Westminster Abbey
Two kings were crowned here within a single year, 1066, and the abbey also holds poets, scientists and an Unknown Warrior.
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Quick Facts
- Location
- Westminster, London, beside the Houses of Parliament
- Founded
- Benedictine monastery here in the 10th century; Edward the Confessor's church consecrated in 1065
- Current Gothic building
- Begun by Henry III in 1245
- Height
- Nave vault around 31 metres, among the tallest in England; western towers about 69 metres
- Coronations
- English and British coronations since William the Conqueror's in 1066, including Charles III in 2023
- Royal weddings
- Include Elizabeth II in 1947, William and Catherine in 2011
- Status
- Royal Peculiar, answering to the monarch rather than a bishop; UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987
- Burials and memorials
- Around 3,300 people are buried or commemorated here
The church that a king never saw finished
Edward the Confessor rebuilt the abbey in the Norman-influenced style that was fashionable on the Continent, and it was consecrated in late December 1065. He was too ill to attend and died within days, on 5 January 1066. He was buried before the high altar. Within the year, Harold Godwinson was crowned here, and then William the Conqueror, on Christmas Day 1066. That began a tradition of coronations at the abbey that continues today. Edward's main church was largely replaced, but substantial Norman monastic fabric survives, including the vaulted undercroft with its round arches and massive supporting columns, and the Pyx Chamber. Henry III shows that the tradition had a wobble. He was first crowned at Gloucester Abbey, now Gloucester Cathedral, in 1216, before a second coronation at Westminster in 1220.
Henry III's expensive obsession
In 1245 Henry III decided to knock down the old church and build something worthy of Edward, whom he revered as a saint. The result was a French-inspired Gothic masterpiece, with soaring arches, flying buttresses and a polygonal chapter house. Henry spent heavily, and the work absorbed vast sums from the Crown. He built Edward a grand shrine in the heart of the church, and it remains a focus of the abbey, though much worn. The building grew over the centuries. Henry VII's lavish chapel was added from 1503, with a spectacular fan-vaulted ceiling. The twin western towers were designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor and finished in the 1740s.
Not a cathedral, and not run by a bishop
Westminster Abbey is often assumed to be a cathedral. It is not. It is a Royal Peculiar, a church answerable directly to the monarch, and it is led by a dean. That status dates from the Reformation. Henry VIII dissolved the monastery in 1540, and Elizabeth I refounded the church in 1560 as a collegiate church with its own dean and chapter, a model that still stands. It is also not the same as Westminster Cathedral, the red-and-white Catholic cathedral a short walk away.
A national attic of the dead
Kings and queens lie here in numbers, including Elizabeth I, who shares a tomb with her half-sister Mary I. The inscription on it speaks of their shared resting place and hope of resurrection. Then there is Poets' Corner, which began when Geoffrey Chaucer was buried here in 1400. Later came memorials to Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, the Brontës and many more. Not everyone commemorated is actually buried beneath their stone. Scientists also rest in the nave: Isaac Newton has a monument, and Charles Darwin is buried near it. Stephen Hawking's ashes were interred nearby in 2018. The most moving grave may be the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, placed in the nave in 1920 and filled with soil from the battlefields of France. Visitors are asked not to walk over it.
The chair, the stone and the crowning
The Coronation Chair, made for Edward I around 1300, has been used for coronations for centuries. Look closely and you will see centuries of graffiti carved by Westminster schoolboys and tourists. For most of its history the chair held the Stone of Scone, brought from Scotland by Edward I in 1296. It was returned to Scotland in 1996 and is now displayed in Perth, though it is due to be brought back to the abbey for future coronations. The abbey has also seen weddings, funerals and thanksgivings of national weight, including the funeral of Elizabeth II in 2022.
What to look for when you go
Look up first. Henry VII's Lady Chapel ceiling is a showpiece of English late Gothic, with stone that looks like lace. Find the Cosmati pavement in front of the high altar, a medieval mosaic floor laid in 1268 using coloured stone and glass. Step into the Chapter House, with its remarkable tiled medieval floor, and wander the cloisters and Little Cloister garden. The Pyx Chamber and the oldest door in Britain, dated by tree rings to around the 1050s, are also in the abbey's care. The Queen's Diamond Jubilee Galleries, opened in 2018 and reached via the Weston Tower, extend the story. The abbey is still a working church, with services every day.
Notable people
- Edward the Confessor
- Henry III
- Henry VII
- William the Conqueror
- Geoffrey Chaucer
- Elizabeth I
- Mary I
- Isaac Newton
- Charles Darwin
- Stephen Hawking
- Nicholas Hawksmoor
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