Bury St Edmunds; Abbey Gardens

Bury St Edmunds, commonly referred to locally as Bury, is a picturesque market town steeped in history; the Saxons founded a monastery here about 633, which in 903 became the burial place of King Edmund the Martyr and the town grew around Bury St Edmunds Abbey, a site of pilgrimage.

Our walking guide route starts at Abbot's Bridge, which dates back to the 12th century. We then enter the Abbey Gardens, a six hectare park on the site of the former Benedictine Abbey, and walk via the Sensory Gardens towards the Abbey Gate; in 1327 the Abbey was stormed by the townspeople, who destroyed the original Abbey Gate and much of the monastery. We then walk to the ruined buildings of the original monastery; on one of the pillars is a plaque commemorating the spot where, in 1214, the barons of England swore to compel King John to sign the document now known as the Magna Carta.  We double back to the Rose Garden and emerge into Cathedral Close to visit St Edmundsbury Cathedral itself; it only became a cathedral in 1914 and has been enlarged from the original parish church over the decades.

Outside it is a statue of St Edmund and a small row of residential homes built into the original abbey walls; we then see the Norman Tower which historically has served as the bell tower to the Cathedral.  We pass the Martyr's Memorial to reach the Charnel House, which was built in the 13th century in order to store bones previously buried in the Great Churchyard.  St Mary's church lies to its right; completed in 1427, this has the longest nave of any parish church in England.  We leave the Abbey Gardens and nearby you can see large pieces of the old abbey embedded within a wall which skirts a lane; when Henry VIII dissolved the Bury St Edmund's Abbey in 1539, the towns people moved quickly to re-use the stone flints and mortar - evidence of their recycling can still be seen throughout the town.Read more