There is no shortage of places of historical interest in England. But here in the north, one city shines above the rest in that respect: York. Well preserved, beautiful, and fascinating, York could easily be a destination in and of itself, with more than enough to do to last a week or more. Well, I have a day, and not even that given my hour and a half train ride each way from my northern English base in Manchester, but even with a mere several hours to wander and learn, I’ve come away with a mind full of truly breathtaking history.

Upon arrival at York Station, one is a very short walk from the historical walled town. While the walls of York date only to the thirteenth century, they do follow – in part – an earlier set raised by the city’s founders, the Romans. York was founded in the year 71 as Eboracum, meant to serve as a fortress for the empire’s holdings in Britain. Eboracum hosted a full legion, 6,000 men, many of whom ended up remaining in the area on land grants after their military careers, thereby growing what would become York from a military camp where the Rivers Ouse and Foss come together to a full town. Eboracum was so important that some emperors even held court here.

One such emperor was Constantius I, who actually died here in 306. His son was with him, and was proclaimed emperor by the troops on the spot. That newly crowned emperor would become Constantine the Great, and there is a statue of him near the spot where he was crowned (now York Minster).

It is here at York Minster that I join a free walking tour from White Rose York Tours, a two hour journey through the history of the city as experienced from some of its most important sights. My guide regales the group with tales of Viking times (York was conquered by Ivar the Boneless in 866, and the Vikings would hold the town they renamed Jorvik until 954), the English Civil War (Charles I moved the court here to escape London in the early days of the conflict), and the religious persecution that led to the Guy Fawkes incident (Fawkes was from York). And so many more.

But, of course, the highlights of the city are its medieval remnants. To learn about these, we go back to 1066 and William the Conqueror. In that year, Norman forces from France defeated the local Anglo-Saxons at the Battle of Hastings, and quickly conquered the country. Here in the north, it would be necessary to have a stronghold that would allow for the region to be held against the Scottish. Enter York, and in 1068, York Castle was built as a wooden motte and bailey castle, which would be replaced by a stone keep in the thirteenth century. (Note that locals hated the castle after it stopped being important militarily and actually succeeded in blowing it up, though the exterior tower walls held.)

York Castle, sadly, was also the scene of one of England’s worst events. In 1190, some 150 members of York’s Jewish community – nearly all – were forced to take refuge in the castle from a pogrom seeking to kill them. The local constable proved unable or unwilling to stop the mob that surrounded the castle, so the Jews inside committed suicide to avoid a fate that would have been worse.

Today, the outbuildings of the castle host museums, but over the years they were also courts and prisons.

At roughly the same time as York Castle was rebuilt in stone, the most iconic building of the city was started. York was the seat of the Archbishop of York, rival to the southern Archbishop of Canterbury. Canterbury had a magnificent cathedral, while the one here was, in the minds of the archbishop, lacking. So he started work on a new building to hold water to Canterbury. In 1230, construction began, and would last nearly 250 years. The result is York Minster, the second largest Gothic cathedral in Northern Europe (to the Cologne Cathedral, which you can read about here, although that one wasn’t fully completed until 1880).

Admission is steep at £18, and the resultant year pass doesn’t really do much good for a day tripper, but if you feel like spending that, the inside is huge and beautiful.

Tourists are plentiful in York, even on a Monday, and they funnel down the most famous street in the city. The Shambles is where the butcher shops once stood, with the narrow nature of the street providing shade to the meat hanging outside. In medieval times, butchery was done outside, with literal streams of blood and icky bits flowing down the sloped street. Hence the term for something being rather lousy as being “in shambles.” Today, the street is clean, and lined with souvenir shops, pubs, and candy kitchens.

With the Industrial Revolution, York became less important than some of its neighbors like Leeds and Sheffield. Rather than embrace industrialization, the city resisted, but one industry helped to revitalize it: candy, hence the number of sweets shops. Fun fact: Kit Kat was invented here.

Every bit of York is steeped in history. We stop at the ruins of St Mary’s Abbey, which sits just outside the walls of the city and inside walls of its own. The Abbey tells the story of Henry VIII, who in desiring a divorce and splitting from the Catholic Church to do so, confiscated Catholic lands like this, selling them to his nobles who went along with his scheme.

The stories are endless, and my two hour tour could have easily lasted two more with me being happy. A late lunch in a Tudor-era inn seemed totally appropriate, and then it was back to the station for the ride home to Manchester.

If you are a history lover, York is a place of pilgrimage. Nearly two thousand years of stories exist here, coming to life with the incredibly well preserved city around them. A day wasn’t enough, but it was what I had.

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