Suffolk

Suffolk’s county town Ipswich started life as the small port of Gippeswic, the name coming from the river Gipping and the old Anglo-Saxon word for dwelling . It would fall under Viking rule in the 9th century, be recaptured by the English in the 10th, and would flourish as an exporter of wool and cloth. Indeed today the likes of Bury St Edmunds, Clare, Hadleigh, Ipswich, Lavenham, Long Melford and Sudbury are known as the Suffolk Wool Towns – historic settlements whose early prosperity was powered by the medieval wool trade.