Shrewsbury is the county town of Shropshire, in the West Midlands region of England. Lying on the River Severn, it is a borough home to some 96,000 inhabitants, and is the primary settlement and headquarters of Shropshire Council. It is the second largest town in the ceremonial county of Shropshire, after Telford. Shrewsbury is a historic market town with the town centre having a largely unaltered medieval street plan. The town features over 660 historic listed buildings, including several examples of timber framing from the 15th and 16th century. Shrewsbury Castle, a red sandstone castle fortification, and Shrewsbury Abbey, a former Benedictine monastery, were founded in 1074 and 1083 respectively, by the Norman Earl of Shrewsbury, Roger de Montgomery. The town hosts one of the oldest and largest horticultural events in the country, Shrewsbury Flower Show, and is known for its floral displays, having won various awards since the turn of the 21st century, including Britain in Bloom in 2006.
Today, lying 9 miles (14 km) east of the Welsh border, Shrewsbury serves as a cultural and commercial centre for the ceremonial county and a large area of mid-Wales, with retail output alone worth over £299 million per year. There are some light industry and distribution centres, such as Battlefield Enterprise Park, located mainly on the outskirts. The A5 and A49 trunk roads cross near to the town, as do five railway lines at Shrewsbury railway station. Shrewsbury has also played a part in Western intellectual history, by being the town in which the naturalist Charles Darwin was born and raised. Nearby is the village of Wroxeter, 5 miles (8 km) to the south-west, where the now ruined Roman city of Viroconium Cornoviorum lies. Viroconium was the fourth largest civitas capital in Roman Britain. As Caer Guricon it may have served as the early Dark Age capital of the kingdom of Powys.
The historic town centre still retains its medieval street pattern and many narrow streets and passages. Some of the passages, especially those which pass through buildings from one street to the next, are called “shuts” (the word deriving from “to shoot through” from one street to another). Many specialist shops, traditional pubs and local restaurants can be found in the hidden corners, squares and lanes of Shrewsbury. Many of the street names have also remained unchanged in centuries and there are some more unusual names, such as Butcher Row, Longden Coleham, Dogpole, Mardol, Frankwell, Roushill, Grope Lane, Gullet Passage, Murivance, The Dana, Portobello, Bear Steps, Shoplatch and Bellstone. The Public Library, in the pre-1882 Shrewsbury School building, is situated on Castle Hill. Above the main entrance are two statues bearing the inscriptions “Philomathes” and “Polumathes”. These portray the virtues “Lover of learning” and “Much learning” to convey the lesson that it is good to gain knowledge through a love of learning.
The town was also used as the set for the popular 1984 movie, A Christmas Carol, which filmed many of its interior and exterior shots in and around Shrewsbury. The gravestone prop of Ebenezer Scrooge (played by George C. Scott) that was used in the movie is still present in the graveyard of St. Chad’s Church. In the centre of the town lies The Quarry. This 29 acre (120,000 m²) riverside park attracts thousands of people throughout the year and is enjoyed as a place of recreation. Shrewsbury is known as the “Town of Flowers” and this was the motto printed onto many of the signs on entrance to the town via major roads, although in 2007 the signs were replaced, instead branding the town as ‘the birthplace of Charles Darwin’.
