Greater Manchester's Past Revealed – serie

Piccadilly Place (centred on NGR SJ 8461 9590) lies immediately to the north-west of Piccadilly Railway Station, close to the heart of the modern city. In many ways, it is typical of other areas found within the centre of Manchester. Prior to the Industrial Revolution it lay on the outskirts of the town, only to be subsumed during rapid urban expansion in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. However, in other ways the history of Piccadilly Place is unique, particularly as the site was to play a significant part in the emergence of the industrial city. This booklet charts that development, and also summarises the history of the city and the textile industry, which was to have a fundamental infl uence on the development of both Piccadilly Place, and other parts of Manchester.

During the nineteenth century, the Rock Triangle in Bury had been a thriving industrial area with numerous textile mills, engineering works and iron foundaries, small workshops, and rows of terraced housing. These buildings had all been demolished by the end of the twentieth century, but their buried remains were excavated by Oxford Archaeology North in 2006-7, in advance of the Rock Retail and Leisure development, built between 2008 and 2010. This booklet charts the history of Bury and The Rock Triangle, and summarises the recent archaeological excavations, which have provided a record of part of Bury's important and varie industrial past.

Wigan is well known as one of the key industrial towns of nineteenth-century Lancashire. However, there is increasing evidence to demonstrate that Wigan also has a rich Roman heritage. Whilst some remains and artefacts were discovered during construction works in the nineteenth century, the most remarkable evidence for Roman activity in the town arose from archaeological excavations carried out since the 1980s in the Millgate area. In particular, the remains of a second-century bath-house were discovered during excavations by Oxford Archaeology North in 2004-5, whilst further excavations in 2008 provided new evidence for Roman activity in the first centry AD. The exciting findings from these excavations are summarised in this booklet, which presents th latest information on Roman Wigan.

The printing of cloth played a key role in the early development of Lancashire's cotton industry during the late eighteenth century, and its rapid growth thereafter. The River Irwell and its tributaries around Bury emerged as an important centre for printing, and became associated with some of the textile industry's most famous pioneers. In contrast to other branches of the industry, however, very few historic print works survive as buildings, although several have been the focus of recent archaeological investigations in Greater Manchester. This booklet presents the findings of several excavations and surveys of the remains of former print works, providing an insight into the development of this important industry.