Last month, Warwick Rodwell guided us through recent research in Canterbury Cathedral, focusing on the virtuosic mosaic that once lay before the shrine of Thomas Becket. As a sequel, he now reveals what was learned about the shrine itself, and the chapel in which it stood before the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
Detailed analysis of an elaborate 13th-century mosaic at Canterbury Cathedral has revealed a medieval masterpiece that may be unparalleled in either Roman or medieval Britain. Warwick Rodwell explains further.
Review by Nathalie Cohen This monograph, the result of a project started by David Neal and Warwick Rodwell in 2015 to examine the historic floors in the eastern arm of Canterbury Cathedral, is a stunning achievement. Over nearly 400 pages,…
The Friends have raised some £15 million towards projects as diverse as the purchase of a minibus for the choristers, the conservation of rare books in the library, the restoration of the splendid Tudor gatehouse, and the creation of a new garden in the cathedral precinct.
The figure of Nathan possibly dates to AD 1130-1160, making it perhaps the earliest surviving stained glass in England, and among the oldest in Europe.
Bringing together more than 100 objects from museums, churches, and private collections across Europe, 'Thomas Becket: Murder and the making of a saint' powerfully evokes the medieval era as it explores the life, death, and legacy of Henry II’s ‘turbulent priest’.
With museums allowed finally to reopen next month, those of us who have been starved of culture are looking forward eagerly to the British Museum’s ‘Thomas Becket: murder and the making of a saint’. The exhibition, originally scheduled for last year, marks the 850th anniversary of the country's most famous political assassination – the grisly murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury on 29 December 1170 by four knights in the service of Henry II.
In 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket was killed in his cathedral by knights linked to his former friend King Henry II. But how did Becket become a revered saint and protector of the king?
What job did Becket already hold when he was appointed as Archbishop on 23 May 1162?
Among the 856 heraldic shields emblazoned on the ceilings of the cloister of Canterbury Cathedral is hidden a story of the social and political history of 14th- and 15th-century England. In this large and intensively researched volume, Paul A Fox…