Jewry Wall

The Jewry Wall stands in Leicester’s city centre beside St Nicholas’ Church. It is a tall ruin of Roman brick and stone built in the 2nd century AD. Two large arches pierce the centre of the wall, and smaller arches appear on the east side. The wall once formed part of a public building in the Roman town of Ratae Corieltauvorum. Excavations in the 1930s uncovered the remains of public baths immediately to the west. The wall is among Britain’s largest surviving pieces of Roman civil architecture. Kathleen Kenyon led the digs that revealed the baths foundations between 1936 and 1939. The site is now managed by English Heritage and is a scheduled monument. The adjacent Jewry Wall Museum displays Roman mosaics, painted plaster and local artefacts. The museum reopened in 2025 with new displays and immersive exhibits. Visitors walk past the great masonry to see the exposed bath foundations. The ruins sit next to the church, parts of which still contain reused Roman bricks. A modern museum building faces the wall, linking the Roman and medieval layers of the city. The site offers a clear view of Leicester’s layered past in one place.