Within 730, Venerable Bede in his Ecclesiastical History gives the following quotation about events in A.D.627: "In the place of which the later kings constructed themselves a COUNTRY-SEAT in the Country named LOIDIS [LEEDS]. But the altar, being of stone, escaped the fire and it is still preserved in the monastery of the most reverend abbot and priest, Thridwulf, which is in Elsiete wood."
The name Loidis was applied to the district not to a single place or perhaps settlement, and this is confirmed by two names, Ledsham and Ledston, containing the same element. These two villages are actually about ten miles from the city of Leeds. This then became Leodis, then Ledes, then Leeds.
Natives of Leeds are called "Loiners", there are many hypotheses regarding the origin of the term, not one of which are definitive. Loiner could derive from the name Loidis as above; another explanation is a Loiner is someone born within the sound of the church bells of Briggate. Around the 19th century there have been many yards and closes around Briggate whose back entrances were known as "Low Ins" or even "Loins" consequently "Loiner". Another concept is that there were a lot of lanes within the Briggate area pronounced "loins". Men who gathered at the lane end to gossip etc. were "Loiners".
Ledes was also talked about in the Doomsday Book in 1086. The centre of the town was initially a cluster of buildings at the parish church of St Peter. Within 1207 a new town was founded by the Lord of the Manor, Maurice Paynel between the parish church and the corn mills, at the river crossing. Its spine was a new road, Briggate, the road leading to the bridge. The common spelling became Leedes, one example is, the first map of Leeds by John Cossins in 1725 was titled, 'A New and Exact Plan of the Town of Leedes'.
The movement of the cloth market from the bridge into Briggate itself in 1684 developed the core of the modern city of Leeds. The population expanded from 10,000 at the end of the seventeenth century to 30,000 at the end of the eighteenth. Featuring its churches, chapels and meeting houses, Assembly Rooms, Infirmary and its new Cloth Halls, Leeds became among the many busiest and most prosperous metropolitan centres in the north of England.
The Industrial Revolution set Leeds off at a gallop. The population grew to over 150,000 by 1840 and the place was altered. But not only was it a centre of marketing and manufacture, it was even the centre of a network of communications, particularly by water. In 1699 the Aire and also the Calder rivers were made navigable, linking Leeds with the Ouse, Humber and also the sea. In 1816 the great Leeds to Liverpool canal, a coast to coast link passing through Leeds, was accomplished.
In such a situation, Leeds was ideally situated for the development of an engineering industry - making machinery for spinning, machine tools, steam engines and gears along with other industries based on textiles, chemicals and leather and pottery. Coal was extracted on a large scale and also the still functioning Middleton Railway, the first commercial railway in the world, transported coal into the centre of Leeds.
The Leeds Rifles were raised in 1859 when the Volunteer Force was formed to meet an invasion threat from France. The Corps was titled 7th Yorkshire, West Riding, (Leeds) Rifle Volunteer Corps. Many well known Leeds businesses raised complete companies from their workforces, such as Joshua Tetley's brewery. The Tetley family played a central part in the Leeds Rifles for well over a century providing many officers, commanding officers and honorary colonels. The Leeds Rifles in the beginning had their barracks next to the Town Hall where the Law Courts stand these days. For a more detailed account see The Leeds Rifles.
Leeds became a city in 1893. With elaborate new public structures such as the Public Library and the General Post Office and with its famous arcades threading through the blocks on either side of the main streets, it was most likely the best during those times.
By the end of the Great War, the industrial and social structure of Leeds had already commenced to change. Such an important and thriving city had to turn into a centre of study and teaching. The Yorkshire College of Science along with the Medical School was merged to build the University around 1904. The corporation established Colleges of Technology, Art, Commerce and Education, which were later to be fused into the Polytechnic, which in 1993 became Leeds Metropolitan University.
The hospitals, especially the Infirmary and St James Hospital, established international reputations as main medical centres. The town centre became a commercial centre for retailing and offices and today can claim to be the commercial capital of the North.
