Lichfield

Lichfield town (1991 pop. 25,408) and district, Staffordshire, W central England. Lichfield is a market town with light industries, famous for its three-spired cathedral and its close associations with Dr. Samuel Johnson , who was born there in 1709. The cathedral, dating from the 13th and 14th cent., replaced the original church built by St. Chad, who founded it in the 7th cent. It suffered considerable damage at the hands of the parliamentary forces during the English civil war and was not completely restored until the 19th cent. Johnson's house was turned into a museum that contains relics of his life and works, and a statue of him rests in the market square. Lichfield has a very old grammar school (founded 1497). In the 18th cent., a literary circle that included Erasmus Darwin, Thomas Day, and Anna Seward was known as the Lichfield group.

Lichfield. The seat of the Mercian diocese under St Chad, it was an archbishopric from 787 to 803. Despite the nominal removal of the see to Chester in 1075 and to Coventry (q.v.) in 1095, Lichfield remained a centre of episcopal administration in the diocese throughout the Middle Ages. The cathedral dates mainly from the 13th cent.

Lichfield, diocese of There were Celtic bishops from 656, but no formal see until c. 669, owing allegiance to Lindisfarne, not Canterbury. Theodore of Canterbury nominated Chad as first bishop (d. 672). Lichfield became briefly (788–803) an archiepiscopal see, while Offa, as bretwalda, was in conflict with Canterbury. The creation of the separate Chester diocese in 1541 reduced Lichfield's significance, and in 1836 Coventry came under theWorcester diocese, further reducing Lichfield's influence. The 12th–13th‐cent. cathedral of red sandstone with three spires was badly damaged in the Civil War, restored in the 1660s, and again in the 19th cent.