Lewes


Lewes is the county town of East Sussex, England. It is the police and judicial centre for all of Sussex and is home to Sussex Police, East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service, Lewes Crown Court and HMP Lewes. The civil parish is the centre of the Lewes local government district and the seat of East Sussex County Council at East Sussex County Hall.
A traditional market town and centre of communications, in 1264 it was the site of the Battle of Lewes. The town's landmarks include Lewes Castle, Lewes Priory, Bull House, Southover Grange and public gardens, and a 16th-century timber-framed Wealden hall house known as Anne of Cleves House. Other notable features of the area include the Glyndebourne festival, the Lewes Bonfire and the Lewes Pound.

History

evidence points to prehistoric dwellers in the area. Scholars think that the Roman settlement of Mutuantonis was here, as quantities of artefacts have been discovered in the area. The Saxons built a castle, having first constructed its motte as a defensive point over the river; they gave the town its name.
The place-name 'Lewes' is first attested in an Anglo-Saxon charter circa 961 AD, where it appears as Læwe and Laewes. It appears as Lewes in the Domesday Book of 1086. The name means 'hills', from the Old English hlæw meaning 'hill'.
After the Norman invasion, William the Conqueror rewarded William de Warenne, 1st Earl of Surrey, with the Rape of Lewes, a swathe of land along the River Ouse from the coast to the Surrey boundary. He rebuilt Lewes Castle on the Saxon site; and he and his wife, Gundred also founded the Priory of St Pancras, a Cluniac monastic house, in about 1081. Lewes was the site of a mint during the Late Anglo-Saxon period and thereafter a mint during the early years after the Norman invasion. In 1148 the town was granted a charter by King Stephen. The town became a port with docks along the River Ouse.
The town was the site of the Battle of Lewes between the forces of Henry III and Simon de Montfort in the Second Barons' War in 1264, at the end of which de Montfort's forces were victorious and rebuilt the castle. Simon the Monfort rebuilt the castle. The battle took place in fields now just west of Landport.
At the time of the Marian Persecutions of 1555–1557, Lewes was the site of the execution of seventeen Protestant martyrs, who were burned at the stake in front of the Star Inn. A memorial to the martyrs was unveiled on Cliffe Hill in 1901. Through the 17th and 18th centuries, Lewes developed as the county town of Sussex, expanding beyond the line of the town wall. It was an active port and developed related iron, brewing, and ship building industries.
In 1846 the town became a railway junction, with lines constructed from the north, south and east to two railway stations. The development of Newhaven ended Lewes's period as a major port. During the Crimean War, some 300 Finns serving in the Russian army captured at Bomarsund were imprisoned at Lewes. Lewes became a borough in 1881. Lewes Town Hall opened in 1893 in premises converted from the former Star Inn and in 1913 Council Offices were added in Arts-and-Crafts style.
Lewes Victoria Hospital opened in 1909 in its current premises, as Victoria Hospital and Infirmary, having previously been on School Hill where it opened as the Lewes Dispensary and Infirmary in 1855.

Governance

The name Lewes is also the name of the parliamentary constituency and the local district council as well as Lewes Town Council. Lewes is also where the East Sussex County Council has its main offices, located at County Hall in St Anne's Crescent. Lewes District Council is administered from offices in Southover House on Southover Road. Lewes Town Council is based in the Town Hall on Lewes High Street.
The Town Council comprises Liberal Democrats, Greens and Independents.
For many years, Lewes was dominated by the Conservatives at local level. In 1991, however, the Liberal Democrats won the District Council for the first time, and the constituency returned a Liberal Democrat MP for the first time in 1997. The Conservatives won back control of the District Council in 2011, and strengthened this position in 2015. The elections in May 2019 made the Conservatives the largest party but without overall control of the Council. A Co-operative Alliance of Greens, Liberal Democrats, Labour and Independents succeeded in ousting the Conservative Leader in July 2019 and electing the first Green Leader of the Council, Zoe Nicholson who appointed a Cabinet of Co-operative Alliance Members. The Chair of the Council is Stephen Gauntlett, Liberal Democrat.
The Parliamentary constituency Lewes has also been held the Conservatives since the 1870s, with the exception of the period from 1997 to 2015 when Liberal Democrat Norman Baker held the seat for 18 years, before being defeated by Maria Caulfield who retained her seat in the 2017 and 2019 general elections.
In organisational terms, Lewes became one of the non-county boroughs within the then Sussex, East county under the Local Government Act 1933. In 1974, Lewes District Council was formed on 1 April 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972, and was a merger of the former borough of Lewes along with Newhaven and Seaford urban districts and Chailey Rural District. The election in 2015 was the first time in which Green Councillors had been elected to the Lewes District Council, all from the wards in the town of Lewes.
The town of Lewes became a civil parish with the title of town; there are four wards, Bridge – 5 Councillors, Castle – 4, Central – 1 and Priory – 8.
The representation from Lewes wards at local government levels, as at the latest elections, is as follows.
WardLib DemGreenIndependentTotal
Lewes Bridge5005
Lewes Castle3104
Lewes Central0101
Lewes Priory0538
Total87318

