England Guide
Bristol, Bath and Somerset
Bristol Cathedral
Opening time: Daily 8am–5pm
Price: Free
Address: College Green
Bristol Cathedral was founded around 1140 as an abbey on the supposed spot of St Augustine's convocation with Celtic Christians in 603 and became a cathedral church with the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The two towers on the west front were erected in the nineteenth century in a faithful act of homage to Edmund Knowle, architect and abbot at the start of the fourteenth century. The cathedral's interior offers a unique example among Britain's cathedrals of a German-style hall church, in which the aisles, nave and choir rise to the same height. Abbot Knowle's choir offers one of the country's most exquisite illustrations of the early Decorated style of Gothic, while the adjoining Elder Lady Chapel, dating from the early thirteenth century, contains some fine tombs and eccentric carvings of animals, including a monkey playing the bagpipes accompanied by a ram on the violin. The ornate Eastern Lady Chapel has some of England's finest examples of heraldic glass.