Coordinates: 52°08′N 0°59′W / 52.13°N 0.99°W / 52.13; -0.99

Towcester
The Old Town Hall, Towcester
Towcester  Towcester shown within Northamptonshire
Population	8,856 (2001 Census) 10,023 (est.2010)[1] 20,000 (proj.2020)[2]
OS grid reference	SP691481
- London	65 miles (105 km)
Civil parish	Towcester
District	South Northamptonshire
Shire county	Northamptonshire
Region	East Midlands
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	TOWCESTER
Postcode district	NN12
Dialling code	01327
Police	Northamptonshire
Fire	Northamptonshire
Ambulance	East Midlands
EU Parliament	East Midlands
UK Parliament	South Northamptonshire
List of places: UK • England • Northamptonshire

Towcester ( /ˈtoʊstər/ TOH-stər), the Roman town of Lactodorum, is a small town in south Northamptonshire, England.

Etymology[link]

Towcester comes from the Old English Tófe-ceaster.^[3] Tófe refers to the River Tove;^[4] Bosworth and Toller compare it to the "Scandinavian proper names" Tófi and Tófa.^[3] The Old English ceaster comes from the Latin castra ("camp") and was "often applied to places in Britain which had been originally Roman encampments."^[5] Thus, Towcester means "Camp on the (river) Tove."

Location[link]

The town is about 8 miles (12.9 km) south-west of Northampton and about 10 miles (16.1 km) north-west of Milton Keynes, the nearest main towns. Oxford is about 30 miles (48.3 km) south-west via the A43 road, M40 motorway and A34 road. The A43 now by-passes the town to the north but the A5 road still passes through the town centre. This still carries much traffic in the north-south direction which may be by-passed to the west with the possibility of expansion of the town.^[2][6]

Demographics and expansion[link]

The population was 8,856 at the time of the 2001 census but has since rapidly expanded and there are plans to expand still further^[2][6] with another 3,300 houses equating to an appx 8,250 increase in population. With normal growth this could see the total population rise to around 20,000 people by 2020 (based on the current multiplier of 2.5 persons per average household). The expansion will include an A5 north-south by-pass west of the town and improvements to the links to the A43.

Governance[link]

The town has its own Town Council,^[7] with limited powers, and is also the administrative headquarters of the South Northamptonshire district council.^[8] The town is in the Northamptonshire County Council area.^[9]

Towcester used to be within the parliamentary constituency of Daventry. However, due to boundary changes, it now forms part of the South Northamptonshire constituency (since the 2010 general election).

Facilities[link]

St Lawrence's Church, Towcester

The town has good shopping facilities with the four major supermarket chains of Waitrose, Tesco, two Co-ops and Aldi plus a very good number and range of smaller shops and stores. Towcester also has an Air Cadet squadron located near to Sponne School and The 1st Towcester scouts and guides group.

St. Lawrence's Church, Church of England, stands in the middle of the town. It has a 12th century Norman Transitional ground plan and foundation, probably laid over a Saxon 10th century stone building. Its ecclesiastical heritage may well relate back to Roman times as St Lawrence was patron saint of the Roman Legions. The building was reconstructed in the Perpendicular style 1480–85 when the church tower was added. Permission to quarry stone for this restoration from Whittlebury Forest was granted by Edward IV and later confirmed by Richard III on his way towards Leicestershire and his death at the Battle of Bosworth Field.

The church contains a "Treacle" Bible, a table tomb and cadaver of Archdeacon Sponne, Rector 1422–1448. The Archdeacon started what was thought to be the oldest Grammar school in Northamptonshire, which was merged with the old Secondary Modern School in Towcester to produce Sponne School. The church tower contains more bells than probably any other parish church in the land: a fine peal of 12 bells and a chime of 9 bells which ring the hours and chime tunes at frequent intervals.

Sport[link]

Towcester is famous for its racecourse, originally part of the Easton Neston estate on the east side of the town. Many important national horse racing events are held there.

