Medieval Bargate

You cannot visit Southampton without seeing the historic Bargate, built in Norman times, and once the entrance to the city.
You can’t miss it because it is slap bang in the centre of the city, in the middle of what was until a few years ago the city’s main shopping street.
The street is still there and it is still the shopping centre, although a shopping mall has moved the focus for some stores and shoppers.
It was built around 1180 of stone and flint and was part of the town walls, the remnants of which still remain in places.
Today it is an iconic monument, in the centre of what is known as the QE2 mile, but over the years has had many uses.  Back in the 1700s it was the city’s Guildhall; it was once a police headquarters and prison; has been an exhibition centre and on more than one occasion came close to demolition. In the middle of the four windows on the southern side is a statue of  George 111 in Roman dress, which replaced a wooden statue of Queen Anne.
The QE2 mile is a pedestrian walk which runs through the heart of the city from the cenotaph to the waterfront, past the Bargate, linking the city’s parks, the cultural quarter, shopping high street, old town and the waterfront and is the economic heart of the city.
I know the Bargete principally as an historic listed medieval monument, and for many years saw it every day, the Bargate standing only a couple of hundred yards from the newspaper office where I worked, and for many was the hub of the city.
The march of progress saw my base move, but the Bargate remains, and it still forms my vision of Southampton.
The city itself can claim some of the best preserved town walls which were once its defence and the old town has more than 90 listed buildings, and more than 30 ancient monuments, including medieval wine vaults, an array of medieval churches and a number of fine Georgian houses and hotels.

But nothing quite measures the majesty of the Bargate.