Faith, Power and Legacy in Bury St Edmunds

Published by Charlie Bohan-Hurst on February 9, 2026

John Saunders, a registered Bury St Edmunds tour guide, outlines the rich religious, political and cultural history of Bury St Edmunds and its Abbey.

As a tour guide of Bury St Edmunds, I have immersed myself in the town’s religious, political and financial history, but I bow to the many other eminent historians and academics who have delved far deeper and produced a wealth of reading material. This article is therefore a snapshot of why the town and its Abbey hold significance.

During the decade of AD 630, Sigeberht ruled the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of East Anglia. He invited Felix from Burgundy to establish an area of ecclesiastical jurisdiction at Dummoc (believed to be Walton near Felixstowe), leading to the conversion of the East Angles to Christianity. Sigeberht also permitted the foundation by the Irish monk St Fursey of a monastery at Cnobheresburg, possibly the site of Burgh Castle.

Sigeberht’s Christian and pacifist beliefs led him to abdicate and create a small monastery in the town which was then known as Beodricsworth which, because of his presence, was a Royal Ville (town). However, when Penda and the Mercian army attacked East Anglia, Sigeberht was persuaded to ‘come out of retirement’ and lead his subjects into battle. Armed only with a wand, the inevitable happened and he was killed. Renowned as a Christian martyr, his feast day is commemorated on 29 October and is referred to in the Bury Psalter in the Vatican Library.

We now jump in time to AD 855 when Edmund, at the age of 14 years, was crowned King of East Anglia at Bures. He too proved a wise and popular ruler and was a devout Christian. Around AD 869, he led his people into battle somewhere near Thetford against the invading Danes. He was losing the battle and decided to retreat, not out of cowardice, but to save further bloodshed. He was hunted down by the Danes and defied their demand that he should denounce his Christian beliefs, leading to him being tied to a tree, peppered with arrows and decapitated. Legend has pointed to his place of martyrdom as Hoxne, Lyng, Maldon or other locations. Insufficient space allows me to indicate why these can be discounted, but the most reliable site of Edmund’s death derives from research by the archaeologist Dr Stanley West in 1978, who pinpointed it as Bradfield St Clare, around five miles south of Beodricsworth.

Edmund’s head had been thrown into nearby woods and his followers discovered it being guarded by a wolf. The first claimed miracle of Edmund occurred when his head was reunited with his body. He was initially buried nearby, but other claimed miracles took place; for example, a blind man recovered his sight, and within 30 years Edmund was proclaimed a saint and subsequently his body was moved to Beodricsworth because of Sigeberht’s previous residence in a Royal Ville.

In 1020, King Canute decided that a small rotunda chapel should be built within what we now know as the Abbey grounds. Many pilgrims began to visit the shrine of Edmund in the town, which had changed its name to St Edmundsbury, not because Edmund was buried there but because the town was fortified by ditches, walls, and had gated access. The word ‘burgh’ or ‘bury’ means a fortified place, as in Edinburgh or Glastonbury.

The Abbot of St Edmund’s Abbey held immense power because he was answerable to the Pope and outside the monarch’s control. Nevertheless, relationships between the Abbey and the State seemed mostly to be cordial and, in 1043, Edward the Confessor granted the Abbot 8½ hundreds of land, this being the land mass of West Suffolk known as the Liberty of St Edmund. This brought the Abbot wealth either through rents and tithes and his own rural pleasures.

By the year 1081, it was decided that the Abbey Church of St Edmund should be built, a process that took over 200 years. It was the fourth largest Abbey church in Europe (after Cluny, Speyer and Winchester), a place of pilgrimage and the home of around 80 Benedictine monks (originally from Ely and Holme, Norfolk) who were distinctive by their black habits.

In AD 787, the Second Council of Nicaea decreed that ‘every altar should contain a relic’. They therefore became important and valuable items and were traded both for money and as prestigious gifts. A pilgrim might hope that the shrine at which he or she prayed would contain a whole body – but in reality, the relic inside might be as tiny as a tooth or a finger bone. Whilst the shrine of Edmund in Bury’s Abbey was the focal point, there were accompanying shrines of St Botolph (most likely containing only his arm which, according to M. R. James, arrived between 1045 and 1066), the founder of a monastery at Iken, and St Jurmin (his body having been translated from Blythburgh during the abbacy of Anselm, 1121–1148), the brother of St Etheldreda. Pilgrims came from across the world, illustrated by an array of their badges, some bearing images of camels, in the town’s Moyse’s Hall Museum. Outside the precincts of the Abbey was a chapel dedicated to St Botolph, this being off Southgate Street but en route for pilgrims visiting the Abbey.

By the 12th century, St Edmund was internationally revered and the Abbey was one of the largest and most politically influential religious houses, linked into a network of shrines across Europe that combined prayer and economic success. He was the patron saint of England until 1348 and was used as an intercessor at times of pestilence.

Until mid-2022 we relied on a painting by the Rev Hardy in the late 1800s to illustrate what the Abbey would have looked like. However, its appearance was significantly different, depicted through the excellent digital reconstruction by Historic England/English Heritage Trust (main image).

The Abbey of St Edmund was dissolved at the behest of King Henry VIII in 1539. We are now left with an amalgam of ruins, but it is possible to unpick key areas of interest:

• The original Abbey Gate was in line with the bottom of what we now know as Abbeygate Street. In 1327 around 3,000 dissenters, armed with weapons and burning hay carts, charged at the Gate, destroyed it and attacked the monks. Their quest was to seize the charters and documents on which the Abbot relied for his power and, although there was bloodshed, the riot was ruthlessly put down, with 400 detainees being sent for trial at Norwich and a fine of £14,000 imposed on the burgesses which ruined the town’s economy and disenfranchised the Guilds. However, riots continued and Abbot de Draughton was kidnapped and taken to Brabant where he remained until 1329. This was one of several periods of unrest, leading the Abbey to incur huge losses. The fines on the town were subsequently remitted to £4,000.

• Built in 1347, the ‘new’ Abbey Gate is probably one of the town’s most iconic structures. Its inner archway allowed the destitute to visit the almoner or pittancer for food, clothing and support. It was the equivalent of the modern-day food bank, a much needed and used resource. Whilst there were negative aspects of the Abbey, this was certainly one that found favour and was sorely missed when dissolution occurred – the poor were left unsupported until the Poor Laws developed in late mediaeval times and were codified between 1587 and 1598.

• Beyond the gated entrance was the Great Court and the Black Hostry where visitors would be welcomed.

• The northern side was maintained for provisioning – horses were the mode of transport to venture further afield and a large stabling block existed. It was also the area for the butchers, bakers, tailors, washers, candlestick makers, shoemakers, parchment makers, cooks, porters, stewards and brewers. The brewing of beer was an important part of daily life – not to produce merry monks but to safeguard against drinking the polluted water.

• The Abbey was surrounded by walls and gates, making it a ‘town within a town’. There were also lay men and women within the Abbey grounds – masons, carpenters, those involved in providing utilities etc., supporting the skills and talents that many of the monks themselves possessed.

• The eastern buildings included the Abbot’s Palace, a bone of contention with the townspeople, although the abilities and importance of abbots perhaps legitimised their right to live in such splendour. They were considered greedy in their excessive taxation of those who were forced to use the water mill or Abbot’s Bridge. To the east of the River Lark (formerly known as the Burn) were vinefields which benefited from a warm climate that yielded good harvests of grapes and large quantities of wine.

• There is little doubt that the abbots were not only academically gifted but that they possessed the skills required for running a business, governing politically and creating infrastructure that would survive long after they had gone.

• Abbot Baldwin achieved acclaim for creating the mediaeval grid, commencing the Abbey Church and the Church of St Denys, the building of 342 houses on arable land in the Banleuca (the name given to the land under the jurisdiction of Bury St Edmunds), being Edward the Confessor’s Royal Physician.

• Around 1120, Abbot Anselm had the vision to build a church and tower dedicated to St James, the buildings we now know as the Cathedral and Norman Tower.

• Abbot John de Northwold instituted the Charnel House around 1300 to provide dignity to the souls of the departed.

• Abbot Samson (1182–1211) was behind the building of the unique octagonal towers as part of the West Front of the Abbey Church (image 2), as well as commissioning Master Hugo to provide an ambience of splendour with his paintings and the Bury Cross (now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, with a replica in St Edmundsbury Cathedral Treasury). He was also responsible for building St Saviour’s Hospital on the northern side of the town.

