The Project

The Project

This project, led by Dr Tim Ayers, will make available for the first time a full critical edition and translation of the fabric accounts for St Stephen’s Chapel in the Palace of Westminster, the greatest and most enduring site of English government. The chapel was rebuilt by Edward I from 1292, but completed only by Edward III in the 1360s. By this time, it had been richly decorated with architectural sculpture, stained glass and paintings.

Produced by the king’s exchequer and now in The National Archives, the manuscript accounts are exceptionally full. They document the processes of royal patronage in great detail and are fundamental to an understanding of English royal display. They are also of international significance as evidence for medieval crafts and their working practices, with a wide range of other potential applications for economic and social historians. The accounts are being transcribed and translated by Dr Maureen Jurkowski.

The project will run for two years in parallel with a wider, interdisciplinary research project entitled ‘St. Stephen's Chapel, Westminster: Visual and Political Culture, 1292-1941’ (1 October 2013 to 30 September 2016), on which Dr Ayers is the Co-Investigator.