North West England

The Romans built a legionary fortress at Deva, today's Chester, and a fort at Mamucium, from which Manchester takes its name; Hadrian's Wall ended on the Solway coast in Cumbria. After Rome, Cumbria belonged for a time to Brittonic kingdoms before Anglian and then Norse settlers arrived, leaving Norse words such as fell, beck and tarn across the Lake District. Carlisle and the Cumbrian borders were fought over with Scotland for centuries, raided by the Border reivers until the 17th century.

Lancashire gave its name to the house of Lancaster in the Wars of the Roses, and in 1612 the Pendle witches were tried and hanged at Lancaster. The region's great change came with industry. The Bridgewater Canal opened in 1761 to carry coal into Manchester, which became "Cottonopolis", the world's first industrial city, surrounded by mill towns such as Oldham, Bolton and Blackburn. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway of 1830 was the first inter-city railway worked by steam locomotives. Liverpool grew into one of the world's great ports, enriched by the slave trade and later by emigrant ships and the Irish arrivals of the famine years.

The region was also a centre of radical politics, from the Peterloo Massacre of 1819 to the Co-operative movement founded in Rochdale in 1844 and the suffragettes of Emmeline Pankhurst. In the 20th century Manchester built the first stored- program computer in 1948, and the Blitz hit Liverpool hard in 1941. The decline of the docks and mills brought hard times from the 1960s, followed by regeneration after the 1996 IRA bombing in Manchester and Liverpool's year as European Capital of Culture in 2008.

Manchester and Liverpool have two of England's strongest urban identities, and a friendly rivalry between them. Liverpool's Scouse accent and wit reflect its Irish and Welsh heritage and its port history, and the city has a long-established Chinese community. Manchester is proud of its independence and its role as the capital of the North, with a lively gay village around Canal Street.

Music defines both cities. Liverpool gave the world the Beatles and the Merseybeat sound of the 1960s, while Manchester produced Joy Division, New Order, the Smiths, the Stone Roses and Oasis, and the Haçienda club was the heart of the "Madchester" years. Football is almost a religion: Manchester United and Manchester City, Liverpool and Everton are four of England's best-known clubs, and rugby league is strong in Wigan, St Helens and Warrington.

Cumbria has its own traditions: Cumberland and Westmorland wrestling, fell running and the Grasmere Sports each summer, and the gurning contest at Egremont's Crab Fair. The Lake District's poets, led by William Wordsworth, who was born in Cockermouth, and the children's writer Beatrix Potter shaped how the English see landscape. The old rivalry between Lancashire and Yorkshire lives on in cricket and banter.

About 7.5 million people live in North West England. Greater Manchester has about 2.9 million, with around 570,000 in the city of Manchester itself, and Liverpool has about 490,000. Preston, Blackpool, Bolton, Warrington and Stockport are large towns, Chester has about 90,000 people and Lancaster about 50,000, while Cumbria's largest place is Carlisle.

Manchester is the North's biggest business centre, with finance, media at MediaCityUK in Salford, universities and technology. Liverpool relies on its port, universities, health and tourism. Cheshire is among the wealthiest parts of the North, and the region still makes chemicals, cars and aircraft parts. Cumbria has nuclear work at Sellafield, submarine building at Barrow-in-Furness, hill farming and tourism.

Daily life in the cities is busy, with trams, buses and packed commuter trains, while the Lake District's towns fill with visitors in summer. Current issues include the gap between the booming city centres and poorer former mill towns, housing costs in the Lakes driven up by second homes, and the long wait for better rail links across the Pennines.

The North West has a strong tradition of hearty dishes. Lancashire hotpot is a slow-baked stew of lamb and onions topped with sliced potatoes, and Scouse, a meat and vegetable stew from the sailors' lobscouse, gave Liverpudlians their nickname. Bury is famous for black pudding, and Lancashire and Cheshire both make crumbly cheeses named after their counties. Morecambe Bay potted shrimps, small brown shrimps set in spiced butter, are a local delicacy.

Cumbria has the long, coiled Cumberland sausage, which has protected status, Herdwick lamb from the fell sheep, Kendal mint cake, a sugary peppermint bar carried by climbers, and Grasmere gingerbread, a chewy, spicy biscuit-cake sold in the village since the 19th century. Cartmel is known for its sticky toffee pudding.

Sweet baking includes Eccles cakes, flaky pastry rounds filled with currants, and the Manchester tart of jam, custard and coconut in a pastry case. Vimto, the fruit cordial, was invented in Manchester in 1908. Beer is brewed by old family firms such as Robinsons in Stockport and Thwaites in Lancashire, and Liverpool and Manchester have strong curry and Chinese food scenes.

The Lake District National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, holds Windermere, England's largest natural lake, with Bowness and Ambleside on its shores, and Scafell Pike, England's highest mountain. Grasmere has Wordsworth's Dove Cottage, Keswick sits on Derwentwater beneath Catbells, with Borrowdale and Buttermere beyond, and Wastwater lies below Great Gable. Ullswater has lake steamers, Coniston has Ruskin's house of Brantwood, and Beatrix Potter's Hill Top is in Near Sawrey. Castlerigg stone circle stands above Keswick.

Manchester offers the Science and Industry Museum, the John Rylands Library, Manchester Art Gallery, the Northern Quarter and Old Trafford, with the Lowry and IWM North at Salford Quays. Liverpool has the Royal Albert Dock, with the Merseyside Maritime Museum, the International Slavery Museum and the Beatles Story, the Three Graces on the Pier Head, the Cavern Club and two cathedrals, with Port Sunlight village across the Mersey.

Chester has its walls, the Rows, a Roman amphitheatre and its cathedral, with Chester Zoo nearby and the Jodrell Bank Observatory elsewhere in Cheshire. Blackpool has its Tower, piers, Pleasure Beach and Illuminations, and Lancaster its castle, priory and the Ashton Memorial, overlooking Morecambe Bay.