Since the Second World War and more particularly since the fifties, another transformation occurred, namely the re-establishing of the city. Tens of thousands of slum dwellings were replaced by modern housing estates which have now gained Leeds the accolade of Environment City of the UK and Leeds pioneered the Buchan principles of planning for the motor car and pedestrian.
Leeds stands today as a city of regional, national and international importance. Having its rich history, diverse economy, enterprising people as well as cosmopolitan atmosphere, Leeds looks set to remain its success story well into the future.
For a more detailed account see The Urban Geography of Leeds: an historical analysis of urban development.
Some significant dates in the history of Leeds
731 Bede’s “History of English Church and People” mentions Leeds Parish Church. Leeds was then called Loidis.
1086 Leeds mentioned in the Doomsday Book
1152 Foundations of Kirkstall Abbey created (Cistercian)
1155 Knights Templar take control of Newsam
1207 Maurice Paynel grants Leeds a charter
1258 Market operating in Leeds
1380 Leeds Parish Church renewed
1469 Woollen industry well established in Leeds
1539 Dissolution of Kirkstall Abbey
1552 Leeds Grammar School was founded by Sir William Sheafield
1626 King Charles 1 grants charter
1634 St John’s Church, Briggate consecrated
1642 Civil War - Royalists take Leeds
1645 Bubonic plague kills 1325
1661 Second charter gives Leeds a mayor
1663 Farnley Wood Plot to overthrow Charles 11
1715 Ralph Thoresby published the first history of Leeds "Ducatus Leodensis"
1745 Mob attacks John Wesley in the town
1754 Leeds Intelligencer, now Yorkshire Post, started
1755 Street lighting introduced
1759 Beginning of the Middleton Railway
1770 Leeds-Liverpool Canal started off
1792 Benjamin Gott builds Bean Ing Mills (site of Yorkshire Post)
1808 Leeds Library, Commercial Street is completed
1812 Matthew Murray's stream engines start operating on Middleton Railway
1816 Leeds-Liverpool canal is accomplished
1819 The city is lit by gas
1831 Leeds School of Medicine started
1832 Cholera epidemic strikes in Leeds
1841 New Parish Church opens
1847 Leeds prison at Armley is built
1858 Leeds Town Hall opened by Queen Victoria
1859 Thoresby Society founded
1863 The Corn Exchange is opened
1872 Roundhay Park opened
1874 Yorkshire College of Science founded in Leeds
1878 Thornton’s Arcade along with the Grand Theatre are opened
1884 The launch of the well-known ‘Penny Bazaar’
1884 Municipal Buildings developed by George Corson opened to deal with to several Civic departments, Police and Central Librar
y
1888 City Art Gallery opened
1893 Leeds becomes a city by Royal Charter
1894 Electric tramways are started
1903 The Black Prince in City Square is unveiled
1904 St Anne’s Cathedral is consecrated
1904 University of Leeds granted its very own Charter as being an independent institution by King Edward VII
1905 The very first cinema in Leeds is opened
1908 Visit of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra to open new wing of the University
1911 Children strike in Leeds schools
1922 BBC broadcast from Leeds
1928 Britain’s first permanent traffic lights set up in Park Row
1933 Leeds Civic Hall opened by King George V and Queen Mary
1941 Worst air raid on Leeds - 60 kille
d
1959 Last tram in Leeds withdrawn from service
1964 Merrion Centre is opened
1974 Leeds becomes a Metropolitan District - population increases by 50%
1981 Riots in Chapeltown
1992 Leeds Polytechnic has become Leeds Metropolitan University
1995 Royal Armouries Museum opens
1996 Leeds hosts Euro ’96 football matches
1997 Leeds Grammar School moves to new campus site at Alwoodley Gates
1998 Super bus lanes introduced
2000 Millennium Square opens
2001 Nelson Mandela is made Honorary Freeman of Leeds
2002 Queen's Golden Jubilee Visit