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Westminster Abbey

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Architecture

   The Abbey's western façade
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   The Abbey's western façade

   The Collegiate Church of St Peter, Westminster, which is almost always
   referred to as Westminster Abbey, is a mainly Gothic church, on the
   scale of a cathedral (and indeed often considered one), in Westminster,
   London, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the
   traditional place of coronation and burial site for English monarchs.

History

   According to tradition a shrine was first founded in 616 on the present
   site, then known as Thorn Ey (Thorn Island); its tradition of
   miraculous consecration after a fisherman on the River Thames saw a
   vision of Saint Peter justified the presents of salmon from the Thames
   fishermen that the Abbey received. In the 960s or early 970s Saint
   Dunstan, assisted by King Edgar planted a community of Benedictine
   monks here. The stone Abbey was built around 1045– 1050 by King Edward
   the Confessor, who had selected the site for his burial: it was
   consecrated on December 28, 1065, immediately before the Confessor's
   funeral. It was the site of the last Saxon coronation of his successor
   King Harold.
   A plan dated 1894.
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   A plan dated 1894.

   The only extant depiction of the original Abbey, in the Romanesque
   style that is called "Norman" in England, together with the adjacent
   Palace of Westminster, is in the Bayeux Tapestry. Increased endowments
   supported a community increased from Dunstan's dozen to about eighty
   monks (Harvey 1993 p 2).

   The Abbot and learned monks, in close proximity to the royal Palace of
   Westminster, the seat of government from the later twelfth century,
   became a powerful force in the centuries after the Norman Conquest: the
   Abbot was often employed on royal service and in due course took his
   place in the House of Lords as of right. Released from the burdens of
   spiritual leadership, which passed to the reformed Cluniac movement
   after the mid-tenth century, and occupied with the administration of
   great landed properties, some of which lay far from Westminster, "the
   Benedictines achieved a remarkable degree of identification with the
   secular life of their times, and particularly with upper-class life",
   Barbara Harvey concluded, to the extent that her depiction of daily
   life (Harvey 1993) provides a wider view of the concerns of the English
   gentry in the High and Late Middle Ages. The proximity of the Palace of
   Westminster did not extend to providing monks or abbots with high royal
   connections; in social origin the Benedictines of Westminster were as
   modest as most of the order. The abbot remained lord of the manor of
   Westminster as a town of two to three thousand persons grew around it:
   as a consumer and employer on a grand scale the monastery helped fuel
   the town economy, and relations with the town remained unusually
   cordial, but no enfranchising charter was issued during the Middle Ages
   (Harvey 1993 p 6f). The abbey built shops and dwellings on the west
   side, encroaching upon the sanctuary.

   The Abbey became the coronation site of Norman kings, but none were
   buried there until Henry III, intensely devoted to the cult of the
   Confessor, rebuilt the Abbey in Anglo-French Gothic style as a shrine
   to honour Edward the Confessor and as a suitably regal setting for
   Henry's own tomb, under the highest Gothic nave in England. The
   Confessor's shrine subsequently played a great part in his
   canonisation. The work continued between 1245- 1517 and was largely
   finished by the architect Henry Yevele in the reign of King Richard II.
   Henry VII added a Perpendicular style chapel dedicated to the Virgin
   Mary in 1503 (known as the Henry VII Chapel). Much of the stone came
   from Caen, in France ( Caen stone), the Isle of Portland ( Portland
   stone) and the Loire Valley region of France ( tuffeau limestone).
   The choir in 1848.
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   The choir in 1848.

   In 1535, the Abbey's annual income of £2400-2800 during the assessment
   attendant on the Dissolution of the Monasteries rendered it second in
   wealth only to Glastonbury Abbey. Henry VIII had assumed direct royal
   control in 1539 and granted the Abbey cathedral status by charter in
   1540, simultaneously issuing letters patent establishing the diocese of
   Westminster. By granting the Abbey cathedral status Henry VIII gained
   an excuse to spare it from the destruction or dissolution which he
   inflicted on most English abbeys during this period. Westminster was a
   cathedral only until 1550. The expression "robbing Peter to pay Paul"
   may arise from this period when money meant for the Abbey, which was
   dedicated to St Peter, was diverted to the treasury of St Paul's
   Cathedral.