Nearby is the Silverstone motor racing circuit, currently home to the British Grand Prix. In fiction, the "Saracen's Head Inn" in Towcester features in Charles Dickens's novel The Pickwick Papers as one of Mr Pickwick's stopping places along what is now the A5 trunk road.

Towcester is also home to Towcestrians RFC, a rugby club founded in 1933. Towcestrians play in the Mildands 2 East (South) Division and are affiliated to the RFU, East Midlands Rugby Union and the Northants Rugby Alliance.

Since 2010, Towcestrians RFC has hosted the Towcester Beer Festival, marrying a festival of guest ales and ciders with rugby and live music. In 2011 the festival took place on April 29 and 30, the weekend of the Royal Wedding. In 2012, the festival will take place over the first May bank holiday weekend - May 4, 5 and 6.

History[link]

Prehistoric and Roman periods[link]

Towcester lays claim to being the oldest town in Northamptonshire and possibly, because of the antiquity of recent Iron Age finds in the town, to be one of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in the country. There is evidence that it was settled by humans since the Mesolithic era (middle stone age). There is also evidence of Iron Age burials in the area.

Watling Street, looking north

In Roman Britain, Watling Street, now the A5 road, was built through the area and a garrison town called Lactodurum established on the site of the present-day town. Two candidate sites for the Battle of Watling Street, fought in 61AD, are located close to the town, these are Church Stowe which is located 7 km to the north^[10] and Paulerspury which is 5 km to the south.^[11]

Lactodurum was surrounded by a wall that was strengthened at several points by brick towers. Substantial remains of one of these towers could be seen until the 1960s, when it was demolished to make way for a telephone exchange. The wall was also surrounded by a ditch part of which became the Mill Leat on the east side of the town.^{[citation needed]}

The modern day St Lawrence's Church in Towcester is thought^{[by whom?]} to occupy the site of a large Roman civic building, possibly a temple. Small fragments of Roman pavement can be seen next to the church's boiler room.

It is also thought that a Roman pillar is in the garden of one of the houses along Watling Street.

The Saxon period and Medieval age[link]

When the Romans left in the 5th century, the area was settled by Saxons. In the 8th century, the Watling Street became the frontier between the kingdom of Wessex and Danelaw, and thus Towcester became a frontier town^{[citation needed]}. Edward the Elder fortified Towcester in 914. In the 11th century, the Normans built a motte and bailey castle on the site. Bury Mount are the remains of the fortification and is a scheduled Ancient Monument. It was renovated in 2008 with an access ramp added and explanatory plaques added.

Georgian and Victorian periods[link]

In the 18th and early 19th centuries, in the heyday of the stagecoach and the mail coach, the Watling Street became a major coaching road between London and Holyhead, and Towcester flourished, becoming a major stopping point. Many coaching inns and stabling facilities were provided for travellers in Towcester, many of which remain.

The coaching trade came to an abrupt halt in September 1838 when the London and Birmingham Railway was opened, which bypassed Towcester and passed through Blisworth, barely four miles away but enough to result in Towcester quickly reverting to being a quiet market town. By 1866 however, Towcester was linked to the national rail network by the first of several routes which came together to form the Stratford and Midland Junction Railway, known as the "SMJ".^[12] Eventually, from Towcester railway station it was possible to travel four different ways out of the town: to Blisworth (opened May 1866); to Banbury (opened June 1872); to Stratford-upon-Avon (opened July 1873); and finally Olney (for access to Bedford, opened December 1892). The latter line however was an early casualty, closing to passengers in March 1893 although it continued to be used by race specials up until the outbreak of World War II. The Banbury line closed to passengers in July 1951 and the rest in April 1952. Goods traffic lingered on until final axing in February 1964 as part of the Beeching cuts. The site of Towcester railway station is now a Tesco supermarket.

