[6] Mesolithic flints have been found, with signs of later prehistoric settlement and a "nationally important" walled Roman town.

The Roman name of the settlement has been lost, but there is evidence of buildings, a cemetery, occupation outside the town walls and a causeway across the Nene floodplain.

[5] In 2004, Northamptonshire County Council received a grant of £1.2 million from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (now the Department for Communities and Local Government) and purchased Chester Farm, including the walled Roman town and the deserted medieval village of Chester on the Water.

The aims in developing the park are to make Chester Farm accessible to the public and provide opportunities for education, leisure and recreation.

[12] In 2013, the Chester Farm site owned by Northamptonshire County Council received £4 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund to open to the public.

When the farmhouse on the site was badly damaged by the fire, the council received a £1.9 million insurance pay-out for repairs.

[13][14] The 12th-century English historian Henry of Huntingdon mentions a Roman "town on the river (Nene), in Huntingdonshire, which is entirely destroyed" as one of his interpretations of the 28 cities of Britain.

[21] At the 2001 census, the population of Irchester parish was 4,807 in 2,020 households: 2,397 male and 2,410 female, with a mean age of 41 years.

[23] In 1851, the parish population was 960 and in 1861, 1,168; writing in 1872, John Marius Wilson ascribed the increase to "the opening of the railway and... discovery of iron stone.

Places served by East Midlands Railway include London, Luton, Bedford, Nottingham, Derby and Sheffield.

The main bus service is Stagecoach Group's X46, which connects with Wellingborough, Rushden, Northampton, Earls Barton, Higham Ferrers and Raunds.

Of the two village pubs, the Red Lion closed a few years ago, leaving only the Carpenters Arms.

The village has a large country park managed by Northamptonshire County Council,[38] created after local open-cast ironstone quarries were allowed to revert to the wild, having been worked out some decades after the war.

The removal of the ironstone and some limestone that overlaid it has lowered the land around the working face by several metres, though this is not apparent except near the vehicle entrance.

The park has an unusual ridge-and-furrow topography with several metres' relief, marking the movement patterns of the machines that stripped the overburden to expose the ironstone.

Irchester Narrow Gauge Railway Museum in the country park shows working steam and diesel locomotives among more than 40 items of rolling stock.

[39] Since November 2019, Irchester Country Park has hosted a free, weekly parkrun timed 5-km run/walk, every Saturday morning at 9 a.m.[40] In order of birth: