THE
P RTAL
February 2019
Page 12
The Queen’s Diamond
Jubilee Galleries at
Westminster Abbey
Jackie Ottaway and Ronald Crane visit this new venture
I
t was a cold day when we visited Westminster Abbey. It may have been cold outside, but the welcome
from the Abbey staff was warm and friendly. Westminster Abbey is a strange place. Not a Parish Church, or
a Cathedral, but a “Royal Peculiar”; a privilege granted by Queen Elizabeth I in 1560. This means it is outside
the jurisdiction of the CofE, and the Dean and Chapter are directly answerable to the Sovereign.
The Abbey contains the Shrine of Saint Edward
the Confessor. Every monarch since William the
Conqueror has come to the Abbey for Coronation, and
seventeen of them are buried within its precincts. The
Coronation Chair is here, and sixteen royal weddings
have taken place here, not to mention countless other
national and royal events.
Walking through the West Door, one passes the
tomb of the Unknown Warrior. In Poets’ Corner there
are memorials to so many of our nation’s greatest. The
Abbey is inextricably bound up with the history of the
people of the British Isles.
Founded in 960 as a Benedictine monastery, it was
re-built by St Edward the Confessor in 1065. Henry III
began the present building in 1245.
The Weston Tower at Westminster Abbey
designed by Ptolemy Dean Architects Limited
Ptolemy Dean is Surveyor of the Fabric of the Abbey
Photograps: Alan Williams. 2018. Image courtesy of the Abbey
Last year the Queen’s Gallery was opened. 16 metres
(52 feet) above the Abbey’s floor in the medieval
Triforium, it is in an area never before open to the
public. Here are displayed three hundred treasures
from the Abbey’s collection. They reflect the Abbey’s
(and the nation’s) one thousand year history.
The space had previously been used to deposit
The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries at Westminster Abbey
anything that was thought to be of no use, but too Ø
Photograph: Alan Williams, image courtesy of Westminster Abbey