Towcester might have gained a second station on a branch line of the Great Central Railway from its main line at Brackley to Northampton, but this branch was never built.

20th century and beyond[link]

The motor age brought new life to the town. Although now by-passed by the A43, the A5 trunk traffic still passes directly through the historic market town centre causing traffic jams at some times of the day. The resulting pollution has led to the town centre being designated an Air Quality Management Area. An A5 north-south by-pass is likely with plans for expansion of the town being planned by the West Northamptonshire Development Corporation.^[13]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Towcester Town Council
• Towcester Studio Brass Band
• 1960s guide to the town and surrounding rural area
• Old Postcards, Guides and more
• Town guide
• Sponne School Technology College, Towcester
• Towcester and District Local History Society
• Towcester Racecourse
• The Towcester Partnership
• Towcester Flickr Group
• The Stratford Upon Avon & Midland Junction Railway
• Towcester Air Cadets

Joe Wright
Wright at the UK premiere of Atonement, 2007
Born	(1972-08-25) 25 August 1972 (age 39) London, England
Occupation	Director

Joe Wright (born 25 August 1972) is an English film director best known for Pride & Prejudice, Atonement and Hanna.

Early life and career[link]

Wright was born on 25 August 1972 in London, where his parents founded the Little Angel Theatre, a puppet theatre in Islington.

Wright always had an interest in the arts, especially painting.^[1] He would also make films on his Super 8 camera as well as spend time in the evenings acting in a drama club. Wright is dyslexic. He left school without any GCSEs.

He began his career working at his parents' puppet theatre. He also took classes at the Anna Scher Theatre School and acted professionally on stage and camera. He spent an art foundation year at Camberwell College of Arts, before taking a degree in fine art and film at Central St Martins.^[2] In his last year of studies he received a scholarship to make a short film for the BBC that won some awards. On the success of the short, he was offered the script for the serial Nature Boy.^[3] He followed this up with the serials Bodily Harm with Timothy Spall, and the highly acclaimed Charles II: The Power and the Passion with Rufus Sewell which won the BAFTA Award for Best Drama Serial.

During the 1990s he worked at Oil Factory, a music video production company based in Caledonian Road, Kings Cross. He worked on a variety of productions in numerous roles, including casting director. Here he was able to get the opportunity to direct some music videos. Alongside this, particularly on the strength of his short film work, he was also developing The End, his second short film. During this decade Wright also worked part time as a roadie for Vegetable Vision who created visuals for various electronic music bands, such as Chemical Brothers, . He attributes some of the aesthetic and emotion of the UK rave scene as an influence on his work.^[4]

Marriage[link]

Joe Wright is married to Sitarist Anoushka Shankar, daughter of Ravi Shankar, and they have a son named Zubin.^[5]

Feature films[link]

[edit] Pride & Prejudice

In 2005 he made the transition to feature films with the critically acclaimed Pride & Prejudice starring Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen. The film received numerous accolades including 4 Academy Award nominations (including best actress), 6 BAFTA nominations (Wright won the BAFTA for most promising newcomer) and a host of other nominations and wins.

[edit] Atonement

Wright's next feature was an adaptation of Ian McEwan's Booker Prize shortlisted novel Atonement which was released in 2007, reuniting Wright with Keira Knightley and also stars James McAvoy. On 13 December 2007, the film was nominated for 7 Golden Globe Awards, more than any other film that year. Though Wright himself was not nominated for Director, the film received six Academy Award nominations, winning only for Best Original Score. At the BAFTA Awards it received 14 nominations and went on to win for Best Production Design and Best Film.

[edit] The Soloist

His next film was The Soloist which stars Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey, Jr. It is about the "true story of musical prodigy Nathaniel Ayers, who developed schizophrenia in his second year at Juilliard and ended up homeless on the streets of downtown L.A. where he performs the violin and cello."^[6] It was to be released on 21 November 2008; however the release date was pushed back to 24 April 2009.

