Westminster Abbey

The originsIn the 1040s King Edward (later St .Edward the Confessor) established his royal palace by the banks of the river Thames on a land known as Thorney Island. Close to the palace there was a small Benedictine monastery founded around 960 A.D.. Edward chose to re-endow and greatly enlarge this monastery, building a large stone church, called the Collegiate Church of St. Peter, in honour of St. Peter the Apostle. This church became known as the "west minster" to distinguish it from St. Paul's Cathedral (the east minster) in the City of London. Among the most significant ceremonies that occurred in the Abbey in this period there was the coronation of William the Conqueror on Christmas Day (1066)..

Edward The Confessor

Rebuilding the AbbeyEdward's Abbey survived for two centuries.Around the middle of the 13th century  King Henry III, who was very devoted to St. Edward the Confessor, decided to build a more magnificent church and also to provide a new shrine for the Saint, near to whom Henry himself could be buried. It was a great age for cathedrals and the architecture of the new church was greatly influenced by the new Gothic cathedrals founded in France. So, the Abbey was rebuilt in Anglo-French Gothic Style.The building was a Benedictine monastic church until the monastery was dissolved in 1539. Between 1540 and 1556, the abbey had the status of a cathedral. Since 1560, the building is no longer an abbey or a cathedral, having instead the status of a Church of England "Royal Peculiar“, a church responsible directly to the Sovereign.

Place of coronations….

Under the decree of the King of England, Westminster Abbey was designed to be not only a great monastery and place of worship, but also a place for the coronation and burial of monarchs. Every monarch, started from William the Conqueror ,has been crowned in the Abbey, with the only exceptions of Edward V and Edward VIII (that abdicated) who were never crowned. The ancient Coronation Chair can still be seen in the church.

The Coronation Chair

Weddings….

There have been 16 royal weddings in the Abbey since 1100

And burials…..

There have been around 3,300 burials in the church and cloisters and the Abbey also contains over 600 monuments, and wall tablets – the most important collection of monumental sculpture anywhere in the country. Notable among the burials is the Unknown Warrior, whose grave, close to the west door, has become a place of pilgrimage.

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Henry VII’s Lady Chapel

A remarkable new addition to the Abbey was the glorious Lady

Chapel built in the sixteenth century by King Henry VII, the

first of the Tudor monarchs, which now bears his name. It is a

glorious example of late Medieval architecture with a spectacular

fan-vaulted ceiling and high stained glass windows..

It is the burial place of fifteen Kings and Queens,

including Elizabeth I.

Behind the altar is the tomb of Henry VII and his queen

Elizabeth of York.

The Lady Chapel

The Western Towers

Two centuries later a further addition was made to the Abbey

when the western towers (left unfinished from medieval times)

were completed in 1745.

The Abbey's West Towers

The Poets’ Corner

The Poets’ Corner is a place of pilgrimage for literature lovers. Here, over 100 poets and writers are buried or have memorials. Many like William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters and Charles Dickens are famous worldwide. Others, though popular in their day, are now less well known. The first poet to be buried here, in 1400, was Geoffrey Chaucer, author of 'The Canterbury Tales'. Nearly 200 years later, Edmund Spenser (1553-1598) who wrote 'The Faerie Queene' for Elizabeth I, one of the longest poems in the English language, asked to be buried near Chaucer. And so began a tradition of burials and memorials which continues to this day.The Deans of Westminster decide who receives a place based on merit though they consult widely. 

https://youtu.be/xj8NpGKG9jU The Poets’ Corner