So important did Joseph's shrine become as a place of pilgrimage that the Lady Chapel was rededicated in his name. About an undercroft was dug under the Lady Chapel and Galilee, apparently so that pilgrims visiting the shrine of St Joseph could access an ancient well that may have existed before the abbey was founded. By the late Middle Ages Glastonbury had become the richest abbey in England, due to the heavy pilgrimage trade.
It was rich enough to build an inn for well-to-do pilgrims the George Inn, on nearby High Street, which still welcomes guests years later. Throughout much of the medieval period, Glastonbury was the second wealthiest monastic house in Britain, after only Westminster Abbey. But that acquiescence would only postpone the inevitable.
By Glastonbury was the last remaining monastery in Somerset. When pressed by the king, the abbot refused to surrender the Abbey, claiming rightly that the Act for suppressing the lesser houses did not apply to Glastonbury.
Thomas Cromwell, the prime mover of Henry's suppression of the monasteries, had Whiting imprisoned in the Tower of London.
There Cromwell questioned the Abbot himself, and, not surprisingly, found him guilty of treason and sentenced him to death. A possible pretext for the charge of treason might be that a book opposing Henry VIII's divorce from Catherine' of Aragon was supposedly found among Whiting's belongings. Later conspiracy theories have suggested that Cromwell was really after treasure that he believed was hidden at Glastonbury, and that Whiting courageously refused to tell him its whereabouts.
One theory that has taken hold over the years is that the abbots of Glastonbury had been entrusted with hiding the Holy Grail. The story goes that this secret was handed down from one abbot to the next.
Whiting knew the secret, and this knowledge he took to the grave. Whatever the pretext, Cromwell was on shaky legal ground. Whiting, as Abbot of Glastonbury, was a member of the House of Lords, so he should have been brought before Parliament to answer any charges.
Cromwell was not too bothered by legality, however, and acted without waiting for the due course of the law to take effect. He had Whiting sent to Wells, where a mock trial took place on 14 November Whiting was accused of 'robbing Glastonbury church', and found guilty.
On the following day, he and two of his monks were taken to Glastonbury. They were placed on hurdles and dragged through the town to the top of Glastonbury Tor, where all three men were hanged, drawn, and quartered.
Whiting's head was put on display over the gate of his abbey, while his severed limbs were displayed to the public at Ilchester, Bridgwater, Bath, and Wells. And thus the last abbot of the most powerful monastery in England perished. Whiting was beatified in When archaeologist Frederick Bligh Bond excavated the abbey in the early 20th century he found bones he believed to be those of Abbot Whiting. After the abbot's death, the abbey was looted for building stone, and a colony of weavers was set up on the monastic site.
It was not until that the grounds were bought by the Bath and Wells Diocesan Trust, and the ruined abbey buildings were restored so that visitors could once again enjoy this remarkable historic site. The abbey is entered through the Abbey Gatehouse, an imposing arched gateway located on off Magdalene Street. Visitors pass through a fascinating museum depicting life at Glastonbury during the Middle Ages and then enter the Abbey grounds proper.
The first building you see on entering the grounds is St Mary's Chapel, a roofless structure that boasts wonderful architectural details, from the recessed arches of the door to the repetitive arcading that rings the interior.
The purported site of the tomb of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere. Author: Tom Ordelman. In , during the reconstruction, the purported tomb of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere was found in the cemetery. At a point between two pyramids in the Abbey they discovered a covering stone, under which there was a cross of lead with an inscription stating that in the grave lies the famous King Arthur on the Isle of Avalon.
And, at the depth of 16 feet, they came upon a massive hollowed oak trunk that contained two skeletons. Historians dismiss this find today and say that the tomb was made up to attract people to raise funds for the reparation of the abbey. Some people believe that they still lay there to this day, others claim that they were removed when the Crown took control of the Abbey in the 16th century. According to another story, the Abbey was founded in the 1st century by Joseph of Arimathea and Jesus.
Author: NotFromUtrecht. Even the skeptic finds much else to admire about Glastonbury's evocative ruins and its splendid documented history. A community of monks were already established at Glastonbury when King Ine of Wessex enriched their endowment. He is said to have directed that a stone church be built in , the foundations of which now form the west end of the nave.
Glastonbury was ravaged by the Danes in the 9th century. The contemporary reformed soldier St. Neot was sacristan at Glastonbury before he went to found his own establishment in Somerset. The religious way of life had nearly died out by , following the invasions of the Vikings who destroyed many of the monasteries and nunneries.
Decades later there was a revival and the monasteries of Romsey, Abingdon and Glastonbury were rebuilt. The abbey church was enlarged in the 10th century by the Abbot of Glastonbury, St.
Dunstan , the central figure in the 10th-century revival of English monastery life, who instituted the Benedictine Rule; Dunstan became Archbishop of Canterbury in A reassessment of glass-producing furnaces on the site proved not only that Saxon workers were recycling Roman glass imported from Europe, but also that the furnaces are nearly years older than expected and are associated with the construction of the first stone churches around A.
Both the skeletal remains and the inscribed cross disappeared after the dissolution of the abbey in , but archaeologist Ralegh Radford claimed to have found the original burial site when he excavated at Glastonbury during the s and s. Unfortunately, there is little proof connecting that site with the famous king.
As they rebuilt the church after the great fire in , instead of using contemporary architectural styles, they inserted antiquated and retrospective elements, apparently to deliberately feign antiquity.
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