The public institutions include the Yorkshire Philosophical Society, whose museum, in the Grecian style, was opened in 1830 and the free library in the building of the York Institute of Science and Art. The principal schools are St Peter’s cathedral grammar-school (originally endowed in 1557), Archbishop Holgate’s grammar-school, the York and diocesan grammar-school, and the bluecoat school for boys (founded in 1705), with the associated greycoat school for girls. There are numerous charities.
The chief industrial establishments are iron foundries, railway and motor engineering works, breweries, flour-mills, tanneries and manufactories of confectionery, artificial manure, &c. There is water communication by the Ouse with the Humber, and by the Foss Navigation to the N.E. This is under the control of the corporation. The parliamentary borough returns 2 members. The county borough was created in 1888. The municipal borough is under a lord mayor, 12 aldermen and 36 councillors. The city within the municipal limits constitutes a separate division of the county. The municipal city and the Ainsty (a district on the S.W. included in the city bounds in 1449) are for parliamentary purposes included in the N. Riding, for registration purposes in the E. Riding, and for all other purposes in the W. Riding. The parliamentary borough extends into the E. Riding. Area, 3730 acres.
History.—York is known to have been occupied by the Britons, and was chosen by the Romans as their most important centre in north Britain and named Eboracum or Eburacum. The fortress of Legio VI. Victrix was situated near the site of the cathedral, and a municipality (colonia) grew up, near where the railway station now is, on the opposite side of the Ouse. Many inscriptions and a great quantity of minor objects have been found. The emperor Hadrian visited York in A.D. 120, and, according to tradition, the body of the emperor Severus who died there in A.D. 211 was burnt on Severus Hill, near the city. After the death of Constantine Chlorus, which also took place in York, his son Constantine the Great, who, according to an ancient but incorrect tradition, was born there, was also inaugurated emperor there. A bishop of York is mentioned, along with, and with precedence of, bishops of London and Lincoln (the last name is uncertain) as present at the council of Arles in 314. Nothing is known of the history of the city from the time the Romans withdrew from Britain in 410 until 627, when King Edwin was baptized there, and where shortly afterwards Paulinus, the first archbishop, was consecrated. In the time of Archbishop Egbert (732–766) and of Alcuin, at first a scholar and afterwards master of the cloister school, York became one of the most celebrated places of education in Europe. It was also one of the chief Danish boroughs, and Earl Siward is said to have died there in 1055. In 1066 it was taken by Harold Hardrada, and in 1068 the men of the north of England, rising under Edgar Aetheling and Earl Waltheof, stormed the castles which William I. had raised, putting to death the whole of the Norman garrison. The Conqueror in revenge burnt the town and laid waste the country between the Humber and Tees. York was frequently visited by the kings of England on the way to Scotland, and several important parliaments were held there, the first being that of 1175, when Malcolm, king of Scotland, did homage to Henry II. In the reign of Richard I., the citizens rose against the Jews, who fled to the castle. Here, however, they were obliged to surrender, many killing themselves after putting to death their wives and children, the rest being massacred by the citizens. The council of the North was established in York in 1537 after the suppression of the Pilgrimage of Grace. In 1642 York was garrisoned by Royalists and besieged by the parliament. It was relieved by Prince Rupert, but surrendered after the battle of Marston Moor. Being under the rule of the earls of Northumbria, York is not mentioned in the Domesday Survey. In the first charter (which is undated) Henry II. granted the citizens a merchant gild and all the free customs which they had in the time of Henry I. Richard I. in 1194 granted exemption from toll, &c., throughout the kingdom, and King John in 1200 confirmed the preceding charters, and in 1212 granted the city to the citizens at a fee-farm of £160 a year. These charters were confirmed by most of the early kings. Richard II. conferred the title of lord mayor, and a second charter, given in 1392, shows that the government then consisted of a lord mayor and aldermen, while a third in 1396 made the city a county of itself and gave the burgesses power to elect two sheriffs. Edward IV. in 1464 incorporated the town under the title of “Lord Mayor and Aldermen,” and in 1473 directed that all the citizens should choose the mayor from among the aldermen. As this led to constant disputes, Henry VII. arranged that a common council, consisting of two men from each of the more important gilds and one from each of the less important ones, should elect the mayor. The city is now governed under a charter of Charles II., confirming that of 1464, the governing body consisting of a lord mayor, 12 aldermen and 36 councillors. The city has returned two members to parliament since 1295. During the 14th century there were constant quarrels between the citizens and the abbey of St Mary’s about the suburb of Bootham, which the citizens claimed as within the jurisdiction of the city, and the abbey as a separate borough. In 1353 the king took the borough of York into his own hands, “to avoid any risk of disturbance and possible great bloodshed such as has arisen before these times,” and finally in the same year an agreement was brought about by Archbishop Thoresby that the whole of Bootham should be considered a suburb of York except the street called St Marygate, which should be in the jurisdiction of the abbey.
From the time of the conquest York was important as a trading and commercial centre. There were numerous trade gilds, one of the chief being that of the weavers, which received a charter from Henry II. During the 17th and 18th centuries the trade declined, partly owing to the distance of the city from the sea, and partly owing to the regulations of the trade gilds.
See Francis Drake, Eboracum: or the History and Antiquities of the City of York, from its original to the present time (1736); Extracts from the Municipal Records of the City of York during the Reigns of Edward IV., Edward V. and Richard III. (1843); Victoria County History, Yorkshire; J. Raine, York (1893); A. P. Purey-Cust, York Minster (1897); Heraldry of York Minster (Leeds, 1890); B. S. Rowntree, Poverty: a Study of Town Life (1901).
YORK, a township of York county, Maine, U.S.A., on the Atlantic coast about 45 m. S.W. of Portland, and 9 m. by rail N.E. of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Pop. (1910) 2802. Area, 64 sq. m. York is at the terminus of the York Harbor and Beach division of the Boston & Maine railway. In York village is the county gaol (1653–54), preserved by the Old York Historical and Improvement Society as a museum of local antiquities. Two colonial taverns also remain. York Harbor, York Beach, York Cliffs and Long Beach are attractive summer villages. The first settlement was made about 1624. In April 1641 Sir Ferdinando Gorges, proprietor of the province of Maine, erected this into the Borough of Agamenticus, and on the 1st of March 1642 he chartered it as a city under the name of Gorgeana. In 1652, when Massachusetts extended her jurisdiction over Maine, the city of Gorgeana became the town of York. In 1692 most of the houses were burned by the Indians and the inhabitants killed or taken captive. York was the shire town of Yorkshire from 1716 to 1735, the shire town with Portland (then Falmouth) of the district of Maine from 1735 to 1760, and a county-seat of York county from 1760 to 1832. During the middle of the 18th century York had considerable trade with the West Indies and along the coast, and as late as the middle of the 19th century it had important fishing interests. Its development as a summer resort was begun about 1873, but until 1887, when the railway reached it, its chief means of access was by stage from Portsmouth.
See J. P. Baxter, Agamenticus, Bristol, Gorgeana, York (Portland, 1904); G. A. Emery, Ancient City of Gorgeana and Modern Town of York (Boston, 1873); and Pauline C. Bouve, “Old York; a Forgotten Seaport,” in the New England Magazine (July 1902).
YORK, a city and the county-seat of York county, Nebraska, U.S.A., about 46 m. W. by N. of Lincoln. Pop. (1900) 5132, (1910) 6235. It is served by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy and Chicago & North-Western railways. It is the seat of the School of the Holy Family and of York College (founded in 1890,