[edit] Hanna

Wright reunited with Atonement star Saoirse Ronan for the action thriller Hanna. The title character is a 17 year old girl trained since birth to be an assassin by her father (Eric Bana), a rogue CIA asset. The movie received mostly positive reviews with Roger Ebert calling it a "first rate thriller" in his review^[7] The film received an aggregate score of 65 from Metacritic, meaning it received generally positive reviews.^[8]

[edit] Anna Karenina

Wright is directing a screen adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's classic novel Anna Karenina. Current cast includes Keira Knightley as Anna, Jude Law as her husband, Aaron Johnson as her young love, and Irish actor Domhnall Gleeson as Konstantin Levin, as well as Kelly Macdonald, Olivia Williams, Matthew Macfadyen and Michelle Dockery.^[9][10][11] Saoirse Ronan and Andrea Riseborough were initially cast in the film, but dropped out and were replaced by Alicia Vikander and Ruth Wilson, respectively. In July 2011, Keira Knightley began rehearsals,^[12] in preparation for principle filming expected to begin later in 2011.^[13] The film also has Indian actress Tannishtha Chatterjee play a part in it.^[14]

Directorial trademarks[link]

After only four full-length features, Wright has distinguished himself as a director, winning a BAFTA award for best newcomer for Pride and Prejudice and becoming the youngest director ever to have a film open the Venice Film Festival with Atonement.^[15] According to the director's commentary on Pride and Prejudice, Wright is influenced by the work of British film director David Lean, and possessing a certain knowledge of art history, tries sometimes to compose his shots after classical paintings.

Charles II: The Power and The Passion, Pride and Prejudice, Atonement and Hanna all have long tracking shots in them. Atonement has a continuous 5 minute and 5 second shot of the Dunkirk evacuation. "Basically, I just like showing off," Wright told the audience at the Hay Festival.^[16]

Filmography[link]

Casting and crew[link]

Actor	Pride & Prejudice (2005)	Atonement (2007)	The Soloist (2009)	Hanna (2011)	Anna Karenina (2012)
Keira Knightley	Y	Y			Y
Anna Romano		Y		Y	Y
Olivia Williams				Y	Y
Michelle Dockery				Y	Y
Tom Hollander	Y		Y	Y
Brenda Blethyn	Y	Y
Matthew Macfadyen	Y				Y
Jena Malone	Y		Y
Dario Marianelli	Y	Y	Y		Y
Saoirse Ronan		Y		Y

References[link]

External links[link]

• Joe Wright at the Internet Movie Database

This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (August 2011)

Saint Lawrence
Lawrence before Valerianus
Martyr
Born	c. 225 AD Osca, Hispania (now modern-day Spain)
Died	258 AD 10th August Rome
Honored in	Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, Anglican Communion, Lutheranism
Canonized	Pre-Congregation
Major shrine	Basilica di San Lorenzo fuori le Mura in Rome
Feast	August 10
Attributes	Usually holding a gridiron and wearing a dalmatic
Patronage	Rome, Rotterdam, Birgu (Malta), Huesca (Spain), San Lawrenz, Brgy. San Lorenzo, San Pablo City, Philippines (Gozo), Canada, Sri Lanka, comedians, librarians, students, miners, tanners, chefs, roasters

Lawrence of Rome (Latin: Laurentius, lit. "laurelled"; c. 225 – 258) was one of the seven deacons of ancient Rome, serving under Pope St. Sixtus II, who were martyred during the persecution of Valerian in 258.

Holy Chalice[link]

According to lore, among the treasures of the Greek church entrusted to Lawrence for safe-keeping was the Holy Chalice, the cup from which Jesus and the Apostles drank at the Last Supper. Lawrence was able to spirit this away to Huesca, in present day Aragon, with a letter and a supposed inventory, where it lay hidden and unregarded for centuries. When Augustine connects Lawrence with a chalice, it is the chalice of the Mass:

For in that Church, you see, as you have regularly been told, he performed the office of deacon; it was there that he administered the sacred chalice of Christ’s blood.

