He went on to ask the question “Are there reasons for assuming that there was a settlement in the Tiffey Valley before William d ‘Albini founded the Priory (later the Abbey)?”. Looking back at aerial photographs showed that there were almost certainly two areas of population being what we now know as the town centre, which was an oval shaped settlement with a dividing line between it and Tungreen (Tun means estate), what we now call Town Green and then completely separate. Even up to 1810 Town Green was still a separate community from that of the Market Place and Market Street.

Andrew then went on to show how important water was to the settlement, showing ancient maps and old aerial photographs indicating that Wymondham had many streams flowing to the river, one in particular that was highlighted being a stream running from beyond what is now Waitrose down behind Norwich Road, across a marshy area (King’s Head Meadow) and behind the properties in the town to join up with the Tiffey. He explained that the river was formed during the last Ice Age when boulder clay had been washed down from hills by storms and that six metres deep bores along the valley show vast amounts of shellfish evidently from previous millennia. This had formed a winding waterway we now call the River Tiffey, which had almost certainly had its course altered by human intervention. Much larger ancient maps explained how Wymondham was ideally placed between two very important trading posts, namely Norwich and Thetford, and that it was set on higher ground between these two locations, making it an ideal trading post and a settlement for defending tribal boundaries in ancient times. He said that thousands of years ago people would have wanted a settlement which could be defended, was on high ground between major trading posts, had a water supply and had good access. Wymondham met these criteria and was an ideal place to control trade, being midway between Norwich and Thetford and also on the main trading route from the Midlands to the North Sea.

Wymondham was a stronghold in the times before the Norman Conquest, and in fact going back much further to the Iron Age. It was an ideal trading centre as it would have had many inns, lots of ancient roads and a supply of meat, fish and vegetables. It was also a religious centre as there were numerous holy springs such as those at Becket’s Well. There was the Benedictine Priory and then later the Abbey, but these would both have likely replaced a more ancient Saxon minster church. It was explained that the Market Place was where Becket’s Chapel is now located until the 1270s. Wymondham would have been a market settlement with good supplies of fish from ancient river areas such as Westwade and Dykebeck, meat from Gristlewood (Gristle being a place where young pigs are kept) with grain and vegetables from areas such as Wicklewood and High Oak. This would have indeed created a very strong trading centre. The oval- shaped town centre settlement had been divided into almost equal strips of land equating to the sizes of old English measurements, where the foot used to be 9’9” long until the Normans arrived and changed it all!

It was then explained that it was highly likely that the actual origins of ‘modern Wymondham’ were formed in the Tungreen area, possibly by Vikings, but that the oval area which we now see as the centre of the town was a separate settlement of Iron Age or Middle Saxon origin. There may be many thousands of Iron Age, Saxon or Viking artefacts buried under Wymondham town centre, but we will never find them because Wymondham itself is a Medieval town and, therefore, cannot be dug up!

There are so many cultures that helped to form Wymondham, but it is almost impossible to know who and when they were here. The likely conclusion was that the flatlands above the Tiffey Valley attracted groups of Mesolithic and Neolithic hunter gatherers over a long period of time, then there would have been an Iron Age Celtic community, then Romans leading to a mid-Saxon community. Most likely then the Angles formed a settlement and then there was the Saxon Minster followed by late Saxons when possibly there were the two areas of habitation previously mentioned. Following on there would have been the Danish Vikings who would most likely have formed areas such as Market Street, Dykebeck, Damgate and Browick. Then came the Normans and William d’Albini with certainly expansion of Wymondham in the 11th and 12th centuries resulting in the Abbey and Becket’s Chapel. Medieval times followed with the Black Death, then Tudor England and the dissolution of the monasteries, leading on to the more recent periods from 1538 onwards when communities at Vicar Street and Middleton Street were most likely formed, linking Wymondham to Tungreen. Most fascinating of all, however, was that according to Andrew there was every likelihood, based upon findings of ancient footprints at Happisburgh, that predecessors of Homo sapien (modern man) could have walked through, and resided in what we now know as Wymondham as far back as 950,000 years ago!

If only we had a time machine! Kevin Hurn, who was in the chair, gave the vote of thanks to Andrew for a most fascinating talk. Andrew then proceeded to answer questions for over twenty minutes.