Timeline of Reading, Berkshire

Reading ( (listen) RED-ing) is a town and borough in Berkshire, England. Located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the rivers Thames and Kennet. Reading is 40 miles (64 km) east of Swindon, 24 miles (39 km) south of Oxford, 40 miles (64 km) west of London and 16 miles (26 km) north of Basingstoke. Reading is a major commercial centre, especially for information technology and insurance. It is also a regional retail centre, serving a large area of the Thames Valley with its shopping centres, including the Oracle, the Broad Street Mall, and the pedestrianised area around Broad Street. It is home to the University of Reading. Every year it hosts the Reading Festival, one of England's biggest music festivals. Reading has a professional association football team, Reading F.C., and participates in many other sports. Reading dates from the 8th century. 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. By 1525, Reading was the largest town in Berkshire, and tenth in England for taxable wealth. 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. 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 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. Reading is also the county town of Berkshire.

Reading Minster, or the Minster Church of St Mary the Virgin, is the oldest ecclesiastical foundation in the town of Reading, Berkshire, England. Although eclipsed in importance by the later Reading Abbey, Reading Minster regained its status after the destruction of the Abbey and is now an Anglican parish church. The minster gives its name to the street of St Mary's Butts, on which it stands. The Minster Church of St Mary the Virgin should not be mistaken for the similarly named St Mary's Church, Castle Street, which is only a few yards away.

Reading Nunnery was a nunnery in Berkshire, England that existed during the Anglo-Saxon period.It was established in 979. The site is now occupied by St Mary's Church.

The Oracle was a workhouse that produced cloth in the English town of Reading, Berkshire. The Oracle shopping centre, which now occupies a small part of the site, takes its name from the Oracle workhouse.

The Oracle is a large indoor shopping and leisure mall on the banks of the River Kennet in Reading, Berkshire, England. Partly on the site of a 17th-century workhouse of the same name, it was developed and is owned by a joint venture of Hammerson and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.

Eurospeak Language School is an institution that specializes in English language training and cultural exchange. The school was founded in 1991 and is in Reading, United Kingdom. The founder of Eurospeak, Michael O'Brien, died in 2011. Eurospeak also has a "subsidiary" in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Each year, Eurospeak welcomes more than 1,349 students from over 71 nationalities. In May 2018, Eurospeak submitted a planning application to create new premises at Cumberland Place, Southampton. The planning application was approved, and Eurospeak Southampton opened in October 2018.

Broad Street Independent Chapel is a former nonconformist chapel dating from 1707. It is situated in Broad Street, now the principal shopping street of the English town of Reading. The building has been reused as a branch of the Waterstone's chain of bookshops. The building is a Grade II listed building.

Heelas (now branded as John Lewis & Partners) is a major department store in Reading in the English county of Berkshire. It was known as Heelas until 2001 and that name is still in common usage. The store fronts on to Reading's main pedestrianised shopping street, Broad Street, and backs onto Minster Street and The Oracle shopping centre. The store has belonged to the John Lewis Partnership since 1953.

Bridge Street, formerly known as Seven Bridges, is a historic street in the town of Reading in the English county of Berkshire. It took its original name from the seven bridges that carried it over various channels of the River Kennet, and was the earliest crossing place of that river in the town.Bridge Street connects Southampton Street, formerly known as St Giles' Street, to the south, with St Mary's Butts to the north.

St Mary's Butts is a thoroughfare in the English town of Reading, Berkshire. On its west side is the Broad Street Mall. It is connected to the north with Broad Street, the pedestrianised primary high street of Reading. St Mary's Church and Butts are where the town of Reading originally grew from.To the south, St Mary's Butts reaches a cross-roads, where it meets Gun Street (the western continuation of Minster Street) to the east, Castle Street to the west, and Bridge Street to the south.

See also Battle of Reading (871), Siege of Reading (1642–1643)The Battle of Reading took place on 9 December 1688 in Reading, Berkshire. It was one of only two substantial military actions in England during the Glorious Revolution (the other being at Wincanton), and was a decisive victory for forces loyal to William III of Orange. The victory was celebrated in Reading for many years.

St Mary's Church, Castle Street is an independent church within the Continuing Anglican movement. It is located in the town centre of Reading, in the English county of Berkshire, and is a few yards from the similarly named, but much older Minster Church of St Mary the Virgin. In 1798, there was a disagreement between the Bishop and the congregation of St Giles' Church in nearby Southampton Street. Many of the congregation left and founded a new chapel in Castle Street, on the site of Reading's old gaol. This chapel eventually became the Church of St Mary, Castle Street.The church is a Grade II* listed building. The original 1798 building was a simple Georgian building, but in 1840 the present hexastyle portico in Corinthian style was added by local architect and builder Henry Briant. The frontage is rendered in stucco while the capitals of the portico are probably formed of Coade stone.The church has one of Reading's best church interiors, with a late-18th-century gallery in 5 bays with marbled Doric ground floor and Ionic gallery columns. There is a modillion cornice to the coved central ceiling and a small projecting chancel with a bay for the mid-19th-century organ. The instrument, by Vowles of Bristol, is dated 1870, and was moved to St Mary's from Bristol in 1987. The church used to be lit by two mid-19th-century cast iron chandeliers.Today the church forms part of the Church of England (Continuing), a small group of four congregations outside the Church of England, self-identified on their website as "evangelical, reformed, Anglican".