WardGreenIndependentTotal
Lewes Bridge202
Lewes Castle202
Lewes Priory213
Total617

WardLib DemGreenIndependentInd GreenTotal
Lewes Bridge51006
Lewes Castle12126
Lewes Priory02316
Total654318

WardIndependentLiberal DemocratTotal
Lewes 101
Ringmer and Lewes Bridge011
Total112

On 31 March 2009 Hilary Benn, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, announced his decision to confirm the designation of the South Downs National Park, which came into being exactly one year later and includes the town of Lewes within its boundaries.

Geography

Lewes is situated on the Greenwich or Prime Meridian, in a gap in the South Downs, cut through by the River Ouse, and near its confluence with the Winterbourne Stream. It is approximately seven miles north of Newhaven, and an equal distance north-east of Brighton.
The South Downs rise above the river on both banks. The High Street, and earliest settlement, occupies the west bank, climbing steeply up from the bridge taking its ancient route along the ridge; the summit on that side, 2.5 miles distant is known as Mount Harry. On the east bank there is a large chalk cliff Cliffe Hill that can be seen for many miles, part of the group of hills including Mount Caburn, Malling Down and Golf Hill. The two banks of the river are joined by Willey's Bridge, the Phoenix Causeway and Cliffe Bridge.
The High Street runs from Eastgate to West-Out, forming the spine of the ancient town. Cliffe Hill gives its name to the one-time village of Cliffe, now part of the town. The southern part of the town, Southover, came into being as a village adjacent to the Priory, south of the Winterbourne Stream. At the north of the town's original wall boundary is the St. John's or Pells area, home to several 19th-century streets and the Pells Pond. The Pells Pool, built in 1860, is the oldest freshwater lido in England. The Phoenix Industrial Estate lies along the west bank of the river and contains a number of light industrial and creative industry uses, as well as car parks and a fire station. A potential regeneration project, "The North Street Quarter", for the area would be the largest in Lewes since the South Malling residential area was developed in the 1950s and 1960s and in the South Downs since it became a National Park.
Malling lies to the east of the river and had 18th- and 19th-century houses and two notable breweries. Road engineering and local planning policy in the 1970s cleared many older buildings here to allow the flow of traffic; the main road route east from the town now goes along Little East Street, across the Phoenix Bridge and through the Cuilfail Tunnel to join the A27.
The town boundaries were enlarged twice, in 1881 and 1934. They now include the more modern housing estates of Wallands, South Malling, Nevill, Lansdown and Cranedown on the Kingston Road.
Countryside walks can be taken starting from several points in Lewes. One can walk over Mount Caburn to the village of Glynde starting in Cliffe, traverse the Lewes Brooks from Southover, walk to Kingston near Lewes also from Southover, head up Landport Bottom to Mount Harry and Black Cap along the edge of the old Lewes Racecourse, or wander up along the Ouse to Hamsey Place from the Pells. The South Downs Way crosses the Ouse just south of Lewes at Southease and hikers often stop off at the town. A new route reaching the town at the Railway Land - the Egrets Way - initially conceived in 2011 by the Ouse Valley Cycle Network, has been designed as a network of walking and cycling paths linking Lewes and Newhaven with the villages in between.