According to Christian history the Holy Grail is a relic that was sent by St Lawrence to his parents in northern Aragon. He entrusted this sacred chalice to a friend whom he knew would travel back to Huesca, remaining in the monastery of Saint John of Pena, core of spiritual strength for the emerging kingdom of Aragon. While the Holy Chalice's exact journey through the centuries is disputed, it is generally accepted by Catholics that the Chalice was sent by his family to this monastery for preservation and veneration. Historical records indicate that this chalice has been venerated and preserved by a number of monks and monasteries through the ages. Today the Holy Grail is venerated in a special chapel in the Catholic Cathedral of Valencia, Spain.

Jewels of St Lawrence[link]

After the death of Sixtus, the prefect of Rome demanded that Lawrence turn over the riches of the Church. Ambrose is the earliest source for the tale that Lawrence asked for three days to gather together the wealth.^[1] Lawrence worked swiftly to distribute as much Church property to the poor as possible, so as to prevent its being seized by the prefect. On the third day, at the head of a small delegation, he presented himself to the prefect, and when ordered to give up the treasures of the Church, he presented the poor, the crippled, the blind and the suffering, and said that these were the true treasures of the Church. One account records him declaring to the prefect, "The Church is truly rich, far richer than your emperor." This act of defiance led directly to his martyrdom. This can be compared to the parallel Roman tale of the jewels of Cornelia.

Martyrdom[link]

"The Martyrdom of St. Lawrence" by Juan de León (1758) R.A.B.A.S.F., Madrid)

By tradition, Lawrence was sentenced at San Lorenzo in Miranda, imprisoned in San Lorenzo in Fonte, martyred at San Lorenzo in Panisperna, and buried in the Via Tiburtina in the Catacomb of Cyriaca by Hippolytus and Justinus, a presbyter. Tradition holds that Lawrence was burned or "grilled" to death, hence his association with the gridiron. Tradition also holds that Lawrence joked about their cooking him enough to eat while he was burning on the gridiron, hence his patronage of cooks and chefs, stating something along the lines of, "turn me over ... I'm done on this side". One of the early sources for the martyrdom of Saint Lawrence was the description by Aurelius Prudentius Clemens in his Peristephanon, Hymn II.

Some historians, such as Rev. Patrick Healy, view the traditions of how Lawrence was martyred as "not worthy of credence"^[2], as the slow lingering death can not be reconciled "with the express command contained in the edict regarding bishops, priests, and deacons (animadvertantur) which ordinarily meant decapitation."^[2] A theory of how the tradition arose is put forward by Pio Franchi de' Cavalieri. He postulates that it was the result of a mistaken transcription, the accidental omission of the letter "p" - "by which the customary and solemn formula for announcing the death of a martyr--passus est ["he suffered," that is, was martyred ] -- was made to read assus est [he was roasted]."^[2] The Liber Pontificalis, which is held to draw from sources independent of the existing traditions and Acta regarding Lawrence, uses passus est concerning him, the same term it uses for Pope Sixtus II (martyred by beheading during the same persecution).^[2]

Constantine I is said to have built a small oratory in honour of the martyr, which was a station on the itineraries of the graves of the Roman martyrs by the seventh century. Pope Damasus I rebuilt or repaired the church, now known as San Lorenzo fuori le Mura, while the minor basilica of San Lorenzo in Panisperna was built over the place of his martyrdom. The gridiron of the martyrdom was placed by Pope Paschal II in the church of San Lorenzo in Lucina.

Veneration[link]

The stone on which Lawrence's body was laid after death, in San Lorenzo fuori le mura

Lawrence is one of the most widely venerated saints of the Roman Catholic Church. Devotion to him was widespread by the fourth century. As his martyrdom occurred very early in Church history, many Non-Catholic Christians honour him as well. Since the Perseid Meteor Shower typically occurs every year in mid-August, on or near Saint Lawrence's feast day, some refer to the shower as the "Tears of Saint Lawrence."