   The Abbey was restored to the Benedictines under the Catholic Queen
   Mary, but they were again ejected under Queen Elizabeth I in 1559. In
   1579, Elizabeth re-established Westminster as a " Royal Peculiar" — a
   church responsible directly to the sovereign, rather than to a diocesan
   bishop — and made it the Collegiate Church of St Peter, (that is a
   church with an attached chapter of canons, headed by a dean). The last
   Abbot was made the first Dean. It suffered damage during the turbulent
   1640s, when it was attacked by Puritan iconoclasts, but was again
   protected by its close ties to the state during the Commonwealth
   period. Oliver Cromwell was given an elaborate funeral there in 1658,
   only to be disinterred in January 1661 and posthumously hanged from a
   nearby gibbet.

   The abbey's two western towers were built between 1722 and 1745 by
   Nicholas Hawksmoor, constructed from Portland stone to an early example
   of a Gothic Revival design. Further rebuilding and restoration occurred
   in the 19th century under Sir George Gilbert Scott.

   Until the 19th century, Westminster was the third seat of learning in
   England, after Oxford and Cambridge. It was here that the first third
   of the King James Bible Old Testament and the last half of the New
   Testament were translated. The New English Bible was also put together
   here in the 20th century.

Coronations

   King Edward's Chair
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   King Edward's Chair

   Since the coronations in 1066 of both King Harold and William the
   Conqueror, all English and British monarchs (except Lady Jane Grey -
   although it is highly debatable whether she was, either in theory or
   practice, the Queen of England - Edward V and Edward VIII, who did not
   have coronations) have been crowned in the Abbey. The Archbishop of
   Canterbury is the traditional cleric in the coronation ceremony. St
   Edward's Chair, the throne on which British sovereigns are seated at
   the moment of coronation, is housed within the Abbey; from 1296 to 1996
   the chair also housed the Stone of Scone upon which the kings of
   Scotland are crowned, but pending another coronation the Stone is now
   kept in Scotland.

   According to H.V. Morton's In Search of London, a ghostly monk is said
   to appear in the Abbey on the eve of a monarch's coronation. The book
   states that the monk was last seen prior to the coronation of George VI
   in 1937. (The book was published in 1951; it is unknown if the monk was
   seen prior to Queen Elizabeth II's coronation in 1953.)

Burials and Memorials

   The Abbey at night, from Dean's Yard. Artificial light reveals the
   exoskeleton formed by flying buttresses
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   The Abbey at night, from Dean's Yard. Artificial light reveals the
   exoskeleton formed by flying buttresses

   Henry III rebuilt the Abbey in honour of the Royal Saint Edward the
   Confessor whose relics were placed in a shrine in the sanctuary. Henry
   III was interred nearby in a superb chest tomb with effigial monument,
   as were many of the Plantagenet kings of England, their wives and other
   relatives. Subsequently, most Kings and Queens of England were buried
   here, although Henry VIII and Charles I are buried at St George's
   Chapel, Windsor Castle, as are all monarchs and royals after George II.

   In 2005 the original ancient burial tomb of Edward the Confessor was
   discovered, beneath the 1268 Cosmati mosaic pavement, in front of the
   High Altar. A series of royal tombs dating back to the 13th and 14th
   centuries was also discovered using ground-penetrating radar.

   Aristocrats were buried in side chapels and monks and people associated
   with the Abbey were buried in the Cloisters and other areas. One of
   these was Geoffrey Chaucer, who was buried here as he had apartments in
   the Abbey where he was employed as master of the Kings Works. Other
   poets were buried around Chaucer in what became known as Poets' Corner.
   Abbey musicians such as Henry Purcell were also buried in their place
   of work. Subsequently it became an honour to be buried or memorialised
   here. The practice spread from aristocrats and poets to generals,
   admirals, politicians, scientists, doctors, etc., etc. These include:

Buried

   Westminster Abbey with a procession of Knights of the Bath, by
   Canaletto, 1749
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   Westminster Abbey with a procession of Knights of the Bath, by
   Canaletto, 1749

Nave

     * Clement Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee
     * Angela Georgina Burdett-Coutts
     * Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald
     * Charles Darwin
     * Saint Edward the Confessor
     * George Graham
     * Ben Jonson
     * David Livingstone
     * James Clerk Maxwell
     * Sir Isaac Newton
     * Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford
     * Robert Stephenson
     * Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox
     * J.J. Thomson
     * William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin
     * Thomas Tompion
     * The Unknown Warrior
     * George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham
     * Charles Lyell