• The Abbots were the bosses and reliant, as in the modern day, on workers to deliver the end product. Their religious devotion had to dovetail with the management of everyday life and the calamities that occurred with remedial building work following riots and fire damage, structural defects, all of which was accomplished without computer-aided design. But we also learn of extravagance in their lifestyle, for example the installation of Abbot Samson in 1181 at the palace when over 1,000 guests dined.

• Alongside the Abbot’s Palace were the apartments for kings and queens. All monarchs up to and including Henry VII came to the town, many for pilgrimage. King Henry VI and his wife Margaret of Anjou celebrated Christmas at the Abbey in 1433, alongside a huge entourage, and remained until Easter 1434, the costs met by the Abbey which nearly bankrupted it.

• Another long-staying guest was Archbishop Erland Eystein. In July 1152, Cardinal Nicholas Brekespear, who subsequently became the only English Pope (Adrian IV), was sent as Papal Legate to Norway to reorganise and reform the Church throughout Scandinavia. He was mandated to create two archbishoprics in Norway and Sweden, one of these being Nidaros. Archbishop Eystein held this position and perpetuated the cult of their martyred King St Olav but, in 1180 following political unrest, he was exiled from Norway and was granted asylum at St Edmund’s Abbey from 9 August 1181 until 16 February 1182, at a time when the town was without an Abbot following the death of Abbot Hugh. This interim period lasted until the election of Abbot Samson. His impact received praise from the Chronicler, Jocelyn de Brakelond: “He was of great value to us in securing our free election, testifying to our merits and publicly declaring before the king what he had seen and heard about us.”

Eventually returning to Norway, Eystein reigned as Archbishop until his death in 1188. He was locally proclaimed a saint in 1229, but papal approbation was not forthcoming until 2001 when approval appears to have been given by the Vatican for his beatification, with his feast day being on the day of his death, 26 January.

• Parliament was held at the Abbey twice in the 1200s and once in the 1400s.

• The Abbey was the burial place of Alan, Earl of Bretagne, and his wife Constance, second daughter of William the Conqueror; Thomas Brotherton, Earl of Norfolk and fifth son of Edward I; Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter and uncle of Henry V; Mary Tudor, Queen of France, sister of Henry VIII.

By the time of dissolution in 1539, it appears that St Edmund’s body had been removed from the shrine – the King’s Commissioners stated that the shrine was of little value and cumbersome to deface but no other mention was made of our renowned saint.

The ruins that remain still reflect the immense size of the Abbey Church (image 3): its transept pillars and high altar, the sites of residence, an infirmary, a scriptorium, the Chapter House, the burial places of abbots, altars within the crypt. All possess their own stories which are too detailed for this article.

But do not look upon the Abbey as a relic of the past. Abbey 1000 brought together religious, civic and community plans for celebrating the Abbey’s Millennium in 2020 but Covid delayed by two years the 43 ecumenical events, including:

o Pilgrimages from Ely and Holme

o The gathering of those from Benedictine communities

o The celebration of Mass by Bishop Alan Hopes in St Edmundsbury Cathedral at which the Anglican Bishop Martin Seeley preached; this being followed by an Anglican service with the Bishops reversing their roles

o The display of Abbey manuscripts on loan from Pembroke College

o Vespers followed by a procession to the site of St Edmund’s shrine at which Abbot Geoffrey Scott of Douai preached

o Illumination of the Abbey grounds and Norman Tower with an historic narrative

Until his death in 2024, Stephen Ortiger was the Abbey’s titular abbot, the appointed abbot for a destroyed or suppressed abbey. His successor awaits appointment.

Abbey 1000 has now been replaced by Abbey of St Edmund, Reborn, a £9.9m project designed to bring together town, cathedral and abbey and including St Edmund’s Catholic Parish. The project’s patron is the 8th Marquess of Bristol who also holds the hereditary position of High Steward of the Liberty of St Edmund, a title dating back to the bequest of Edward the Confessor.

There is so much history attached to St Edmund’s Abbey exposing its good times and those of justified criticism. Monasticism, names of saints and pilgrimage intermingle to generate the desire to explore more of Bury’s beacon of faith. If it has previously eluded your gaze, do come and see us but do not expect to discover the body of St Edmund – that’s a completely different and lengthy saga!