Newport Cathedral

Interior of Newport cathedral (St. Woolos) looking down the Nave to the High Alter

Architectural History

Original Church founded c. 500 AD, as a Celtic church of the grave by converted bandit,[St] Gwynllyw, founder of a dynasty of Saints. Woolos is an English corruption of his name.
Successive re-buildings pre- 1,000 AD of what is now the Galilee [entrance chapel], complete with remains of shuttered square window. It feels a very holy, spiritual and peaceful place.12th century: Fine Norman Nave.
12th century corbels supporting the roof of what was almost certainly then a blind south aisle.
Romanesque arch - doorway between Galilee Chapel and Norman Nave, mounted on pillars possibly taken from the Roman remains at nearby Caerleon.
Norman font, broken up at the Reformation and restored in the early 19th century
Later 12th century: rebuilding of Galilee Chapel.
13th century Chancel, later demolished, but bits of which were incorporated in later rebuilds.
15th century nave ceiling and north aisle. The nave ceiling is more or less contemporaneous with the hull of the newly discovered Newport ship and this fact reminds us that the words nave and navy share the same Spanish root.
15th century tower with its well-weathered statue thought to be that of Jasper Tudor, uncle of Henry VII and former governor of the Castle.
15th century steps and doors, leading to a medieval rood loft and subsequently to a 17th century Singing Gallery, both demolished.
!7th century, the creation of the Church as a Preaching Box, with high box pews, in the nave and its two aisles. Both Galilee and Chancel are allowed to decay.
19th century restorations by Habershon, Pyte and Faulkner. Windows put in south aisle to match those from the 15th century in the north. New Chancel built using at least some material from the Medieval Chancel it replaced. Medieval south porch with room above, used by visiting priests from Gloucester Abbey, which had the income of tithes from the living. It was demolished because it was seen, wrongly, as a seventeenth century addition.
Early 20th century restoration removes nineteenth century panels from the nave roof and brings in parquet flooring. It also replaces the box pews with modern ones.
Early 1960’s, Alban Caroe is commissioned to provide the Cathedral with a new Chancel to provide Cathedral Chapter members [Canons] with proper seating and a proper setting where needed foe ceremonial services. The stone of the old Chancel is used, which means that what seemed a medieval leper window finishes up in a strange place. Stone from a demolished Monmouthshire Church at Kemeys Inferior was also employed.
Caroe also is responsible for the extension creating the South aisle Chapel and for the Crindau altar.
At the same time, John Piper is commissioned to provide a huge canvass with rose window for the east end of the Chancel.