Eccles, Greater Manchester

Eccles (/ˈɛkəlz/) is a market town in the City of Salford in Greater Manchester, England, 3 miles (4.8 km) west of Salford and 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Manchester, split by the M602 motorway and bordered by the Manchester Ship Canal to the south. The town is famous for the Eccles cake.

Eccles grew around the 13th-century Parish Church of St Mary. Evidence of pre-historic human settlement has been discovered locally, but the area was predominantly agricultural until the Industrial Revolution, when a textile industry was established in the town. The arrival of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway led to the town's expansion along the route of the track linking those two cities.