Salisbury also has a copy of the Magna Carta.
An ancient cathedral was north of the present city at Old Sarum. A new cathedral was built near the meeting of the rivers and a settlement grew up around it, which received a city charter in 1227 as New Sarum.
Preferring settlements in bottomland, such as nearby Wilton, the Saxons largely ignored Old Sarum until the Viking invasions led King Alfred (King of Wessex from 871 to 899) to restore its fortifications. Along with Wilton, however, it was abandoned by its residents to be sacked and burned by the Dano-Norwegian king Sweyn Forkbeard in 1003.
Sweyn Forkbeard was King of England for five weeks from December 1013 until his death. Based in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire, Sweyn began to organise his vast new kingdom, but he died there on 3 February 1014