Day 2: Canterbury Cathedral and So Much More!
The Amazing Cathedral
We explored Canterbury as a group today. The main attraction was the Cathedral, the largest in England. It's absolutely massive and an engineering marvel. When we got to the cathedral, we were split into two groups, one to tour the inside and one to learn about masonry and restoration practices. Our group was in the cathedral tour first. The big story is Thomas Beckett, who was assassinated in the church, presumably by four Frenchmen hired by the king. A sculpture of the two swords on the wall commemorates this. The swords cast shadows onto the wall, forming the other two swords--four total--one for each of the assassins. |
A Mason's Work
The Cathedral has been renovated many times over it’s 1,000 year plus history. It’s been continually added onto and restored. It has even burned down. The really old Romanesque part still exists in the basement part because that didn’t get touched by the fire. Following our tour of the church, we met with the lead mason in charge of upkeeping the stones and the structure of the church. The tour was very interesting. The mason talked about how every day is about problem solving. His team assesses the church for structural weaknesses and then replace stones “only when necessary.” They do everything in the traditional way the masons did throughout the years—no computers. They take precise measurements and then hand draw templates that serve as the plans for replicating the stones. It’s a slow and detailed process. They have 14 members on their current team, and it takes 4 years of apprenticeship to become a mason. Due to a labor shortage, the government is trying to shorten that to 2 years. Interestingly enough, the stones are all freestanding and held in place by gravity and flexible mortar. Cement would be too rigid and would cause stress throughout the structure. It’s interesting that the mason compared the completion of the church to an ancient space race. The building of these huge structures was originally an experiment to see who could build the biggest and highest churches. The builders weren’t sure they would stand, and some of the churches indeed failed and fell. Some were bombed in the war, and some fell in earthquakes. The highlight was going up an elevator to the top of the scaffolding to see the work in progress. It was windy and a bit unnerving up there, but very interesting to see how they replaced individual stones that needed repair. It was not uncommon to see a medieval stone right next to a brand new one. Over the life of the church most stones have been replaced once or twice. You could tell by the shades of the stone as well as the width of the grout lines. We were told that the new standard is ¼ inch gap all around. Each stone is engraved on the inside/side with the mason’s symbol and some etching to hold the mortar in place. |
Boats and Beer
After the church tour, we had a little break for lunch. We bought some light food at the local grocery store, a salad and a sandwich. After lunch, we met at 3:00 for a punting boat ride on the River Stour. We had 7-8 people in each boat, and a young man poled us up and down the river while sharing history of the area. Once again, we heard about Thomas Beckett. He was an engaging young man and a good storyteller. After the punting, we went for a beer tasting at a local brewery. While brew pubs are common in the U.S., they are not in England. The owner shared the history of his business, the turbulent times with COVID, and how they have evolved. They currently brew beer, whiskey, vodka, gin, and more and have recently received a number of international awards. Since they are so small, however, they can’t really capitalize on that fame to market their product more widely. They simply don’t have the production capacity to do so. Our guide kept saying “Boats before beer” to help us remember the itinerary. It's definitely better to boat before drinking beer! |