1213, and by 1281 Exeter was the only town in the south-west to have three market days per week. There are also records of seven annual fairs, the earliest of which dates from 1130, and all of which continued until at least the early 16th century.
Prior to the expulsion of the Jews of England in 1290, Exeter was home to England's most westerly Jewish community.
During the high medieval period, both the cathedral clergy and the citizens enjoyed access to sophisticated aqueduct systems which brought pure drinking water into the city from springs in the neighbouring parish of St Sidwell's. For part of their length, these aqueducts were conveyed through a remarkable network of tunnels, or underground passages, which survive largely intact and which may still be visited today.
Exeter and Bristol hosted the first recorded Common Council in the medieval England. The first detailed and continuous evidence of its existence and activity was founded after 1345. Formed by twelve "better and more discreet men" (in Latin: duodecim meliores), reelected each year, it was originally designed to control the abuse of the Major and of his four stewards, which respectively presided over the borough court and the provost court. The members of the Common Council come from the same elite of wealthy citizens, as did the major and the stewards and this concern introduced a second conflict of interests in the government organism of the city.
Modern times[edit]
An illustration of Exeter in 1563, entitled Civitas Exoniae (vulgo Excester) urbs primaria in comitatu Devoniae
Tudor and Stuart eras
In 1537, the city was made a county corporate. In 1549, the city successfully withstood a month-long siege by the so-called Prayer Book rebels: Devon and Cornish folk who had been infuriated by the radical religious policies of King Edward VI. The insurgents occupied the suburbs of Exeter, burnt down two of the city gates and attempted to undermine the city walls, but were eventually forced to abandon the siege after they had been worsted in a series of bloody battles with the king's army. A number of rebels were executed in the immediate aftermath of the siege. The Livery Dole almshouses and chapel at Heavitree were founded in March 1591 and finished in 1594.
When John Hooker was appointed to the city payroll in 1561, he created the Court of Orphans as a municipal government for families broken by the premature death of their major economic source. He also was made the Common Council as the legal owner of any estate left to the orphan children of Exeter, until they have reached the age of 21 to be partially paid back. The orphan tax was used to fund the construction of the Exeter canal.
The city's motto, Semper fidelis, is traditionally held to have been suggested by Elizabeth I, in acknowledgement of the city's contribution of ships to help defeat the Spanish Armada in 1588; however its first documented use is in 1660.[citation needed] Schools in Exeter teach that the motto was bestowed by Charles II in 1660 at the Restoration due to Exeter's role in the English Civil War.[citation needed]
When in 1638 Reverend John Wheelwright was exiled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and subsequently established a community on the banks of the Squamscott River, he named the region Exeter after its Devonian counterpart. During the American Revolution it became the capital of New Hampshire.
Exeter was secured for Parliament at the beginning of the English Civil War, and its defences very much strengthened, but it remained under pressure from the Royalists. In October 1642, Parliament extended powers to send troops into the city to search out royalist supporters. In September 1643, Exeter was captured by the Cornish Royalist Army led by Prince Maurice. Queen Henrietta Maria stayed in Exeter for the birth of her youngest daughter, Henrietta, in 1644. The city remained firmly under the king's control until near the end of the war, being one of the final Royalist cities to fall into Parliamentarian hands. The surrender of Exeter was negotiated in April 1646 at Poltimore House by Thomas Fairfax. During this period, Exeter was an economically powerful city, with a strong trade of wool. This was partly due to the surrounding area which was "more fertile and better inhabited than that passed over the preceding day" according to Count Lorenzo Magalotti who visited the city when he was 26 years old. Magalotti writes of over thirty thousand people being employed in the county of Devon as part of the wool and cloth industries, merchandise that was sold to "the West Indies, Spain, France and Italy". Celia Fiennes also visited Exeter during this period, in the early 18th century. She remarked on the "vast trade" and "incredible quantity" in Exeter, recording that "it turns the most money in a week of anything in England", between £10,000 and £15,000.
