[D. Weller
KING SEBERT’S TOMB.
Now we come to the time of Edward the Confessor, when we feel we know more about the real history.
Edward the Confessor had been in exile in Normandy during the reigns of the Danish Kings. When Hardicanute died, Edward came back to England, and was crowned King at Winchester. After he was once settled in his kingdom he remembered a solemn vow he had made while he was in a foreign land, and when he doubted whether he would ever get back to England. This was the vow: “Sire Saint Peter, under whose aid I put myself and my property, be to me a shield and protection against the tyrant Danish plans: Be to me lord and friend against all my enemies. To thy service I will entirely give myself up, and well I vow to you and promise you, when I shall be of strength and age, to Rome I will make my pilgrimage, where you and your companion Saint Paul suffered martyrdom.”
The English were most unwilling that their King should leave them, and go away on such a long and dangerous journey as it was in those days. So they begged the King to remain, and he sent to ask the Pope what he might do instead of going to Rome. The Pope answered that he might build or restore some monastery in honour of St. Peter. There is a beautiful old story which tells that while the King was thinking over this matter, and wondering where to build his monastery, a message was brought to him from a holy hermit of Worcestershire, one Wulsinus, and the message was as follows: “I have a place in the west of London, which I myself chose, and which I love. This formerly I consecrated with my own hands, honoured with my presence, and made it illustrious by divine miracles. The name of the place is Thorney, which once, for the sins of the people, being given to the fury of barbarians, from being rich is become poor, from being stately, low, and from honour is become contemptible. This let the King, by my command, repair and make it a house of monks, adorn it with stately towers, and endow it with large revenues. There shall be no less than the House of God and the Gates of Heaven.”
This, and other reasons, decided the King to rebuild the church at Thorney Isle, and this great “Minster of the West” was probably begun about the year 1055. In 1065 the eastern part of the church, that is to say, the choir and transepts, was ready, and it was consecrated by Archbishop Stigand on Innocents’ Day, 28th December 1065. King Edward was too ill to be at the service, so his wife, Queen Editha, had to represent him.
Edward the Confessor died on 5th January 1066, and was buried the next day, the Feast of the Epiphany, in front of the high altar of his new church.
That church was very different to look at from the Abbey we all know at the present day. It was built in what is called the Norman style, with massive pillars, round arches, and round-headed windows. It must have been a very large and splendid church, almost as large as the present one, only that it was not so high.
The church and the surrounding monastery buildings were finished during the reigns of the early Norman kings, and William the Conqueror confirmed the charters granted to the Abbey by the Confessor, and bestowed yet more lands upon it.
We must now pass over nearly two hundred years, and speak of the time of King Henry III. In the year 1220, Henry III began to build a very beautiful chapel, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, at the eastern end of the Abbey church. It was just about this time that some of the grand cathedrals of France, such as those of Amiens, Reims, and Chartres, were being built in that lovely and graceful pointed style which is called Gothic, but which really comes from France.
Henry III, when visiting his brother-in-law, St. Louis, King of France, had no doubt seen some of these glorious new churches, and was very anxious to build one like them in honour of King Edward the Confessor, for whom he had a great reverence.