History of Old Sarum

Just a few miles from Salisbury towards Stonehenge lies Old Sarum, the original site of Salisbury.

Old Sarum is approached via an opening in two high Iron Age banks, which obscure the site from outside, and give it the air of a mysterious hidden castle. The banks were begun almost 5000 years ago, and remained intact until the Roman invasion. The Romans installed a garrison in the river valley below the site and it was probably used as a market centre. At this time it was called Sorviodunum.. The Roman settlement  was established a few hundred yards from the fort, down at the bottom of the river valley at what is now Stratford-Sub-Castle. Most probably Sorviodunum/Sarum would have been the site of a regular market and other forms of trading which depended on quick efficient transport and communications. However, the signs of Roman occupation are only slight. Some coins date to the 1st and 2nd centuries, with the most coming from the 3rd and 4th. Other finds are from Stratford-sub-Castle, being the fields to the west of the fort, and from the fields to the south. There were other Roman buildings around, but no Roman town of importance has been found.

 Following the departure of the Romans the Saxons may have used the site, but when the Normans came they quickly realised its strategic importance and constructed a motte and bailey castle within the old earthworks.


The cathedral foundations

This was replaced by a stone keep in 1100, and a royal palace was erected within the banks in 1130. In the meantime the first cathedral on the site was completed in 1092, but it burned down only 5 days after it was consecrated. A new, larger cathedral was completed around 1190.

Relations between the clerics of the cathedral and the castle guard were punctuated with outbreaks of petulance and occasional violence. The churchmen became so exasperated that in 1219 Bishop Richard Poore decided that enough was enough, and he determined to build a new cathedral at a location several miles to the south. A settlement grew up around the site of the new cathedral, and it is this settlement that is the modern city of Salisbury.