Canterbury Cathedral Priory

Over the last century, many historians have examined the monastic records, rolls, and financial accounts of Canterbury Cathedral. Yet, although the politico-religious, architectural, and administrative history of the priory has been for the most part researched, a close analysis of the earliest thirteenth-century records has been surprisingly neglected. Nevertheless, the period c.1200 - c.1230 remains crucial to our understanding of the priory's development, marked by a series of turbulent events, including the monastic exile from 1209, the granting of Magna Carta, the First Barons' War, and the Translation of the relics of St Thomas to their new shrine in 1220. Whilst the records available for this period are not as abundant as those from later centuries, in part due to the administrative 'dark age' of the exile, the priory's financial accounts, in conjunction with secondary material within this project, provide more than adequate materials from which a study can be attempted.