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> cathedral cities like Cambridge or Oxford Oxford cathedral is actually the college chapel of Christ Church, a college of Oxford University. It's not open to
by denton-scratch 3y ago
> cathedral cities like Cambridge or Oxford
Oxford cathedral is actually the college chapel of Christ Church, a college of Oxford University. It's not open to the public. You need a letter from your anglican parish priest confirming that you are a church member if you want to visit.
It's not even a landmark; the chapel is inside the college walls, and barely visible from the street. The striking tower over Christ Church (Tom Tower) is over the college gatehouse, and not part of the chapel.
Tom Tower, by the way, is named for Great Tom, the bell that chimes the hours. It used to chime local time, which in Oxford is nine minutes behind UTC. Nowadays it chimes UTC hours (formerly GMT).
- timthorn 3y agoAnd Cambridge doesn't have a cathedral. That would be in Ely, though Great St Mary's is a big church.
- fredley 3y agoNot as big as King's Chapel over the road though!
- thom 3y agoI suppose I’m guilty of conflating dreaming spires and river punts with Anglican dioceses, I just didn’t want prospective students to rock up on an open day disappointed. :)
- denton-scratch 3y agoI think the best "dreaming spire" is the spire of St. Mary's Church, billed as the University Church. There's a spiral staircase up the inside of the spire, made of very worn stone, and a narrow viewing platform around the top, from which you can look down and see the layout of the quads of several of the most-famous colleges. And you can rub noses with a couple of gargoyles.