Norwich Cathedral, RC Cathedral of St John the Baptist, Norwich

A seven-mile route from the Roman camp at Caistor St Edmund leads to Norwich’s awe-inspiring cathedral, a peaceful walk into a city where pilgrimage has a mixed history

Highlights

• Medieval artistic masterpiece
• Effigy of St Felix

Norwich Cathedral has numerous echoes of the saints in its beautiful halls – although its actually saintly legacy in terms of shrines is relatively conflicted, even among the religious disputes that have scarred Britain. It is dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity, a suitably aspirational patronage for a cathedral that manages to rise above so much.

Starting at the more peaceful end of Norwich’s long history of veneration, there is a rare medieval effigy in the ambulatory thought to show St Felix, the French missionary who founded the first church in East Anglia and who has left his mark across the region.

Just next to this effigy is St Luke’s Chapel, which houses one of the most complete pieces of English devotional art from the medieval period. The Despenser Reredos depicts the Passion of Christ and was painted in 1381, surviving damage during the Reformation by being reused as a table top. It is named after a rather alarming bishop of this city, Henry le Despenser, who in addition to the pastoral care of his flock also led a blood-soaked Crusade in France and conducted a military campaign to suppress the Peasant’s Revolt. The beautiful reredos was painted that same year, perhaps in thanks for his victory over the common folk of Norfolk.

Bishops these days are made of gentler stuff but continue to commission inventive and creative artworks to embellish their buildings. In 2019, a helter-skelter was installed in this cathedral over the summer, attracting visitors and also affording a close-up view of some of the magnificent roof bosses.

So much else of this cathedral speaks of superlatives and artistic ingenuity. The famous spire is the second tallest in Britain after Salisbury, while the scale of its cloisters is matched by the vast extent of the cathedral close, which is the size of a small village. The Anglo-Saxon cathedral was originally at North Elmham, where only the ruins survive of an important ecclesiastical capital. The bishop’s seat was subsequently transferred to Norwich in 1094.

As for its complicated pilgrimage legacy, the cathedral once had the shrine of a local saint, a young boy of 12 found murdered in 1144. Some blamed the Jewish community at the time, although the sheriff refused to prosecute because their claims lacked any credible evidence. Indeed the church itself later suppressed the cult of William of Norwich, in the years leading up to the Reformation. His shrine has long since disappeared. This one-time saint is no doubt grateful to lie in peaceful anonymity, his cult mired in anti-Semitism from the outset.

A more conventionally saint-like figure is also linked to Norwich. Elizabeth Fry was born in the city and the Quaker Meeting House which she attended can still be seen, though it is kept locked. A famous penal reformer, she was shocked by the abject squalor in which women prisoners were forced to live with their children. Fry campaigned tirelessly for the humane treatment of prisoners and was the first woman to give evidence to Parliament. Her grave is in the Friends’ cemetery on Whiting Road in Barking, Essex. Quakers don’t recognize the idea of sainthood, but it is not disrespectful to say her life and legacy are comparable to those of a saint.

And finally, no pilgrim to Norwich can truly rest before taking in the city’s Roman Catholic cathedral, particularly with its reliquary claiming to hold fragments of the manger, the swaddling clothes, hay, and a crumb of the stable wall.

Directions

Norwich Cathedral, The Close, Norwich NR1 4EH

www.cathedral.org.uk

W3W: bids.lace.forum

GPS: 52.6318N 1.3001E

Norwich Cathedral is on the east side of the city. It is open daily 7:30 am-6 pm. Admission is free, and donations are welcome. The Meeting House that Elizabeth Fry attended on Upper Goat Lane (GPS: 52.6299N 1.2912E), which runs between Pottergate and Saint GilesStreet: www.norwichquakers.org.uk. The place of her birth is marked by a plaque at Gurney Court, off Magdalen Street. The RC Cathedral of St John the Baptist is on Unthank Rd, Norwich NR2 2PA.