Old Sarum The hilltop at
Old Sarum lies near the
Neolithic sites of
Stonehenge and
Avebury and shows some signs of early settlement. It commanded a
salient between the
River Bourne and the
Hampshire Avon, near a crossroads of several early trade routes. During the
Iron Age, sometime between 600 and 300 BC, a
hillfort (
oppidum) was constructed around it. Preferring settlements in bottomland, such as nearby
Wilton, the Saxons largely ignored Old Sarum until the
Viking invasions led (King of Wessex from 871 to 899) to restore its fortifications. It subsequently became the site of Wilton's
mint. uniting his former sees of
Sherborne and
Ramsbury into a single diocese which covered the
counties of
Dorset, Wiltshire, and
Berkshire. In 1055, Herman had planned to move his seat to
Malmesbury, but
its monks and
Earl Godwin objected. Herman and his successor,
Saint Osmund, began the construction of the
first Salisbury cathedral, though neither lived to see its completion in 1092. the compilation of the
Domesday Book, which was probably presented to William at Old Sarum, The
cathedral was
consecrated on 5 April 1092 but suffered extensive damage in a storm, traditionally said to have occurred only five days later.
Bishop Roger was a close ally of (reigned 1100–1135): he served as viceroy during the king's absence in
Normandy He refurbished and expanded Old Sarum's cathedral in the 1110s and began work on a royal palace during the 1130s, prior to his arrest by Henry's successor,
Stephen. After this arrest, the castle at Old Sarum was allowed to fall into disrepair, but the sheriff and castellan continued to administer the area under the king's authority.
New Sarum Bishop of Salisbury
Hubert Walter was instrumental in the negotiations with
Saladin during the
Third Crusade, but he spent little time in his diocese prior to his elevation to
archbishop of Canterbury. The brothers
Herbert and
Richard Poore succeeded him and began planning the relocation of the cathedral into the valley almost immediately. Their plans were approved by but repeatedly delayed: Herbert was first forced into exile in
Normandy in the 1190s by the hostility of his archbishop
Walter and then again to
Scotland in the 1210s owing to royal hostility following the
papal interdiction against . The secular authorities were particularly incensed, according to tradition, owing to some of the clerics debauching the castellan's female relations. This caused
Peter of Blois to describe the church as "a captive within the walls of the citadel like the
ark of God in the profane house of
Baal". He advocated: Herbert Poore's successor and brother, Richard Poore, eventually moved the cathedral to a
new town on his estate at Veteres Sarisberias ("Old Salisburies") in 1220. The site was at "Myrifield" ("Merryfield"), a meadow near the confluence of the
River Nadder and the
Hampshire Avon. It was first known as "New Sarum" The cathedral also contains the best-preserved of the four surviving copies of
Magna Carta. New Sarum was made a
city by a charter from in 1227 and, by the 14th century, was the largest settlement in Wiltshire. The city wall surrounds the Close and was built in the 14th century, again with stones removed from the former cathedral at Old Sarum. The wall now has five gates: the High Street Gate, Gate, the Queen's Gate, and Gate were original, while a fifth was constructed in the 19th century to allow access to
Bishop Wordsworth's School, in the Cathedral Close. During his time in the city, the composer
Handel stayed in a room above St Ann's gate. The original site of the city at Old Sarum, meanwhile, fell into disuse. It continued as a
rotten borough: at the time of its abolition during the reforms of 1832, its
Member of Parliament (MP) represented three households. In May 1289, there was uncertainty about the future of
Margaret, Maid of Norway, and her father sent ambassadors to
Edward I. Edward met
Robert the Bruce and others at Salisbury in October 1289, which resulted in the
Treaty of Salisbury, under which Margaret would be sent to Scotland before 1 November 1290 and any agreement on her future marriage would be delayed until she was in Scotland. The
Parliament of England met at New Sarum in the years 1324, 1328, and 1384. In 1450, a number of riots broke out in Salisbury at roughly the same time as
Jack Cade led a famous rebellion through London. The riots occurred for related reasons, although the declining fortunes of Salisbury's cloth trade may also have been influential. The violence peaked with the murder of the bishop,
William Ayscough, who had been involved with the government. In 1483, a large-scale rebellion against
Richard III broke out, led by his own 'kingmaker',
Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham. After the revolt collapsed, Buckingham was executed at Salisbury, near the Bull's Head Inn. An
act of Parliament, the
River Avon Navigation (Christchurch to New Sarum) Act 1664 (
16 & 17 Cha. 2. c. 12) was passed on 2 March 1665 for making the
River Avon navigable from
Christchurch to the city of New Sarum, and the work completed, only for the project to be ruined shortly thereafter by a major flood. Soon after, during the
Great Plague of London,
Charles II held court in Salisbury's cathedral close. Salisbury was the site chosen to assemble
James II's forces to resist the
Glorious Revolution. He arrived to lead his approximately men on 19 November 1688. His troops were not keen to fight Mary or her husband William, and the loyalty of many of James's commanders was in doubt. The first blood was shed at the
Wincanton Skirmish, in
Somerset. In Salisbury, James heard that some of his officers had deserted, such as
Edward Hyde, and he broke out in a nosebleed, which he took as an omen that he should retreat. His commander in chief, the
Earl of Feversham, advised retreat on 23 November, and the next day
John Churchill defected to William. On 26 November, James's own daughter,
Princess Anne, did the same, and James returned to London the same day, never again to be at the head of a serious military force in England.
20th and 21st centuries Following the destruction by the
Luftwaffe of the Southampton factories building
Supermarine Spitfires in 1940, production was dispersed to
shadow factories elsewhere in the south of England. Salisbury was the major centre of production, supplemented by
Trowbridge and
Reading. Several factories were set up in the centre of Salisbury and staffed by predominantly young women who had no previous mechanical experience but were trained for specific tasks in the aircraft construction process. Supporting the factories were many workers producing small components in home-based workshops and garden sheds. Sub-assemblies were built in the city centre factories and then transported to
High Post airfield (north of the city, in Durnford parish) and Chattis Hill (northeast, near
Stockbridge), where the aircraft were assembled, test flown and then distributed to
RAF airfields across England. A total of over 2000 Spitfires were produced. The whole process was carried out in secret without the knowledge of even the local people and only emerged into public knowledge after the production of a film describing the whole process. In July 2021 a memorial to the workers, in the form of a life-size fibreglass model Mk IX Spitfire, was unveiled in Castle Road, Salisbury (near the rugby club) on the site of one of the factories. At the time of the
1948 Summer Olympics, held in London, a relay of runners carried the
Olympic Flame from
Wembley Stadium, where the Games were based, to the sailing centre at
Torbay via
Slough,
Basingstoke, Salisbury, and
Exeter. The
Local Government Act 1972 eliminated the administration of the City of New Sarum under its former charters, but its successor,
Wiltshire County's
Salisbury District, continued to be accorded its former city status. The name was finally formally amended from "New Sarum" to "Salisbury" during the
2009 changes occasioned by the
Local Government Act 1992, which established the Salisbury City Council. On 4 March 2018, former Russian double agent
Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia Skripal, were
poisoned in Salisbury with a
Novichok nerve agent. ==Governance==