Cirencester - Day 5

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Today we decided that we would spend some time having a look around Cirencester. It was probably good that we had already made this decision as the weather was a bit gloomy when we woke this morning. We had to break out our umbrellas to walk into the centre of town to arrive at the Parish Church of St John the Baptist in time for the 10.30am tour.

St John’s is often mistaken for a cathedral because it is a particularly large and beautiful parish church. In fact, it is one of the largest parish churches in the country, built, repaired, renovated and extended with wool money as Cirencester was renowned for its successful and lucrative wool trade.

There has been a church on this site since the earliest years of the Christian era, with the oldest parts of building that exists today dating from the 12^th-century. Although originally built in the 12^th-century the nave was rebuilt in about 1520. The monks had built a trading building for the Abbey on the south side of the church and, since it was now taller than the nave, the town’s merchants decided to raise the roof of the nave by 20 feet!

The nave is surrounded by the Trinity Chapel, Lady Chapel, St Catherine’s Chapel, Chancel and Chapel of St John the Baptist. The pulpit which dates to 1450 is a rare and finely worked wine glass design. Beside it is an hourglass that runs for 57 minutes. This was introduced at a time when sermons could run for hours. The hourglass was introduced to limit the vicar’s sermons to one hour!!

St Catherine’s Chapel was particularly beautiful. It was originally built in 1150 and included a wall painting of St Christopher carrying the Christ Child. Only a little of this artwork survives today. What is impressive is the ceiling that features fan vaulting that was installed 350 later. When the Abbey next door was dissolved by Henry VIII the fan vaulting was rescued and retrofitted to the chapel.

The tower was erected in 1400 with funds taken from the Earls of Kent and Salisbury who had been plotting against the crown and were arrested by the townspeople when they got wind of their treasonous plan. They built it over a Roman ditch though so had to stitch in a flying buttress to support it! The buttress isn’t so visible from the inside, but is rather conspicuous on the outside. Even after all of this cobbling together the church is really rather beautiful.

One of the church’s most prized possession is the Boleyn Cup. It was made in 1535 for Anne Boleyn who later gifted it to her daughter Queen Elizabeth. The story goes that when in Cirencester QE I took ill and was attended by a local physician. She recovered from her illness and gifted the cup to her physician, Richard Master. A descendant of his later gifted the cup to the church.

From the church we wandered around to the Abbey Garden that is all that remains of the once mighty St Mary’s Abbey founded by Augustinian monks in 1117. The fan-vaulted south porch of the church is the only part of the abbey that remains apart from a Norman archway gate and some ruined walls. It is now integrated with the church as a porch or covered entrance to the church, but was originally a free-standing building erected by the abbey. For a time after the Reformation, it served as the Town Hall.

Our next stop was the Corinium Museum. Cirencester was Rome’s second most important city in Britannia after London (Londinium) and was known to them as Corinium Dubonnorum. The museum houses a wealth of locally found Roman artifacts along with materials from the Neolithic, Saxon and Viking periods. Situated at a significant trading junction, the city has been well populated throughout history. The museum tells a comprehensive story of that history.

After lunch we checked out a few shops. I had my eye on a dress in Fat Face where I have shopped before but, on this occasion, I couldn’t find any well-priced sale items. The dress I had seen in their window was too pricey for me! Last time we were over I bought some travel pants by Craghopper and I really like them. We found some in one of the outdoor stores, but the current style was nowhere near as appealing as the pair that I have so I saved money there too!

We popped back to a jewelry and guitars shop that I spotted on our first day here hoping to buy a few vintage or at least vintage looking brooches. The store had a dressmaker’s dummy covered with brooches pinned onto it. It looked amazing! I managed to restrict myself to just three brooches.

Today we were able to return to Lick where we purchased our gelatos on day one in the Cotswolds. Yum, proper ice-creams after two days of Soleros.

We spent what remained of the afternoon relaxing in our room at The Cotswold Hare before walking back into town for dinner at Cote Brasserie. They had good value deals on two and three course set menus. Bernie ordered an entrée and main and I ordered a main and dessert and we shared the entrée and dessert so that we could have three courses for the price of two. Does that make us cheapskates?

We were back in our room again by about 7.30pm when the church bells started peeling. We were told this morning that the bells at St John’s are a relatively rare set of 12 bells. Our guide told us that the bells are rung on alternate Sundays for services BUT he didn’t reveal that the bell ringers would be practicing tonight!! If we had known, we probably would have remained in the town centre a bit longer to hear them. We could still hear them at the B&B, but I am sure they would have sounded more dramatic right by the church. We were treated to about half an hour of the bells which was lovely.



Steps: 9,748 (6.47 kms)

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