The town's cloth trade was especially badly damaged, and the town's economy did not fully recover until the 20th century. The subsequent Siege of Reading by Parliamentary forces succeeded in April 1643. Despite its fortifications, it had a Royalist garrison imposed on it in 1642. Reading played an important role during the English Civil War. By 1611, it had a population of over 5000 and had grown rich on its trade in cloth, as instanced by the fortune made by local merchant John Kendrick. Д«y 1525, Reading was the largest town in Berkshire, and tax returns show that Reading was the 10th largest town in England when measured by taxable wealth. The last abbot, Hugh Faringdon, was subsequently tried and convicted of high treason and hanged, drawn and quartered in front of the Abbey Church. The Abbey was largely destroyed in 1538 during Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries. It is not known how badly Reading was affected by the Black Death that swept through England in the 14th century, but it is known that the abbot of Reading Abbey, Henry of Appleford, was one of its victims in 1361, and that nearby Henley lost 60% of its population. Reading was an important river crossing point: in 1312, King Edward II directed that its bridges should be kept in good order. As part of his endowments, he gave the abbey his lands in Reading, along with land at Cholsey. Reading Abbey was founded in 1121 by Henry I, who is buried within the Abbey grounds. The presence of six mills is recorded: four on land belonging to the king and two on the land given to Battle Abbey. In its 1086 Domesday Book listing, the town was explicitly described as a borough. ДЄfter the Battle of Hastings and the Norman conquest of England, William the Conqueror gave land in and around Reading to his foundation of Battle Abbey. The Danes remained in Reading until late in 871, when they retreated to their winter quarters in London. The battle is described in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and that account provides the earliest known written record of the existence of Reading. On 4 January 871, in the first Battle of Reading, King Ethelred and his brother Alfred the Great attempted unsuccessfully to breach the Danes' defences. In late 870, an army of Danes invaded the kingdom of Wessex and set up camp at Reading. The name probably comes from the Readingas, an Anglo-Saxon tribe whose name means Reada's People in Old English (the Anglo-Saxons often had the same name for a place and its inhabitants). However, the first clear evidence for Reading as a settlement dates from the 8th century, when the town came to be known as Readingas. Occupation at the site of Reading may date back to the Roman period, possibly in the form of a trading port for Calleva Atrebatum. View of Reading from Caversham by Joseph Farington in 1793 The 19th century saw the coming of the Great Western Railway and the development of the town's brewing, baking and seed growing businesses, and the town grew rapidly as a manufacturing centre. The 18th century saw the beginning of a major ironworks in the town and the growth of the brewing trade for which Reading was to become famous. The town was seriously affected by the English Civil War, with a major siege and loss of trade, but played a pivotal role in the Glorious Revolution, whose only significant military action was fought on its streets. By 1525, Reading was the largest town in Berkshire, and tenth in England for taxable wealth. It was an important trading and ecclesiastical centre in the Middle Ages, the site of Reading Abbey, one of the largest and richest monasteries of medieval England with strong royal connections, of which the 12th-century abbey gateway and significant ancient ruins remain. Among its sports teams are Reading Football Club and Reading Hockey Club, and over 15,000 runners annually compete in the Reading Half Marathon. Every year it hosts the Reading Festival, one of England's biggest music festivals. It is also a regional retail centre, serving a large area of the Thames Valley, and home to the University of Reading. Reading is a major commercial centre, especially for information technology and insurance. It is on the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, 40 miles (64В km) east of Swindon, 25 miles (40В km) south of Oxford, 40 miles (64В km) west of London, 15 miles (24В km) north of Basingstoke, 13 miles (21В km) southwest of Maidenhead and 15 miles (24В km) east of Newbury. Reading ( / Л€ r Й› d ЙЄ Е‹/ ( listen) RED-ing) is a historic large market town in Berkshire, England, in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the rivers Thames and Kennet.

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