* From signs.
☐ From neighbouring places, as churches, &c.
‡ From trees formerly growing there.
║ From ridicule.
§ From their situation, as backwards, forwards, with respect to other streets.
A
ABBEY Church of St. Peter’s, Westminster. Many have been the fables invented and propagated by the monks, relating to the original foundation of this ancient edifice; but the most probable account is given by those who place it under Sebert, King of the East Saxons, who died in 616. These say, that this Prince being converted to christianity by Austin’s discourses, and his uncle Ethelbert’s example, erected this church on the ruins of a temple dedicated to Apollo, in the island of Thorney, and caused Mellitus, Bishop of London, to consecrate it to St. Peter.
As many ridiculous miracles have been related of its foundation, it is the less surprizing that its dedication should also be represented as miraculous, and that St. Peter himself, five hundred years after his decease, should be represented by the monks, as doing honour to the new fabric, by performing the ceremony himself. For according to the legend, the King having ordered Mellitus to perform the ceremony, St. Peter over-night called upon Edricus, a fisherman, and desired to be ferried over to Thorney, which happened to be then overflowed by the heavy rains that had lately fallen; the fisherman consented, and having carried over the Apostle, he saw him consecrate the church amidst a grand chorus of celestial music, and a glorious appearance of heavenly lights. After which the Apostle returning, discovered himself to the fisherman, and bid him tell Mellitus what he had heard and seen, and as a proof of his divine mission, gave him a miraculous draught of salmon, and then assured him, that none of his profession should ever want that kind of fish in the proper season, provided they made an offering of the tenth fish for the use of the new church; which custom, it seems, was continued by the fishermen four hundred years after.
This church and its monastery were afterwards repaired and enlarged by Offa, King of Mercia, but being destroyed by the Pagan Danes, they were rebuilt by King Edgar, who endowed them with lands and manors, and in the year 969 granted them many ample privileges.
The church and monastery having again suffered by the ravages of the Danes, were again rebuilt by Edward the Confessor, who pulled down the old church, and erected a most magnificent one, for that age, in its room, in the form of a cross, which afterwards became a pattern for that kind of building. The work being finished in the year 1065, he caused it to be consecrated with the greatest pomp and solemnity, and by several charters not only confirmed all its ancient rights and privileges, but endowed it with many rich manors, and additional immunities: ordained that all its lands and possessions, should be subject to none but its own jurisdiction, and the convent be free from the authority of the Bishop of London; and the church, by a bull of Pope Nicholas I. was constituted the place for the inauguration of the Kings of England. In short, he gave it a charter of sanctuary, in which he declares, that any person whatsoever, let his crimes be ever so great, who takes sanctuary in that holy place, shall be assured of life, liberty, and limbs, and that none of his ministers, nor those of his successors, should seize any of his goods, lands or possessions, under pain of everlasting damnation, and that whoever presumed to act contrary to this grant, should lose his name, worship, dignity, and power, and with the traitor Judas, be in the everlasting fire of hell. This was the pious language of St. Edward the Confessor, and from this charter, Westminster Abbey became an asylum for traitors, murderers, robbers, and the most abandoned miscreants, who lived there in open defiance of the laws.