THE young snouted-lizard, or rhyncosaurus, as he is known to swots, began slurping through the cloying ooze of Wirral many millions of years ago.

In those steaming days, his surprisingly agile thoughts were devoted to the consumption of healthy quantities of greens, rather than the fleeting concerns of today, such as the political composition of the council.

Even so, he was, by the standards of the time, a demure fellow with a gentle nature, keen to make friends with anyone of a like mind.

However, between blinks, his eyes were alert to the advance of the vulgar newcomer, chirotherium, whose sole ambition was to devour our lizard in one sitting.

The rhyncosaurus, though peace-loving, was a metre high, two metres long and quite bulky. More importantly, he had been fitted with a long, hooked beak for unearthing roots. Sadly, it was not sufficient to protect him from chirotherium, who clumped about in a menacing manner, leaving footprints in the mud.

Now, perhaps, the more canny sociologist is beginning to note an enduring pattern emerging from the primeval slime. As Wirral had become home to creatures of different habits, needs and temperament, so it would be with the people. On a trip around the peninsula, you will spot extraordinarily sharp social contrasts between the rich and poor, the ambitious and those resigned to their fate.

These gulfs, within a few miles of each other, are as wide as any in the UK. Politicians and economists have said that this makes Wirral the mirror of a country, where social equality has never been more than a dream.

Here, you will find the affluent striding the golf links in fashionable pullovers, or settling with a gin and tonic (ah, the chink of ice cubes in a smiling G&T) on the Gatsby-like lawns, jutting out like freshly watered carpets, amid the vivid orange of the gorse bushes on the heathlands around the west coast communities of Hoylake, Caldy, West Kirby, Meols, Heswall and Gayton.

Down in the squat houses, the high-rise flats, with their clanking lifts, or on the out-of-town estates, people are accustomed to knocks. The heavy industries, which once sustained them and provided the hope of better things to come, are mostly gone, leaving young men and women in baggy trousers, pushing prams or trolleys or slumped in front of daytime TV.

In broad geographic terms, the east of the peninsula, Birkenhead, Rock Ferry and Wallasey, has the poverty and social problems, which arise from them. But even then the picture is complicated by the affluent parts of Oxton, Noctorum and New Brighton bordering the poor districts. On the other side of Wirral, generally associated with affluence, there are pockets, where people wish they had a share in the prosperity around them.

In his History of Wirral (2002), Stephen Roberts, the academic and Wirralian, wrote of the social divisions in New Brighton, which had been laid out in 1841 on 170 acres of sandhills as “the seabathing rendezvous par excellence of the Lancashire people of note”.

Before long, however, the idyll of the “noted” was broken on its north-eastern perimeter by ruffians and squatters, who built driftwood shacks and provided donkey rides and rude beach entertainment. “Things were not going according to plan,” wrote Roberts. “The working-class was colonising a district intended for the exclusive use of members of the bourgeoisie and industrial aristocracy.”

Matter were to grow even worse. In the 1870s, a syndicate developed the Ham and Egg Parade. The hoi-polloi had found a kind of haven for their rollicking and frolicking, drinking and dicing. “Ooh, look at what the butler saw!”

Well, sentiments of this sort are still heard today, as people from Wirral, in their various social classes with many sub-divisions, discuss each other.

Again, Wirral reflects Britain as a whole. The peninsula was dotted with settlements. Celts, Roman, Saxons, Vikings and Normans all roamed it, bestowing their places names, artefacts, jewels, weapons, burial places, houses and churches to the later generations. Villages ending in “by” (Irby, Pensby etc) were often named by the Vikings, to whom Wirral was a cherished new land, with Thingwall as its political and administrative centre.

Meols, sheltered by sandbanks, was the main port and in more recent times it has become a haunt for archaeologists. Among their numerous finds were three Carthaginian coins (drachmae), dating from 220-210 BC - during the time when Hannibal, the greatest of all Carthaginians, was waging his epic war against Rome.

Evidence of Norman architecture can be found all over Wirral and that takes us to the Benedictine monks, who started the ferry across the Mersey from Birkenhead Priory, the oldest standing building on Merseyside.

It was founded in 1150 by Hamo de Massey (the spelling of his name would change over the years). Hamo was the third baron of Dunham Massey, in the Bucklow Hundred. The first baron, “Hamon de Masci”, had accompanied William the Conqueror on his invasion of England in 1066. In addition to ferrying merchants to Liverpool and providing hospitality for wayfarers, the prior and his 16 monks followed the strict rules of life as dictated by St Benedict in the 6th century – with eight daily services, as well as estate work, farming, fishing and gardening.

In June, 1536, the priory was closed by Henry VIII, as part of the Suppression Act (Dissol- ution of the Monasteries), which had recorded that “manifest sin, vicious, carnal and abominable living is daily used and committed amongst the little and small abbeys”.

In Birkenhead? Surely not!

Beyond the windows of the priory, you can see the cranes on the site of the famous Cammell Laird yard, builders of great ships, including the Alabama (Confederate blockade runner in the American Civil War), the Mauretania, the Rodney, the Prince of Wales and two Ark Royal aircraft carriers.

The surrounding docks and the shipyard, started by the Scot William Laird in 1824, gave birth to modern Birkenhead.

But the man, now clasping a horn as he strolls the polished floors of the Williamson Art Gallery and Museum on the town’s Slatey Road, is thinking of a much earlier time.

“This is the Wirral Horn,” he says. “It was the badge of office of the Forester of Wirral. It was presented to Alan Sylvester, the first Forester, in the 1120s.

“It has been passed down through something like 26 generations, including the Stanleys. It now belongs to Vivian Baring (of the banking family), who was kind enough to lend it to us for an exhibition last year. I am about to return it.”

The man speaking about this fine artefact is Colin Simpson, the principal museums’ officer for Wirral. To this quietly spoken 52-year-old falls the immense task of presenting and preserving the art and history of Wirral, its people and places.

Colin lives in Wallasey with his wife, Sue, and children, Hannah, 15, and Joshua, 17.

“The horn has a silver plate which was added in the Victorian years,” he adds. “The forest covered the whole of Wirral. It doesn’t mean that it was all trees, but the law designated it as a hunting area. Nothing could disturb the breeding or grazing of deer. Wild boar, hares and game birds were also protected. It was forbidden to enclose or cultivate land within the forest’s boundaries – to fell trees or cut peat, to dig ditches or build hedges. Hounds or other dogs owned by residents had to have their front claws removed.”

These measures were kept by the forester and his six assistants. In practice this was the Normans imposing their will on the Saxons – the Robin Hood story transferred from Sherwood Forest to Wirral.

The laws were lifted in 1376 by Edward, the Black Prince (of Wales) and Earl of Chester.

Throughout this time, Meols, with its sheltered harbour, was the main port in the north west of England, particularly for crossing to Ireland. Its role diminished in medieval times, possibly because it was deluged in a storm.

People and places come and go, but history flows on.

Colin phones Ray Davies, museum, assistant down at Birkenhead Priory. Phones! Those old monks would have relied on prayer for their more distant communications. But they did believe in miracles.

And when the sun rises over their priory, you understand why.