The shrine in Rome containing the gridiron said to have been used to grill Lawrence to death

St Lawrence is especially honoured in the city of Rome, where he is one of the city's patrons. There are several churches in Rome dedicated to him, including San Lorenzo in Panisperna, traditionally identified as the place of his execution. He is invoked by librarians, archivists, cooks, and tanners as their patron. His celebration on 10 August has the rank of feast throughout the entire Catholic world.^[3] On this day, the reliquary containing his burnt head is displayed in the Vatican for veneration.

Lawrence statue in St. Lawrence Deacon & Martyr Parish Church, Balagtas, Bulacan, Philippines[1].

The Escorial Palace, situated at the foot of Mt. Abantos in the Sierra de Guadarrama, was built by King Philip II of Spain to commemorate the victory of Spanish forces over those of King Henry II of France at the Battle of St Quentin, which took place on the feast of St Lawrence on 10 August 1557. To honour the martyr, the entire floor plan of this imposing edifice was laid out in the form of a gridiron, the means by which St Lawrence was martyred.

French explorer Jacques Cartier gave the name of Saint Lawrence to the widest river estuary in the world. At the mouth of this river is the large Gulf of Saint Lawrence, surrounded by all the Canadian Maritime provinces. Closer to the source of this river are the Laurentian mountains (north of the city of Montreal), the major Montreal borough of Saint-Laurent (borough), as well as the famed Saint Lawrence Boulevard that spans the full 11.25 km width of the island of Montreal. Further upstream, on the south side of the river near its source at Lake Ontario, is St. Lawrence County, New York.

St Lawrence is the patron saint of the monks of Ampleforth Abbey. St Lawrence is also venerated by Anglo-Catholics. A major church in Sydney, Australia, situated in the former civil (land division) parish of St Lawrence, is called "Christ Church St. Laurence". The Brotherhood of St Laurence also bears his name.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Saint Lawrence

Prayer[link]

This prayer can be found in the Divine Office on the saint's feast day, August 10:^[4][5] <poem>

Father,

you called Saint Lawrence to serve you by love

and crowned his life with glorious martyrdom.

Help us to be like him

in loving you and doing your work.

Grant this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever. Amen.</poem>

Or more accurately: <poem>

O God,

Blessed Lawrence showed forth the fire of his love for you, both by faithful service and glorious martyrdom.

Make us to love the things which he loved,

and to do the works that he taught.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.</poem>

In the Breviary of 1962 (now authorized again) the prayer reads:

O Almighty God,

Who didst give unto Blessed Lawrence power

to be more than conqueror in his fiery torment;

grant unto us, we beseech thee,

the power to quench the flames of our sinful lusts.

Through Jesus Christ, we pray

Amen ^[6]

See also[link]

• Saint Lawrence (disambiguation) for places, churches and schools called Saint Lawrence or Saint Laurent
• San Lorenzo del Escorial, the monastery built by Philip II to commemorate his victory at St. Quentin on the feast day of St. Lawrence. The monastery (and the attached palace, college, library, etc.) are laid out in a grid resembling a grill with a handle.
• Saint Lawrence River
• San Lorenzo de Almagro
• List of saints
• Lorcán Ua Tuathail, also known as St Laurence O'Toole

References[link]

External links[link]

• Henry Wace, A Dictionary of Christian Biography: Laurentius
• Catholic Encyclopedia Saint Lawrence
• Golden Legend: "The Life of Saint Laurence"
• Leo I: Sermon on St Lawrence
• Orthodox Christianity Church of Saint Lawrence
• [2] Church of Saint Lawrence, Birgu, Malta
• [3] Patron of Ampleforth Abbey, North Yorkshire