Natural sites and events

Three Sites of Special Scientific Interest lie within the parish: Lewes Downs, Lewes Brooks and Southerham Works Pit. Lewes Downs is a site of biological interest, an isolated area of the South Downs. Lewes Brooks, also of biological importance, is part of the floodplain of the River Ouse, providing a habitat for many invertebrates such as water beetles and snails. Southerham Works Pit is of geological interest, a disused chalk pit displaying a wide variety of fossilised fish remains. The Railway Land nature reserve is on the east side of the town next to the Ouse, and contains an area of woodland and marshes, which now includes the Heart of Reeds, a sculpted reed bed designed by local land artist Chris Drury. The Winterbourne stream, a tributary of the Ouse, flows through it. This stream flows most winters and dries up in the summer, hence its name. It continues through Lewes going through the Grange Gardens and often travelling underground. The Heart of Reeds is one of the sites in East Sussex and Kent home to the marsh frog, an introduced species. It is popular with pond-dippers and walkers. A centre for the study of environmental change is due to be built at the entrance to the nature reserve.
On 27 December 1836, an avalanche occurred in Lewes, the worst ever recorded in Britain. A large build-up of snow on the nearby cliff slipped down onto a row of cottages called Boulters Row. About fifteen people were buried, and eight of these died. A pub in South Street is named The Snowdrop in memory of the event.
On 21 August 1864, Lewes experienced an earthquake measuring 3.1 on the Richter magnitude scale.
In October 2000 the town suffered major flooding during an intense period of severe weather throughout the United Kingdom. The commercial centre of the town and many residential areas were devastated. In a government report into the nationwide flooding, Lewes was officially noted the most severely affected location. As a result of the devastation, the Lewes Flood Action group formed, to press for better flood protection measures.

Climate

Climate in this area has mild differences between highs and lows, and there is adequate rainfall year-round. The Köppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "".

Religious buildings

Church of England

The Roman Catholic church is dedicated to St. Pancras in memory of the Priory and is a red-brick building over the street from St. Anne's.

Non-conformist

In 2001 the service industries were by far the biggest employers in Lewes: over 60% of the population working in that sector. A little over 10% are employed in manufacturing, mostly in the smaller industrial units.
The town is a net daytime exporter of employees with a significant community working in London and Brighton whilst it draws in employees of the numerous local government and public service functions on which its local economy is strongly dependent.
An important part of the town's economy is based on tourism, because of the town's many historic attractions and its location.
As referenced in the governance section, the town is also where three tiers of local government have their headquarters, and the head office of Sussex Police is also in Lewes.

Lewes Bonfire

The town's most important annual event is the Lewes Bonfire celebrations on 5 November, Guy Fawkes Night. In Lewes this event not only marks the date of the uncovering of the Gunpowder Plot in 1605, but also commemorates the memory of the seventeen Protestant martyrs burnt at the stake for their faith during the Marian Persecutions. The celebrations, which controversially involve burning an effigy of Pope Paul V, who was pope during the Gunpowder Plot, are the largest and most famous Bonfire Night celebrations in the country.

Economy

The Lewes Chamber of Commerce represents the traders and businesses of the town. The town has been identified as unusually diversified with numerous specialist, independent retailers, counter to national trends toward 'chain' retailers and large corporate retail outlets.
Lewes Farmers' Market, one of the first in the UK, was started in the 1990s by Common Cause Co-operative Ltd and is a popular re-invention of Lewes as a market town. The Farmers' Market takes place in pedestrianised Cliffe High Street on the first and third Saturdays of every month, with local food producers coming to sell their wares under covered market stalls. A weekly food market in the Lewes Market Tower was established in July 2010 by Transition Town Lewes to allow traders to sell local produce. Occasionally French traders from the Twin Town of Blois attend, vending on Cliffe Bridge.
From 1794 beers, wines and spirits were distributed from Lewes under the Harveys name, and the town is today the site of Harvey & Son's brewery celebrated as one of the finest ale producers in England.
In September 2008, Lewes launched its own currency, the Lewes Pound, in an effort to increase trade within the town. One Lewes Pound is equal to £1. Like the similar local currency in Totnes, the initiative is part of the Transition Towns movement. The Lewes Pound and the Transition Towns movement have received criticism for a failure to address the needs of the wider Lewes population, especially lower socio-economic groups. Such local currency initiatives have been more widely criticised in light of limited success stimulating new spending in local economies and as an unrealistic strategy to reduce carbon emissions. The Lewes Pound can be exchanged for the same amount of pounds sterling in several shops in Lewes and can be spent in a wide range of local businesses. Many of the notes were sold on eBay at a higher amount. Early numbers and sequenced notes fetched very high prices from foreign collectors.

