Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Saturday, 6 August 2022

The re-burial of Abbot Whethamstede


A week ago the bones of John Whethamstede, who served twice as Abbot of St Albans from 1420-40 and then again from 1451 until his death in 1465,were reinterred adjacent to the tomb of Humphrey Duke of Gloucester in the Shrine chapel of the former abbey and now cathedral. The BBC News website has an illustrated report on the service at How the mystery of the long lost Abbot was solved

I wrote about the discovery in 2017 of the Abbot’s remains in his destroyed chantry chapel in a 2020 post at Face to face with Abbot John Wheathamstead

That also looks at the facial reconstruction of the Abbot’s features, as does another article from the Herts Advertiser which can be seen at  

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