Alban
died on this hillside early in the third century, the first person in England
to die for his Christian faith. People have come here to pray ever since. The
first building on the spot about which we can be certain was the monastery founded
in 793 by King Offa which housed the shrine of St Alban, a gorgeous, glittering
box holding the bones of the saint. Pilgrims flocked to the shrine and St Albans
soon became the most important place of Christian pilgrimage in England. Offa’s
Saxon church was torn down soon after 1066 by the Normans and a larger, finer
and Norman building rose in its place. Built of recycled bricks from the now
ruined Roman city of Verulamium, the Norman heart of the Cathedral still stands
to this day, though it has been developed and extended in other styles.
The wealth and far-reaching power of the Abbey came to a dramatic end in 1539. Under Henry VIII the monastery was dissolved, the riches of the Abbey removed, Alban’s bones discarded and the shrine hacked to pieces. The people of St Albans bought the Abbey church back from the crown about 10 years later and a long, slow process of decline and decay began. Help finally arrived in the nineteenth century in the shape of the wealthy Edmund Grimthorpe: the building today and St Alban’s shrine at its heart bear testimony to a considerable amount of Victorian restoration. The Abbey became a Cathedral in 1877. Further building went on in the twentieth century; in 1982 a new chapter house was built on the very spot where the monastic one had stood.
This
rich mix of architecture and history is also a lively parish church which is
always humming with activity. The trails and workshops offered by the Education
Centre reflect some of the Cathedral’s multi-faceted life.
I had a brilliant time and learned a lot while having fun at the same time.
TOM
It was much more interesting acting out the story than listening to it.
SOPHIE
I feel they were particularly moved by the story of Alban and found a spiritual
side to the whole experience.
HEAD OF RE – INDEPENDENT SCHOOL
Home Page