Medieval Bristol: A Self-Guided Audio Tour

Bristol's medieval streets carry more than a thousand years of drama, ambition, and spectacle. On this self-guided audio tour, you'll trace the city's most gripping stories through plague, rebellion, public punishment, and royal ceremony – uncovering how power and criminality shaped one of England's great medieval cities. The tour starts at St John on the Wall, a 14th-century church built atop the last surviving fragment of Bristol's medieval wall, complete with a portcullis groove still visible overhead. From here, you'll walk through the arch where Elizabeth I processed on horseback and Queen Victoria knighted a mayor without stepping from her carriage.

The tour ends at the crossroads of High Street and Wine Street, where the High Cross once soared 50 feet high as Bristol's stage for coronations, executions, and naked parades of shamed lovers.