Manchester
Manchester is a major industrial city in the North West of England, in the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester, and formerly a part of Lancashire. It is the third largest city in England after London and Birmingham. It is also an important port, served by the Manchester Ship Canal beside the River Mersey.
History
Originally a Roman military settlement named Mamcumium, and later of a tenth century burh (Anglo-Saxon fortified place), Manchester was of regional importance only until the Industrial Revolution, when it became a major center of the cotton industry and renowned as a "shock city", a place where new urban and social developments were undertaken. Manchester and its environs saw the first large-scale application of factory technology and organisation; Manchester was the first city to experience full-scale suburbanisation; it was (with Liverpool) the first city to have a fully locomotive-hauled public railway, in 1830. It also experienced in full measure the negative aspects of this headlong rush to modernise and urbanise in its terrible slums, described in a dramtic piece of reportage by Friedrich Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England (1844-45; first published in English 1892).
Culture
A number of significant bands have come from Manchester, including:
Sport
- In 2002 Manchester hosted the Commonwealth Games.
- It is the home of two major football teams, Manchester United and Manchester City.
- Lancashire county cricket club play many of their matches at Old Trafford, which has also been the venue of many test matches.