Lincoln

Lincoln rises above the River Witham, its cathedral and castle crowning the steep hill over the old city. Founded as a Roman settlement, it became an important medieval centre of government, religion and trade. The cathedral treasury preserved a copy of Magna Carta issued in 1215, a document read at the sheriff's court in the neighbouring Norman castle.

During the civil war that followed King John's reign, the castle's constable Nicola de la Haye defended it against a siege in 1217. More than four centuries later the castle was besieged again, this time by Parliamentary forces during the English Civil War of the seventeenth century. They overwhelmed its Royalist defenders in 1644, bringing the old royal fortress into another struggle for the kingdom.