Georgian and Victorian eras
John Rocque's 1744 map of Exeter
Early in the Industrial Revolution, Exeter's industry developed on the basis of locally available agricultural products and, since the city's location on a fast-flowing river gave it ready access to water power, an early industrial site developed on drained marshland to the west of the city, at Exe Island. However, when steam power replaced water in the 19th century, Exeter was too far from sources of coal (or iron) to develop further. As a result, the city declined in relative importance and was spared the rapid 19th-century development that changed many historic European cities. Extensive canal redevelopments during this period further expanded Exeter's economy, with "vessels of 15 to 16 tons burthen [bringing] up goods and merchandise from Topsham to the City Quay". In 1778 a new bridge across the Exe was opened to replace the old medieval bridge. Built at a cost of £30,000, it had three arches and was built of stone. In 1789, King George III and his family made a royal visit to Exeter.
Frontispiece to Shapter's "History of the Cholera in Exeter in 1832"
In 1832, cholera, which had been erupting all across Europe, reached Exeter. The only known documentation of this event was written by Dr Thomas Shapter, one of the medical doctors present during the epidemic.
The first railway to arrive in Exeter was the Bristol and Exeter Railway that opened a station at St Davids on the western edge in 1844. The South Devon Railway Company extended the line westwards to Plymouth, opening their own smaller station at St Thomas, above Cowick Street. A more central railway station, that at Queen Street, was opened by the London and South Western Railway in 1860 when it opened its alternative route to London. Butchers Lloyd Maunder moved to their present base in 1915, to gain better access to the Great Western Railway for transportation of meat products to London.
The High Street c. 1895
The first electricity in Exeter was provided by the Exeter Electric Light Company, which was formed at the end of the 1880s, but it was municipalised in 1896 and became the City of Exeter Electricity Company.
In 1896 £88,000 was spent constructing sewerage system which reduced the risk of infectious diseases,
The first horse-drawn trams in Exeter were introduced in 1882 with 3 lines radiating from the city's East Gate. One line went to St David's station via New North Road, the Obelisk (where the Clock Tower now stands) and St David's Hill. The second line went out along Heavitree Road to Livery Dole and the third went to Mount Pleasant along Sidwell Street. There was a depot off New North Road.
20th century[edit]
A new bridge across the River Exe was opened on 29 March 1905, replacing the former Georgian structure. Constructed of cast iron and steel to a three-hinged arch design, it was built to the designs of Sir John Wolfe Barry at a cost of £25,000.
Lamp standard from the 1905 Exe Bridge, installed at Butts Ferry on Exeter Quay in 1983
In the same year, electric trams replaced the earlier horse-drawn system. A new route ran along High Street, down Fore Street, and over the Exe Bridge before dividing towards Alphington Road and Cowick Street. Other changes included rerouting the St David's Station line via Queen Street and extending the line to Heavitree.
On 17 March 1917, a tram descending Fore Street went out of control, collided with a horse-drawn wagon, and overturned on Exe Bridge, killing one passenger.
By the 1920s, tram services were increasingly seen as problematic due to congestion, high maintenance costs, and slow speeds in Exeter’s narrow streets. The city council decided to replace the system with double decker buses. The final tram ran on 19 August 1931. The only surviving Exeter tram, car 19, is preserved at the Seaton Tramway.
During the Second World War, Exeter was subjected to 18 air raids by the German Luftwaffe between 1940 and 1942, resulting in widespread destruction of the city centre. From April 1941 to April 1943, the city was defended by No. 307 Polish Night Fighter Squadron, known as the "Lwów Eagle Owls", based at Exeter Airport. The Polish city of Lwów shared Exeter’s motto, Semper Fidelis ("Always faithful").
In April and May 1942, as part of the Baedeker Blitz, launched in response to RAF attacks on Lübeck and Rostock, approximately 40 acres (16 ha) of the city was destroyed by incendiary bombing. Many historic buildings, particularly around High Street and Sidwell Street, were lost, and others, including the cathedral, were damaged. On the night of 4 May 1942, four aircraft from No. 307 Squadron engaged around 40 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers, preventing four from dropping their payloads. A total of 156 people were killed in the raids.
