A Gentle Day in Genteel Bath!

Bath Abbey

I haven't blogged for many weeks - the long hot English summer has taken its toll and three weeks spent in France and northern Spain brought its own distractions. But now, although it is still far too hot for me, we are at last seeing the tiny first stages of summer's close - darkness is falling a little earlier, the flowers in the garden are perhaps past their best - and my thoughts are perhaps returning to "literary" pursuits!

Yesterday, Pat and I went on a coach outing to the city of Bath in Somerset. Bath lies about 120 miles away from us so it was a lengthy journey but a wonderful day. It was organised by our local U3A (University of the 3rd Age) group of which Pat and I are both members and specifically by the History Group in the U3A. Each year they have day out to some place of historical significance - this year it was Bath. It was everything that we hoped for. Superbly organised, as always, by the History Group's leader, Carol Williams we all saw enough of this delightful place to whet our appetites for a further visit of our own – perhaps a long weekend or an Autumn break - to take in more of all that Bath offers.

Bath is an ancient city. It is one of the smallest cities in the UK and nestles in the rolling, beautiful countryside of Somerset. From anywhere in the city you can see the trees of the surrounding country so it is a very pleasant place to live and to visit. Although a settlement has been there since prehistoric times it was with the arrival of the Romans 2 millennia ago that Bath really "took off". The Romans discovered the many qualities of the thermal springs that came to the surface in the area and the baths that they established there gave birth to the town's Roman name: "Aqua Sulis" . Aqua Sulis was one of the important garrison towns in Roman Britain and part of the network of Roman roads that crisscrossed the country at that time joining Roman garrisons and occupied towns. The Fosse Way, one of those roads went north east straight across the English countryside to another great Roman garrison at Lincoln - or as the Romans called it "Lindum". Today, that ancient road is one of our main routes - the A46 - and it runs within a few miles of my house here in Nottingham.

Part of the Roman Baths

Since Roman times Bath has blossomed from a garrison town and Roman settlement with some rather splendid baths - reputably with great healing qualities - to being, in Georgian England, almost the cultural capital of the kingdom where the great and the good came to "take the waters" and to see and be seen. It was the chic, "in place",  to be in 18th century England and its architecture and layout today reflects this. It is a town of fine buildings, grand streets and crescents, but at the same time it manages to retain a human feel; it seemed to me to be a very "livable in" place where the buildings and streets complemented the  inhabitants and the business of the town.

To walk the streets of Bath is to walk though the full pageant of English history and to rub shoulders with the movers and shakers of days gone by. The ancient honey coloured limestone makes Bath’s architecture so instantly recognisable and the world famous Roman Baths, the mediaeval Abbey, the Pump and Assembly Rooms, the famous Pulteney Bridge (modelled on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence) and the magnificence of residential architecture of the Royal Crescent and Circus are just a very few of the things that have made this Somerset town a World Heritage Site. Bath has, by far, more Grade 1 listed buildings (50+) per head of population than anywhere else in the country.  

Baths and Abbey together

Add to that the great and the good who have lived here and came to “take the waters” of this spa town and one has a real historical treasure house: Lord Nelson, Prime Ministers William Pitt &  William Pitt the Younger, the artist Thomas Gainsborough, architect Robert Adam,  politician William Wilberforce famous for his campaign to outlaw slavery, the Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie, Charles Dickens (he wrote much of The Pickwick Papers here), Jane Austen, the satirical author Richard Brinsley Sheridan, William Herschel (discoverer of the planet Uranus and court astronomer to George III), Beau Nash, Louise XVIII of France...........and countless others;  an endless list of the great and good of English and international history.

As we sat watching the world go by in the afternoon sun a Jane Austen Walking Tour  passed led by a delightful lady in full 18^th century attire complete with lace parasol – this was straight out of Pride and Prejudice! And, indeed, a few doors away from the Jane Austen Centre one could enjoy a cup of tea at Mr Darcy’s Tea Room! Who would be next, I mused? – perhaps the outrageous Mrs Malaprop from Sheridan’s play The Rivals, loudly proclaiming one of her awful malapropisms! It was not to be; but behind us, as we sat, the magnificent Abbey – dating back as far as the 7^th century - reminded us of our nation’s great religious and cultural heritage whilst at the same time the Roman Baths confirmed that these Mediterranean invaders and immigrants to our island brought with them a culture, ideas and technology that far predate our own cleverness and culture.

The Circus - one of the great rounded Georgian Streets

that have become synonymous with the name Bath

Today, the streets are not busy with the sedan chairs of 18^th century when it was the second most important city in the kingdom, after London, and the place to both see and be seen by the great and good of these islands. Nor do the streets echo to the sound of Roman markets and centurions  as they must have done two millennia ago. Now it is the big High Street names, that ply their trade within the Doric columns buildings and Palladian style architecture. But despite today’s modernity – the tourists on the open topped buses, the ubiquitous Costa and Starbuck’s coffee shops, or the  street traders who pass - one, sadly jarring the senses, with his second hand Sainsbury’s shopping trolley filled with toilet rolls each sheet emblazoned with Donald Trump’s face! - Bath still retains its ancient feel and wears its age both well and gracefully. Wherever one looks there is something of interest and taste to see – in short, a gentle, genteel and gracious town – and I couldn’t help feeling that had one of the residents from the past found themselves transported to today’s Bath, they would have seen much they recognised and approved of.