Landmarks

The town is the location of several significant historic buildings, including Lewes Castle, the remains of Lewes Priory, Bull House, Southover Grange and public gardens, and a 16th-century timber-framed Wealden hall house known as Anne of Cleves House because it was given to her as part of her divorce settlement from Henry VIII, though she never lived there. Anne of Cleves House and the castle are owned and maintained by the Sussex Archaeological Society. The Round House, a secluded former windmill in Pipe Passage, was owned by the writer Virginia Woolf.
The steep and cobbled Keere Street is home to many historic buildings, including a timber framed antiquarian bookshop. The gardens of the buildings on the east side of the street border the old Town Walls. The Prince Regent once drove his carriage down the street, and a sign at the bottom commemorates this event.
The ancient street pattern survives extensively as do a high proportion of the medieval building plots and oak framed houses, albeit often masked with later facades. The 18th-century frontages are notable and include several, like Bartholomew House at the Castle Gate, that are clad in mathematical tiles which mimic fine brick construction. Numerous streets of 18th- and 19th-century cottages have survived cycles of slum clearance as models of attractive town housing.
At the highest point of the old town the Portland stone and Coade stone facade of the Crown Court, the brick Market Tower and florid Lewes War Memorial mark the historic centre, although trade has tended to concentrate on the lower land in modern times. At the lowest part of the town, by the river, Harvey & Son's Brewery, 'The Cathedral of Lewes' is an unspoilt 19th-century tower brewery and is the only one of the town's five original major breweries still in use. Nearby Fitzroy House is a George Gilbert Scott designed building, constructed as a library in memory of Lewes MP Henry Fitzroy in 1862 and now a private residence. The railway station is the other important monument of the industrial era.
's home
Southover Grange is a grade II* listed Tudor manor house built in 1572 with Caen limestone taken from the ruins of Lewes Priory. The house and its gardens were bought by Lewes District Council and opened to the public in 1945. The house is now owned by East Sussex County Council, and it is currently being refurbished into a wedding venue, registry office and community facility. The east wing is leased to an art shop and the Window café. The Grange gardens are divided by the Winterbourne stream and contain formal bedding displays, a wildflower area, a knot garden and some notable trees, including a large Magnolia grandiflora, a mulberry tree dating perhaps to the 17th century and a tulip tree planted by Queen Elizabeth II. The gardens are open to the public during daylight hours all year round.
Pelham House dates back to the 16th century and features architecture of all subsequent eras and a private landscaped garden facing the Downs. It now serves as an independent hotel. The Shelleys, also now a hotel, is likewise of some antiquity with a private garden and family associations with Percy Shelley.
The centre of Lewes is notable for a consistently high calibre of regional vernacular architecture and variety of historic construction materials and techniques. A comprehensive survey of all historical plaques was conducted in 2013 by a local civic society, the Friends of Lewes.
A distinctive feature of the centre of Lewes is the network of alleyways or 'twittens' which run north–south on either side of the High Street and date back to Anglo-Saxon times. According to the Dictionary of the Sussex dialect and collection of provincialisms in use in the county of Sussex published in Lewes in 1875. "Twitten is a narrow path between two walls or hedges, especially on hills. For example, small passageways leading between two buildings to courtyards, streets, or open areas behind". Some twittens remain flint-wall-lined pedestrian thoroughfares, others are now narrow usually one-way roads. The most notable of all Lewes' twittens is Keere Street. A weekly Sunday morning run up and down all the twittens on the south side of the High Street – the so-called Twitten Run – has operated in the town since November 2015.

Public sculpture

Historic

With Eric Gill's move to Ditchling, the artistic community there gave rise to other sculptors in the Lewes district such as his nephew John Skelton and Joseph Cribb. Skelton's studio in Streat has continued as an educational and artist's workshop since his death in 1999. Eric Gill and Jacob Epstein conceived a great scheme for doing some collossal figures together around 1910 for a modern Stonehenge on 6 acres of land at Asheham House, Beddingham, south-east of Lewes. William Rothenstein agreed to buy the lease but the scheme failed.
Edward Perry Warren first saw Lewes House in 1889 and with his partner John Marshall they were prodigious collectors of fine antique sculpture there. Eric Gill was introduced to Warren by Roger Fry and the stone carving Ecstasy purchased, which is now in the Tate Gallery collection. William Rothenstein suggested that Warren might like to acquire Rodin's new sculpture The Kiss and after several visits, in 1904 the Lewes Kiss arrived at Lewes House. In 1906 Rodin requested that Warren lend The Kiss to an important exhibition in Regent Street, London. This made it famous in Britain for the first time. The Kiss was returned to the stables at Lewes House, where it remained until 1914 until offered to Lewes Town Council. It was placed in the Town Hall, at the South End of the Assembly Room on 2 December 1914. Early in 1915, The Kiss was wrapped in canvas and marked off with a guard rail. The Town Council returned the statue, saying only that the room did 'not lend itself to such a noble piece of statuary.' On 26 February 1917, The Kiss was once more taken to the stable block where it was to remain until Warren's death in 1928. After a short period on loan to Cheltenham, The Kiss was purchased in 1953 by public subscription and is now one of the Tate's most popular attractions.
It returned on loan to Lewes in 1999 for the exhibition Rodin in Lewes.

Present day

The Helmet, by Enzo Plazzotta, stands in the grounds of Lewes Priory. The Cuilfail Spiral by Peter Randall-Page sits on the roundabout at the north end of the Cuilfail Tunnel; made of 7 pieces of Portland limestone. The Magnus Inscription sits in the East wall of St John Sub Castro on the Junction of Abinger Place and Lancaster Street. The Janus Head by John Skelton and Lewes Group by Jon Edgar sit in Southover Grange Gardens. Sculpture to Thomas Paine by Marcus Cornish commissioned as a private donation was unveiled in July 2010 outside the new Lewes Library in Styles Field.

Transport

Lewes, from its inception, has been an important transport hub. Its site as a bridging point was probably originally a ford: today the main routes avoid the town centre. The A27 trunk road taking traffic along the south coast between Eastbourne and Southampton passes to the south of the town. The A26 from Maidstone to Newhaven; and the A275 both come in from the north. The Brighton & Hove bus company and Compass Travel serve the town. The bus station was closed for a while but reopened in late 2008.
Lewes railway station was originally the junction for six routes. The town still enjoys hourly fast trains from London. The two erstwhile rural rail routes to the north, linking to East Grinstead and Uckfield respectively, are both now closed, but the East Coastway Line, connecting Brighton with Eastbourne and Hastings, and the branch to Seaford remain.
The Vanguard Way, a long-distance footpath from London to Newhaven, passes through countryside east of the town. The South Downs Way also passes close to Lewes, crossing the Ouse at Southease, some four miles south of the town. The Greenwich Meridian Trail, a long-distance path that follows the Greenwich Meridian from Peacehaven in East Sussex to Sand le Mere in East Yorkshire passes through the middle of the town. A festival celebrating and encouraging walking and cycling, the Lewes Hike and Bike Festival, was created in 2012 but only ran for three years. The Eastbourne and Lewes Walking Festival was created in 2018 to promote walking in the local urban and rural South Downs area.

Education

Primary schools

There are many primary schools including:
Western Road and Southover School, despite being separate schools, are housed in linked buildings. The original Southover buildings are of red brick in the Queen Anne style, dating back to the early 20th century. The additions to it now forming the Western Road buildings date from after 1945. The two schools share a field. Pells Primary School closed in 2017. The alternative independent primary school, Lewes New School, closed in 2018.

Secondary schools

There are two secondary schools in the town and one nearby:
, formerly Sussex Downs College, has one of its campuses in Lewes, and provides a range of courses including A Levels, GCSEs, Functional Skills and Access courses and vocational qualifications such as NVQs and BTECs.

