Back to St Wystan’s

I blipped this amazing Anglo Saxon crypt a few years ago. When a friend came to stay, I took her over to Repton but they were upgrading the electrics in the church and health and safety rules meant we couldn’t go in.

Success this morning.

These steep and uneven stone steps lead down to the crypt, constructed in the first half of the 8th century, during the reign of King Aethelbald. Later, a mausoleum, it became the final resting place of Mercian kings.

“holy air encased in stone” was how Sir John Betjeman described it.

The crypt was rediscovered in 1779, when a workman, digging a hole for a grave in the chancel floor, broke through the vaulting and fell in....

If you’re interested in the Anglo Saxon period, this treasure is well worth a visit.