North Transept

     * William Ewart Gladstone
     * William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham
     * William Pitt the Younger

South Transept

   The North entrance of Westminster Abbey
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   The North entrance of Westminster Abbey

   Poets' Corner
     * Robert Adam
     * Robert Browning
     * William Camden
     * Thomas Campbell
     * Geoffrey Chaucer
     * William Congreve
     * Abraham Cowley
     * William Davenant
     * Charles Dickens
     * John Dryden
     * Adam Fox
     * David Garrick
     * John Gay
     * George Frederick Handel
     * Thomas Hardy
     * Dr Samuel Johnson
     * Rudyard Kipling
     * Thomas Macaulay
     * John Masefield
     * Laurence Olivier, Baron Olivier
     * Thomas Parr
     * Dante Rossetti
     * Richard Brinsley Sheridan
     * Edmund Spenser
     * Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson

Cloisters

     * Aphra Behn
     * Percy Dearmer
     * General John Burgoyne

North Choir Aisle

     * Henry Purcell
     * Ralph Vaughan Williams

Chapel of St Paul

     * Sir Rowland Hill

Commemorated

   Christian martyrs from across the world are depicted in statues above
   the Great West Door
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   Christian martyrs from across the world are depicted in statues above
   the Great West Door
     * William Shakespeare, buried at Stratford-upon-Avon
     * Sir Winston Churchill, buried at Bladon, Oxfordshire
     * Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, buried at Hughenden
       Manor, Buckinghamshire
     * Adam Lindsay Gordon, buried in Australia
     * Lord Baden-Powell, buried in Nyeri, Kenya
     * Paul Dirac, buried in Florida
     * Oscar Wilde (in a stained glass window unveiled in 1995), buried in
       Paris
     * Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, buried at Cambridge, Massachusetts
     * General James Wolfe
     * Ten 20th-century Christian martyrs from across the world are
       depicted in statues above the Great West Door. Unveiled in 1998 by
       Her Majesty The Queen, these are, from left to right:
          + St. Maximilian Kolbe
          + Manche Masemola
          + Janani Luwum
          + Grand Duchess Elizabeth of Russia
          + Martin Luther King, Jr.
          + Óscar Romero
          + Dietrich Bonhoeffer
          + Esther John
          + Lucian Tapiedi
          + Wang Zhiming

Removed

   The following were buried in the abbey but later removed on the orders
   of Charles II:
     * Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector
     * Admiral Robert Blake
     * John Pym

Schools

   Westminster School and Westminster Abbey Choir School are also in the
   precincts of the Abbey. It was natural for the learned and literate
   monks to be entrusted with education, and Benedictine monks were
   required by the Pope to maintain a charity school in 1179; Westminster
   School may have been founded even earlier for children or novices, and
   the legendary Croyland Chronicle relates a story of 11th century king
   Edward the Confessor's Queen Editha chatting to a schoolboy in the
   cloisters, and sending him off to the Palace larder for a treat.

Transport

     * Nearest London Underground stations:
          + St. James's Park (District, Circle lines)
          + Westminster (Jubilee, District, Circle lines)

Chapter

   The Abbey is a collegiate church organised into the College of St
   Peter, which comprises the Dean and four residentiary Canons (one of
   whom is also Rector of St Margaret's Church, Westminster, and Speaker's
   Chaplain), and seventeen other persons who are members ex officio, as
   well as twelve lay vicars and ten choristers. The seventeen are the
   Receiver-General and Chapter Clerk, the Registrar, the Auditor, the
   Legal Secretary and the Clerk of the Works (the administrative
   officers). Those more directly concerned with liturgical and ceremonial
   operations include the Precentor, the Chaplain and Sacrist, the
   Organist, and the (honorary) High Steward and High Bailiff. The Abbey
   and its property is in the care of the Librarian, the Keeper of the
   Muniments, and the Surveyor of the Fabric. Lastly, the educational role
   of the Abbey is reflected in the presence of the Headmaster of the
   Choir School, the Headmaster and Under Master of Westminster School,
   and the Master of The Queen's Scholars.

   The Abbey is governed by the Dean and Chapter established under the
   Elizabethan statute of 1560. This consists of the Dean and the four
   residentiary Canons.