Culture

Located four miles outside of Lewes is Glyndebourne opera house. Founded in 1934, the venue draws large audiences for its Summer Festival and has attracted a host of international talent throughout its history. Lewes Operatic Society and New Sussex Opera are also based in the town of Lewes.
A number of other local classical music series operate in the town, including the Nicholas Yonge Society; and the baroque and early classical Workshop Series. The Musicians of All Saints is a Lewes-based chamber orchestra founded in 1987 who perform both new works and standard repertoire. A new annual music series, the Lewes Chamber Music Festival, was created in summer 2012. Other local music groups include the Lewes Concert Orchestra founded in 1993; and the Lewes, Glynde and Beddingham Brass Band, founded in 1922.
The East Sussex Bach choir is based in Lewes, as well as a number of other active amateur choirs, including Pro Musica Chamber Choir, the Everyman Ensemble, the Paddock Singers, Lewes Vox and East Sussex Community Choir.
The principal town museum is Barbican House Museum at Lewes Castle, which hosts the Lewes Town Model as well as four galleries of Sussex archaeology. Anne of Cleves House has various collections relating to the history of Lewes. There are several independent art galleries in the town including the Martyrs Gallery in the former Star Brewery in Market Street; St Anne's Gallery in the High Street and occasional art exhibitions mounted at the Town Hall. Other galleries are listed in Gallery Guide Lewes and Art Map Lewes.
Lewes Little Theatre was created in 1939 and is based in dedicated premises on Lancaster Street. It puts on half a dozen or more productions each year. Supporters of the creation of the Theatre include John Maynard Keynes.
A new independent three-screen cinema, the Lewes Depot, opened in May 2017 in a multimillion-pound redevelopment of a former Harvey's brewery depot close to Lewes station. The architects were Burrell Foley Fischer and the work was given a Friends of Lewes award, and highly commended in the South Downs National Park design awards. The Lewes Film Club, which also produces short movies, and Film at All Saints', show films based in the All Saints' Centre, a former church.
Local dance schools and clubs include Lewes Dance Club, East Sussex Dance and ballet groups. Starfish Youth Music is based at Priory School and the young bands who take part regularly perform in local venues such as the Paddock and the All Saints' Centre.
Popular music gigs take place at a number of venues and pubs across the town including the Lewes Con Club, the Snowdrop Inn, the Volunteer pub, the Lewes Arms, the John Harvey Tavern, the Pelham Arms, the Lamb and the Lansdown. The Elephant and Castle hosts the Saturday Folk Club. Union Music Store based in Lewes has become a centre for modern folk, country and Americana, both promoting and hosting live gigs, and recording and producing local musicians. A monthly comedy club based at the Con Club was created in 2010.
A regular local music festival, Lewes Live, takes place in the summer. The town of Lewes was also the UK location for the Mumford and Sons' Gentlemen of the Road tour stopover in 2013. A large jazz festival, Love Supreme Festival was founded in 2013 at nearby Glynde Place. Other local festivals include the Brainchild Festival, based just north of Lewes in the grounds of Bentley Wildfowl and Motor Museum
Annual arts events include ArtWave and the children's Patina Moving on Parade. An annual Lewes Guitar Festival which started in 1999 has not operated since the late 2000s. The annual Charleston Festival is hosted at nearby Charleston Farmhouse near the village of Firle some 6 miles east of Lewes.
An annual festival of light - Lewes Light - was created in 2015 during the UNESCO Year of Light and has run since then as an annual art installation and environmental awareness project.
The Reeves Studio, which is thought to be the oldest continuously operated photographic studio in the world, has been running from the same premises in Lewes since 1855.
Lewes has been influenced by its close proximity to the University of Sussex and Brighton University in terms of significant numbers of academics and students living in the town.
The Headstrong Club whose notable members include Thomas Paine was relaunched in 1987 and continues to operate. A branch of the popular Skeptics in the Pub movement was created in 2011 in Lewes, based at the Elephant and Castle.
The Lewes Literary Society was founded in Lewes in 1948 by authors Barbara Willard and Frances Howell, chaired by Leonard Woolf from 1954 to 1969, and currently by the poets John Agard and Grace Nichols, who live in the town. The Needlewriters is a co-operative of poets and writers which hosts a quarterly evening of poetry and prose at the Needlemakers Cafe, showcasing writers from across Sussex and Kent. The poetry imprint Frogmore Press, founded in Folkestone in 1983, moved to Lewes is 2010. Lewes Live Literature was founded 1995 as a promoter of art and literature events, with an autumn festival which ran 2001–2007 bringing together spoken word with performance, music, film and visual art. Since 2007, LLL has concentrated on live literature production work.
Lewes History Group was founded in 2009 and supports an active programme of talks, information and research into the history of the town and surrounding areas. The Lewes Speakers Festival was created in the mid-2010s and brings a range of national speakers to the town each year, on a range of political, literary and historical topics.
Lewes also has a strong tradition of distinctive local pub games, including Toad in the hole , Dwyle Flunking, and the World Pea Throwing Championships.