Watercolour by Olive Wharry c. 1942 depicting St Sidwell's Church after the Blitz. A 250 kilograms (550 lb) bomb struck the church in the early hours of 4 May 1942, leaving the tower standing but fatally weakened. It was subsequently demolished. (Collection of the Royal Albert Memorial Museum)
The wartime relationship between Exeter and No. 307 Squadron was commemorated when the unit presented the city with a Polish flag on 15 November 1942, the first British city to receive this honour, outside Exeter Cathedral. Since 2012, a Polish flag has been raised over the Guildhall annually on 15 November. The day is now marked as "307 Squadron Day". In 2017, a memorial plaque to the squadron was unveiled in St James Chapel at the cathedral.
Large areas of the city centre were rebuilt during the 1950s, often with limited effort to preserve historic structures. The street layout was altered to improve traffic flow, resulting in the loss of landmarks such as St Lawrence Church, the College of the Vicars Choral, and Bedford Circus. The resulting modern architecture contrasts with the surviving red sandstone buildings.
A notable exception was The House That Moved, one of the oldest private residences in Europe, which was saved from demolition and relocated following intervention by the Ministry of Works.
On 27 October 1960, following exceptionally heavy rainfall, the River Exe burst its banks, flooding large parts of Exeter, including Exwick, St Thomas, and Alphington. Water levels reached up to 2 metres above ground level in places, and 150 employees of the firm Beach Bros were stranded for nine hours. Around 2,500 properties were affected. Further flooding on 3 December that year impacted an additional 1,200 properties.
Exe Flood Relief Channel, constructed after the floods of 1960
These events led to the construction of new flood defences for the city. Work began in 1965, took 12 years to complete, and cost £8 million. The scheme included three flood relief channels and two new concrete bridges, completed in 1969 and 1972, replacing the earlier Exe Bridge which had impeded river flow and exacerbated flooding.
In 1997, the city was the site of a high profile unsolved murder. Fourteen year old Kate Bushell, a pupil at what is now West Exe School, was killed on 15 November while walking her dog along Exwick Lane. Despite extensive investigation, including appeals on Crimewatch, the attacker has never been identified. Police have suggested a possible link to the 1998 murder of dog walker Lyn Bryant in Cornwall. A £10,000 reward remains in place for information relating to both cases.
21st century[edit]
The Princesshay shopping centre, adjoining the Cathedral Close and the High Street, was redeveloped between 2005 and 2007. The scheme attracted local opposition due to its scale and the redevelopment of parts of the historic street layout.
In May 2008, an attempted bombing occurred at the Giraffe café in Princesshay. The attacker was the only person injured in the incident.
John Lewis store on Sidwell Street
A £30 million flood defence improvement scheme was approved in 2015 following a review by the Environment Agency. The scheme aimed to improve flow capacity and resilience across the River Exe system.
The Exeter Pound, a local currency designed to encourage local trade, was introduced in 2015 and discontinued in 2018.
On 28 October 2016, a major fire destroyed large parts of the Royal Clarence Hotel and adjoining historic buildings at Cathedral Yard. The fire resulted in the loss of most of the hotel structure and severe damage to adjoining listed buildings within Cathedral Yard and the High Street frontage. Subsequent redevelopment proposals have progressed through multiple planning stages, with permission ultimately granted for a mixed residential scheme incorporating retained historic fabric.
On 27 February 2021, a Second World War bomb was discovered at a construction site, leading to the evacuation of more than 2,600 people, including nearby residents, businesses, and University of Exeter students. The bomb was safely detonated by bomb disposal teams.
Exeter has recorded relatively high levels of rough sleeping compared with other English local authorities. In the autumn 2020 snapshot, it had the sixth highest number of rough sleepers in England. In 2014, Exeter had one of the highest per capita rates of rough sleeping outside London. During the COVID-19 pandemic, emergency accommodation was provided under the UK Government’s "Everybody In" initiative for rough sleepers and those at risk of homelessness. Government and council funding supported both short-term accommodation and longer-term housing initiatives, including the creation of move-on accommodation for people with experience of rough sleeping.
