There is much to be learned about the history of a building, a community, a neighbourhood, from looking at its landscape with a discerning eye. This book arose out of a Research Day held in 2021 to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the foundation of Chester Society for Landscape History in 1986. It brings together the work of seven members of the Society and offers glimpses into the past based on what can still be seen today. The papers, which focus on Cheshire but reach beyond it to north and south, range in time from the tenth century to the twenty-first, and cover topics as diverse as early ecclesiastical structures, medieval and modern settlements, nineteenth-century transport systems and both private and public buildings. Collectively, they express the enlightenment and the enjoyment to be found in the study of landscape history.
Edited by Sharon M. Varey and Graeme J. White
The Christian Landscape of Early Medieval Chester and Wirral: Thomas Pickles
Contrasting Settlements Along the Dee Valley Frontier: Defence, Crossing, Refuge: Graeme J. White
Cringlemire – Taming a Lakeland Landscape: Maggie Taylor
Early Nineteenth-Century Growth in Three North Shropshire Market Towns and the Influence of the Ellesmere Canal: Robert Ginder
‘Estimating the Effects of the Railway on Chester is Not Easy’: Chris Pilsbury
Carnegie Libraries in Cheshire: Vanessa Greatorex
The Effect of Planning Laws on Settlement Development in Twentieth and Early Twenty-First Century South-West Cheshire: Polly Bird
Recommendation
The seven excellent papers in this Chester Society for Landscape History volume highlight the complex interplay of human factors which have shaped and moulded the varied landscapes of Cheshire and its neighbours over almost two millennia. Eminently readable, thoroughly researched, and properly contextualised, they make – individually and collectively – a major contribution to our understanding of the historical processes which have created the county and the adjacent areas of England and Wales.
Dr Alan Crosby, Editor, The Local Historian
Bibliographic information
Sharon M. Varey and Graeme J. White, Looking at the Landscape: Glimpses into the History of Cheshire and Beyond, 2022, ISBN 978-1-910481-11-0, £13.99. The e-book (ISBN 978-1-910481-37-0) is available through Google Play and library collections such as ebrary, EBSCO, Ebook Central, and Gardners.
Readers of the volume may also be interested in Landscape History Discoveries in the North West and Landscapes Past and Present: Cheshire and Beyond by the same editors.
For more information on University of Chester Press books please visit: www.chester.ac.uk/university-press