The changing face of Colchester Market

It was almost full circle for the weekly event, which first saw bargains exchanging hands in Roman times when the High Street was the town's central street.

Around 900 years later, Saxon Colchester arose from a market opposite the present town hall.

POLL: Is Colchester Market in the right place?

In Norman Colchester, a Royal charter confirmed the town’s right to hold a market – the legal basis for the market now.

Medieval ‘shops’ were more like stalls, open to the air. 'Shop’ is short for workshop, where craftsmen sold on the street goods they made in their room behind.

Nostalgia - Colchester Market in Market in May 1981

The cattle market, too noisy and smelly for the high street, moved to Middleborough where it remained until 1976 but market stalls stayed in the High Street until the 1960s when a boom in the ownership of cars pushed a move to Culver Street car park.

Selling - stallholder Dennis Eves pictured on his fruit and veg stall in 1982

The introduction of the one-way system and plan to create further shopping at Culver Street saw it moved again to outside the old public library.

Fruit - the market seen here in 1993 before it left the high Street for a while

In 1981 it moved back to the High Street, amid doubts about the stalls and the effect on shops which.

As we were - Colchester Market in May 1981 

In 1989 it decamped again to Vineyard Street.

Bustling - the market in full flow in the 1960s

A move back to the High Street was short-lived in 1993 before emerging in the pedestrianised Culver Square West.

It was moved back to High Street by Lib Dem Anne Turrell in April 2015.

These images show it in the High Street and in the 1960s in Culver Street.

Vintage - an early picture of the market when cars were just arriving

Bargains - Colchester Market pictured in the mid-1950s

Stall - a marketholder sells paintings in the High Street