Lewes in literature

With a number of authors having lived in or near Lewes, it features, explicitly or disguised, in a number of books.
Possibly the earliest substantial reference in fiction is in The Wanderer: Or, Female Difficulties, an 1814 novel by Fanny Burney, in which the heroine spends time in Lewes and Brighton.
Eve Garnett lived in Lewes and her The Family from One End Street series of children's stories are set in 'Otwell-on-the-Ouse'. Matthew de Abaitua's dystopian novel If Then is set in a fictionalised Lewes. There are strong parallels with Lewes in the setting of Cliffe House which appears in a story called Bloody Baudelaire, by R.B. Russell.
The Collector by John Fowles is set near Lewes with the characters visiting the town, and the Roy Grace crime series by Peter James based in Brighton has scenes set in Sussex Police HQ based in Lewes. Graham Greene's first novel The Man Within has scenes set in Lewes at the Lewes assizes.
Three novels by William Nicholson – The Secret Intensity of Everyday Life, All the Hopeful Lovers and Golden Hour – are based in Lewes and surrounding villages. Three Round Towers and Retribution by Beverley Elphick are set in and around Lewes at the end of the 18th Century. Hope Cottage by Julian Fane is about a family who swap their flat in London for their friends' cottage in Lewes for twelve months.
Other writers to have set works of fiction in Lewes include Andrew Soutar, Judith Glover, and primatologist Alison Jolly who wrote a series of books for children.
The personal diaries of Lewes-based writer Alice Dudeney who wrote popular fiction in the first half of the 20th century were published in 1998 as A Lewes Diary: 1916–1944 describing her life in Lewes with Henry Dudeney before and during the interwar years.
Lewes also features in a range of works of other non-fiction, but notable examples would include To The River by Olivia Laing which follows her walk along the River Ouse and The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane features walks on the South Downs close to Lewes.
In 2015, American writer Joseph Cannizzo Jr. published a collection of poetry about Lewes entitled When in Lewes, following a brief stay in the town.

Media

The Sussex Express newspaper was established in 1837 in Lewes as the Sussex Agricultural Express and merged with the Sussex County Herald in 1938. Now headquartered in Horsham, it serves Lewes and much of East Sussex. It has four editions and includes extensive coverage of the local sports scene. It is part of the Johnston Press network of newspapers.
Viva Lewes was founded as a weekly web magazine in January 2006 and also as a monthly print handbook in October 2006 covering events and activities in and around the Lewes area.
In December 2018 a monthly lifestyle publication Town & County Magazine was launched, with coverage of local life, history, and culture, and celebrity interviews, across Lewes district as well as Alfriston & Ditchling.
Bright 106.4 FM radio station, based in Burgess Hill, broadcasts to an area which extends to Lewes.
Lewes has its own RSL radio station, Rocket FM, which broadcasts via FM and the Internet for three weeks in October/November each year, covering the Bonfire period.
In November 2012, EE launched a series of advertisements promoting its 4G mobile service. All of the adverts, which featured actor Kevin Bacon, were filmed in Lewes.

