Bill Tennent's photos with the keyword: cathedral

People have been coming to worship and pray at Ripon for more than 1,350 years. The Cathedral building itself is part of this continuing act of worship, begun in the 7th century when Saint Wilfrid built one of England's first stone churches on this site, and still renewed every day. Within the nave and choir, you can see the evidence of 800 years in which master craftsmen have expressed their faith in wood and stone.

The 15 Century Font at Ripon Cathedral

The origins of the cathedral are related to the construction in 445 of stone church on the Druim Saileach (Willow Ridge) hill by St. Patrick, around which a monastic community developed. The church was and is the centre of the Church of Ireland. Following the Henrician Reformation in Ireland the cathedral became increasingly associated with the then Established Church and has been definitively in Anglican hands since the reign of Elizabeth I. A Roman Catholic cathedral was built on a neighbouring hill in the nineteenth century. Cordial relations exist between both cathedrals. The church itself has been destroyed and rebuilt 17 times. It was substantially restored between 1834 and 1840 by Archbishop Lord John George Beresford and the architect Lewis Nockalls Cottingham. The fabric remains that of the mediaeval (and earlier – in particular the crypt ) buildings but much restored. While Cottingham was heavy-handed in his restoration the researches of T. G. F. Patterson and Janet Myles in the late twentieth century have shown the restoration to have been notably antiquarian for its time. The tracery of the nave windows in particular are careful restorations as is the copy of the font. The capital decoration of the two western most pillars of the nave (either side of the West Door internal porch) are mediaeval as are the bulk of the external gargoyle carvings (some resited) of the parapet of the Eastern Arm. Cottingham's intention of retaining the richly cusped West Door with flanking canopied niches was over-ruled. Subsequent restorations have more radically altered the internal proportions of the mediaeval building, proportions which Cottingham had retained.

Found my self climbing through Pelaw Woods today, due to a landslip along the riverbank. I had never seen this view of Durham City before, from the Cathedral to the ECML Viaduct with the River Wear and Castle all in one shot.

The pulpit designed in the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau Styles is made of bronze on marble columns and dates from 1913. The figures depict four Anglo-Saxon saints - St Chad, St Cuthbert, St Hilda and St Etheldreda.