Covering
the counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire,
Norfolk & Suffolk. In Tudor times, a thriving woollen trade provided
the wealth to build many splendid churches and grand civil buildings throughout
East Anglia. Several can still be seen, including the Guidhall at Lavenham.
The Roman towns of Colchester and St Albans make a good point from which
to begin an understanding of the region's cultural development. Sutton Hoo
is link from Anglo Saxon paganism into early Christianity and, with the
Norman invasion, came the castles and abbeys. Despite extensive urbanisation,
especially noticeable in Essex, the area still has great expanses of farmland,
some tiny hamlets, several chocolate-box villages, and many delightful pink-
washed thatched and timbered cottages synonymous with Suffolk. A county
of gentle landscapes, and idyllic country life, was captured for eternity
in John Constable's paintings. Water is everywhere in this region. Three
counties border the North Sea, the Great Ouse River travels through two
counties before flowing into The Wash, and there are the amazingly scenic
Norfolk Broads. Extensive fenland was once the main feature of Cambridgeshire,
and the magnificent Ely Cathedral ('Ship of the Fens') still dominates the
flat landscape. |
