Published:
8:00 AM February 6, 2021
Free online events are marking 1000 years of the Abbey of St Edmund in Bury St Edmunds
- Credit: West Suffolk Council
How did Edmund go from being a defeated regional king to the patron saint of England - and why did a Danish monarch decide to build an abbey in his honour?
These are the themes behind the latest in a series of free, online talks to mark 1,000 years since the founding of the Abbey of St Edmund in Bury St Edmunds.
The statue of St Edmund in front of the Abbey West Front in Bury St Edmunds
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How did Edmund go from being a defeated regional king to the patron saint of England and why did a Danish monarch decide to build an Abbey in his honour?
These are the themes behind the latest in a series of free, online talks, to mark 1000 years since the founding of the Abbey of St Edmund in Bury St Edmunds.
“The way the Abbey of St Edmund came into being, compared to all of the other medieval Abbeys in England, is quite possibly unique in that it seems to owe its origins to the ordinary East Anglian people,” said historian Professor Sarah Foot, the Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Oxford.
Bury guides left to right: Terry O Donoghue, Adrian Tindall, Peta Levantis, Lynn Whitehead
- Credit: Archant
This virtual tour of Bury St Edmunds will take you on a historical journey where familiar places may take on new meaning or hidden gems may be revealed.
While the daily tours run by Bury St Edmunds Tour Guides are on pause until April, here they take you around the town centre, home to the ruins of the Abbey of Saint Edmund.
Town Guide John Saunders, of Bury St Edmunds Tour Guides, said: For many people, whether by day or night, a guided tour of Bury St Edmunds is an eye-opener.