Kirkgate
Old Kirkgate (the road to the church from the market place) from a painting by Jessie Dudley, Clifton, York 1872 - 1930
courtesy of Stanley Mackintosh
Kirkgate. A sketch taken from the sketchbook of J M W Turner 1797. The faint sketch lines have been enhanced and some digital colour added by Stanley Mackintosh. (There is often a free copy of this sketch from outside St Margaret's House.)
Kirkgate is one of the oldest streets in Ripon, linking the church to the town centre. It is narrow and now largely free of traffic but until recent years it catered for 2-way traffic.
Kirkgate in Turner's sketch appears much wider that it is today. This may be because Turner moved across the street to complete his sketch, drawing the left hand side from the right, and the right hand side from the left. This enabled him to more easily sketch the detail on the fronts of the buildings. In the past 200+ years many of the buildings have been refronted and there is some evidence that the new fronts were built further out into the street.
The cream washed house on the right is St Margaret's House, still there but sadly without its Tudor frontage. At the far end of the street is the gateway through the wall surrounding the Minster (now the cathedral). Wall and gateway are no longer there.
Many Ripon streets are called "gates". The word does not refer to an entrace to the town. It is from the old Norse and means a street or road.