Sport

In 1694, accounts of Sir John Pelham record 2s 6d paid for a wager concerning a cricket match at Lewes, one of the sport's earliest references.
Lewes Priory Cricket Club is based at the Stanley Turner Ground, Kingston Road. The club were Sussex League champions in 1986 and 1990 and Division 2 winners in 1999, 2006 and 2008. The club has active senior, junior and social sections
Lewes Rugby Football Club, founded in 1930, runs several rugby teams at various competitive levels, including the senior men's sides, the women's, girls' and junior teams. Lewes RFC's home turf is the Stanley Turner Ground, Kingston Road.
Lewes Hockey Club, based at Southdown Sports Club on Cockshut Road, was founded in 1903 and is one of the oldest and largest hockey clubs in Sussex. It is home to 5 men's and 5 women's sides and a wide range of junior sides. Lewes Men won the National HA trophy in 2013 beating Guernsey 3–2 in the final and currently reside in South Premier League, the third tier of national hockey structure.
The local football team is Lewes FC The club was founded in 1885 and play at the Dripping Pan. In July 2017, the club became the first in the world to introduce equal pay to the men's and women's teams. The Lewes FC Women's team were appointed to the second tier of the Women's Super League in May 2018.
The town is also home to Lewes Bridge View which has adult teams competing in the Mid Sussex Football League and Lewes and District Sunday League. In 2016 Lewes Bridge View Juniors joined in partnership with Lewes FC to form Lewes FC Juniors – running Under 8s to Under 16s, with boys and girls teams.
Lewes Athletic Club caters for junior and senior athletes. The club trains at the all-weather 400m track at the end of Mountfield Road, and other locations in the area. Lewes Swimming Club was reconstituted in 1975 by Commonwealth gold medal-winning swimmer Christine Parfect and others. The club has 300+ members and organises swimming sessions at Lewes, Ringmer, Newlands School, Newhaven and Seaford Head pools during term-time. Lewes Wanderers Cycling Club was reconstituted in 1950. The club organises regular time trials throughout the summer.
Lewes Tennis/Hockey Club has 16 tennis courts, four squash courts, two netball courts and a floodlit astro/hockey pitch. Lewes Bowls Club situated behind the Mount on Mountfield Road was founded in 1922. It is affiliated to Bowls England and members play in the Meridian League and the Brighton League, as well as in informal games for pleasure. Between April and September members play on a flat lawn green with six rinks and inside the clubhouse on short mat for the winter season. Lewes Golf Club is set on downland above Cliffe Hill on the east-side of Lewes, where the sport has been played since 1896.
The Moyleman, an off-road marathon event over the hills around Lewes, starting and finishing in the town, was created in 2014 and first run in 2015.
Lewes Racecourse, located immediately to the west of the town on the slopes of the Downs, operated for 200 years until closed in 1964. It is still used as a training course, and there are several stables nearby. Race days are held at nearby Plumpton Race Course.
There are a number of Service Clubs in Lewes, including Lewes Lions Club which is a member of Lions Clubs International. The club runs various events including the Christmas Concert in December each year with the LGB Brass and the annual 'International 'Toad-in-the-Hole' Competition' and holds street collections to raise funds so as to assist people and organisations in and around Lewes. Since the 1960s, the Lewes Rotary Club has hosted its distinctive annual skittles tournament in the gardens of Southover Grange in June each year.

Notable people

Among the many notable former residents of Lewes is Thomas Paine, who was employed as an excise officer in the town for a time from 1768 to 1774 when he emigrated to the American colonies. The Paine association sits at the centre of a radical tradition that is represented today by writers working in the town.
The sciences and natural enquiry are represented by Gideon Mantell who is credited with the first discovery and identification of fossilised dinosaur teeth. Lewes doctor Richard Russell popularised the resort of Brighton.
Lewes is the birthplace of 16th-century madrigalist Nicholas Yonge. In the 1960s it was home to Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones, as it is now to other musicians, notably Herbie Flowers, Arthur Brown and Tim Rice-Oxley from Keane.
Daisy Ashford lived from 1889 to 1896 at Southdown House, 44 St Anne's Crescent, where she wrote The Young Visiters. Edward Perry Warren, an eccentric American collector, lived in Lewes House. In 1919 Virginia Woolf briefly owned – but never lived in – the Round House, a windmill in Pipe Passage, before moving to her final home, Monk's House in Rodmell. Diarist John Evelyn spent his boyhood at Southover Grange.

Crime

The fact that Lewes has a Crown Court, and a prison, is reflected by the fact that many notorious people have been connected with the town. During the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland several prominent figures involved in it were in Lewes Prison, including Éamon de Valera ; Thomas Ashe ; Frank Lawless ; and Harry Boland. Others have included George Witton involved in shooting prisoners during the Boer War.
Lewes assizes saw many important trials. In 1949 serial killer John George Haigh was sentenced to death. In 1956 suspected serial killer John Bodkin Adams had his committal hearing in Lewes before being sent to the Old Bailey, London for trial. He was subsequently tried and convicted in Lewes in 1957 for fraud, lying on cremation forms and obstructing a police search. An early case was that of Percy Lefroy Mapleton hanged for murder and the subject of the first composite picture on a wanted poster.
LocallyNationally
Robbery0.171.85
Theft of a motor vehicle1.674.04
Theft from a motor vehicle4.599.56
Sexual offences0.831.17
Violence against a person16.7519.97
Burglary2.995.67

Twin towns

Lewes is twinned with Waldshut-Tiengen, Germany, since 1974 and with Blois, France, since 1963, although informal links between these two towns began in 1947.

Etymology

It is generally held that the name Lewes comes from the plural form of the Anglo-Saxon "hlaew", which means "hill". This refers to the surrounding hills of the South Downs or ancient burial mounds within the area; but A Dictionary of British Place Names says that it derives "From the rare OE word lǣw 'wound, incision', here used in a topographical sense 'gap'."