Southwark is a district of Central London and is the north-west of the London Borough of Southwark. Centred 1 1⁄2 miles (2.4 km) east of Charing Cross, it fronts the River Thames and the City of London to the north. It was at the lowest bridging point of the Thames in Roman Britain, providing a crossing from Londinium, and for centuries had the only Thames bridge in the area, until a bridge was built upstream more than 10 miles (16 km) to the west. It was a 1295-enfranchised borough in the county of Surrey, apparently created a burh in 886, containing various parishes by the high medieval period, lightly succumbing to City attempts to constrain its free trade and entertainment. Its entertainment district, in its heyday at the time of Shakespare's Globe Theatre has revived in the form of the Southbank which overspills imperceptibly into the ancient boundaries of Lambeth and commences at the post-1997 reinvention of the original theatre, Shakespeare's Globe, incorporating other smaller theatre spaces, an exhibition about Shakespeare's life and work and which neighbours Vinopolis and the London Dungeon.