Historical Highlights of Wells Cathedral
Historical Highlights of Wells Cathedral
The present Cathedral was begun about 1175 on a new site to the north of an old minster church.
Bishop Reginald de Bohun brought the idea of a revolutionary architectural style from France, and Wells was the first English cathedral to be built entirely in this new Gothic style.
The first building phase took about eighty years, building from east to west, culminating in the magnificent West Front. About 300 of its original medieval statues remain: a glorious theatrical stone backdrop for feast day processions.
The Jesse Window at Wells Cathedral is one of the most splendid examples of 14th century stained glass in Europe. The window, in its dominant colours of green and gold, depicts a Jesse tree and shows the family and ancestors of Christ, Jesse being the father of King David.
It dates from about 1340 and, considering its age, is still remarkably intact. Fortunately, the window has survived the vicissitudes of time and British history (narrowly escaping destruction during the English Civil War) and so what we see today is basically how medieval glaziers designed and created it and how our ancestors viewed it before us.
There have been sensitive repairs over the centuries, of course, and steps were taken during World War II to protect the Window.
The Cathedral embarked, however, on a major project to conserve the Jesse Window in 2011. More about this ambitious project can be found in the Conservation section here.
The famous Wells clock is considered to be the second oldest clock mechanism in Britain, and probably in the world, to survive in original condition and still in use.
The original works were made about 1390 and the clock face is the oldest surviving original of its kind anywhere. When the clock strikes every quarter, jousting knights rush round above the clock and the Quarter Jack bangs the quarter hours with his heels.
The outside clock opposite Vicars’ Hall, placed there just over seventy years after is connected with the inside mechanism.
The scissor arches, which often visitors believe to be later, modern additions were constructed from 1338-48 as an engineering solution to a very real problem.
By 1313 a high tower topped by a lead covered wooden spire had been constructed but as the foundations were not stable large cracks began to appear in the tower structure.
In fear of a total collapse, several attempts at internal strengthening and buttressing were made, until the famous ‘scissor arches’ were put in place by master mason William Joy as a solution.
The wells or springs, still seen today in the Bishop’s Palace garden, are the reason for the original settlement of this area.
Stone Age flints and Roman pottery have been found near the springs and the earliest evidence of worship is a Romano-British burial chamber, which may have been Christian.
Over this a Saxon mortuary chapel was built and in about 705, A.D. King Ine of Wessex gave permission for a minster church to be founded here.