Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

The final phase of the pre-Conquest Abbey's history was initiated by Abbot Wulfric II in the mid-11th century c. 1050 when he remodelled the main abbey church of Sts. Peter and Paul, by joining it with a link-building to the church of St. Mary further east.

Monument Types

• CRYPT (Early Medieval or Anglo-Saxon to Medieval - 1050 AD? to 1070 AD)

Full description

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The final phase of the pre-Conquest Abbey's history was initiated by Abbot Wulfric II in the mid-11th century c. 1050 when he remodelled the main abbey church of Sts. Peter and Paul, by joining it with a link-building to the church of St. Mary further east. To achieve his objective, Wulfric had to demolish the entire east end of the church of Sts. Peter and Paul, and the western porticus of St. Mary's; however although work had commenced, by the time of Wulfric's death in 1061 it was incomplete and work came to a stop.

All that is known for certain is from the existing remains uncovered at crypt level during the 20th century. It was a centrally planned structure, octagonal externally and circular internally. It had a central rotunda 24.5 feet in diameter (7.5m), defined by a ring of wedge shaped piers; outside this was a concentric ambulatory 6 feet wide (1.8m). Circular stair turrets on the north and south provided communication between crypt and ambulatory and the upper levels of the structure. It is believed that it was of three storeys above the crypt ambulatory, but that the central rotunda may have been open the full height from the crypt floor to the roof. The main level of the ambulatory would have been raised above the level of the nave floor and approached up a flioght of stairs. One would then have proceeded around the ambulatory to gain access to the nave of St. Mary's Church on the east side. Above the ambulatory would have been a gallery; and above that again the clerestory walls would have risen above the gallery roof. In the 1070's this building and St. Mary's Church were demolished when work on the New Great Norman Church began.

Boggis, R. J. E. (Rev.), 1901, A History of St. Augustine's Monastery, Canterbury (Monograph). SKE30288.

Gem, R., 1997, St. Augustine's Abbey Canterbury, English Heritage (Monograph). SKE30335.

Roebuck, J., 2002, St. Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury (Monograph). SKE30293.

Sources and further reading