List of Abbots, Deans, and the Bishop of Westminster

   Westminster Abbey, as seen from the west
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   Westminster Abbey, as seen from the west
   Westminster Abbey's West Door in sunshine
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   Westminster Abbey's West Door in sunshine
                          Abbots
   Edwin                                1049 — c. 1071
   Geoffrey of Jumièges                 c. 1071 — c. 1075
   Vitalis of Bernay                    c. 1076 — 1085
   Gilbert Crispin                      1085 — 1117
   Herbert                              1121 — c. 1136
   Gervase de Blois                     1138 — c. 1157
   Laurence of Durham                   c. 1158 — 1173
   Walter of Winchester                 1175 — 1190
   William Postard                      1191 — 1200
   Ralph de Arundel (alias Papillon)    1200 — 1214
   William de Humez                     1214 — 1222
   Richard de Berkying                  1222 — 1246
   Richard de Crokesley                 1246 — 1258
   Phillip de Lewisham                  1258
   Richard de Ware                      1258 — 1283
   Walter de Wenlok                     1283 — 1307
   Richard de Kedyngton (alias Sudbury) 1308 — 1315
   William de Curtlyngton               1315 — 1333
   Thomas de Henley                     1333 — 1344
   Simon de Bircheston                  1344 — 1349
   Simon de Langham                     1349 — 1362
   Nicholas de Litlyngton               1362 — 1386
   William de Colchester                1386 — 1420
   Edmund Kyrton                        1440 — 1462
   George Norwich                       1463 — 1469
   Thomas Millyng                       1469 — 1474
   John Esteney                         1474 — 1498
   George Fascet                        1498 — 1500
   John Islip                           1500 — 1532
   William Boston                       1533 — 1540
                          Bishop
   intra- Reformation
   Thomas Thirlby                       1540 — 1550
                           Deans
   intra- Reformation
   William Benson (Abbot Boston)        1540 — 1549
   Richard Cox                          1549 — 1553
   Hugh Weston                          1553 — 1556
                           Abbot
   restored by Mary I of England
   John Feckenham                       1556 — 1559
                           Deans
   post- Reformation
   William Bill                         1560 — 1561
   Gabriel Goodman                      1561 — 1601
   Lancelot Andrewes                    1601 — 1605
   Richard Neile                        1605 — 1610
   George Montaigne                     1610 — 1617
   Robert Tounson                       1617 — 1620
   Ben Williams                         1620 — 1644
   Richard Steward (never installed)    1644 — 1651
   John Earle                           1660 — 1662
   John Dolben                          1662 — 1683
   Thomas Sprat                         1683 — 1713
   Francis Atterbury                    1713 — 1723
   Samuel Bradford                      1723 — 1731
   Joseph Wilcocks                      1731 — 1756
   Zachary Pearce                       1756 — 1768
   John Thomas                          1768 — 1793
   Samuel Horsley                       1793 — 1802
   William Vincent                      1802 — 1815
   John Ireland                         1816 — 1842
   Thomas Turton                        1842 — 1845
   Samuel Wilberforce                   1845
   William Buckland                     1845 — 1856
   Richard Chenevix Trench              1856 — 1864
   Arthur Penrhyn Stanley               1864 — 1881
   George Granville Bradley             1881 — 1902
   Joseph Armitage Robinson             1902 — 1911
   Herbert Edward Ryle                  1911 — 1925
   William Foxley Norris                1925 — 1937
   Paul de Labilliere                   1938 — 1946
   Alan Don                             1946 — 1959
   Eric Symes Abbott, KCVO              1959 — 1974
   Edward Carpenter, KCVO               1974 — 1985
   Michael Mayne, KCVO                  1986 — 1996
   (Arthur) Wesley Carr, KCVO           1997 — 2006
   John Robert Hall,                    2007 —
    1. ^ Commonwealth period
    2. ^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h For a time it was customary for the
       Deanery of Westminster to go along with the Bishopric of Rochester.
       These deans held both offices concurrently.

Gallery

   The west front

   The tomb of King Henry III in the Abbey. Henry was crowned king at the
   age of nine, reigning from 1216 to 1272.

   Rear side view from the nearby London Eye

   Quicktime Virtual Reality Panorama of Westminster Abbey Daytime
   Quicktime Virtual Reality Panorama of Westminster Abbey.

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   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
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