Talk:Gloucester Cathedral

School involvement
The article mentions that the King's School uses the Cathedral for events, but fails to mention that another old Gloucester School, Crypt School, also uses it. I am reluctant to edit the article and add more information unless other wikipedians agree that it should be mentioned. Arawn 23:32, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * How much does the Crypt School use the Cathedral? The King's School is very closely associated with the cathedral with daily contact (via the choir and the buildings) whereas the Crypt school is perhaps a little less so. Still it's a good point and if you think it's worth mentioning in the context of the Cathedral, then put it in by all means. If someone disagrees they'll take it out. That's the way it works around here. Naturenet | Talk 08:43, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your reply. The Crypt School has the use of the Cathedral for a whole day a least once a year during the school's "Foundation Day" celebrations (I attended Crypt School). I think perhaps just adding a line such as "Crypt School also has occasional use of the Cathedral" would be sensible. Do you agree? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Arawn (talk • contribs) 04:47, 22 March 2007 (UTC).

Info Box problem again!
The great big info box is causing a huge break in the text. The person who placed it doesn't seem to EVER use the show preview option! See same complaint at Canterbury, Bristol, Ely, Chester etc etc etc etc !Amandajm (talk) 07:43, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Architectural rating
No-one reading this article would even begin to suspect that the choir of Gloucester is reproduced in every single book on English architecture. 08:52, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Three choirs festival
The statement "The festival is held in every third year at Gloucester and is the oldest annual musical festival in the world" contains a rather obvious oxymoron. If it is every 3 years it isnt annual. 82.152.159.30 (talk) 19:47, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
 * 3 Choirs, three hosts. The festival rotates around the catehdrals of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester.  So yes, it is an annual festival, but each indvidual concert only hosts it every third year.  David Underdown (talk) 20:13, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Foundations
On a recent visit to the cathedral, I was told that it does not have any foundations (beyond the crypt). I was told by cathedral staff that the whole thing is built on wet mud, and would start subsiding if that mud began to dry out. So I've found the section on 'foundations' a bit confusing - are there foundations or not?! If I come across a good source for this information, I shall clarify the article - but please feel free to beat me to it! Thanks. Crinoline (talk) 20:26, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Broken link?
The Harry Potter link at the bottom of this page seems to have been changed. It goes to a website with non-english characters that appears to have nothing to do with Harry Potter or Gloucester. I haven't removed it since it may be a temporary problem with the external link, and I'm not sure of the procedure. Djkempoz (talk) 02:18, 29 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Delete it. The site went dead and the domain taken over. Saffron Blaze (talk) 13:45, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Date of establishment/completion?
The article said "established 681" and "rebuilt 1058" but we don’t know what happened in 681 (and 1058); and the infobox refers to 1499. But we don’t know whether in 681 there was a functioning church there holding services or whether in 681 an abbot (?) said "Let’s build a church here" ? I would say that it was completed in 681 if there were regular services held in the church even if more alterations were completed in 1058 and 1499. Hugo999 (talk) 23:05, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
 * - Thanks for bringing this to the Talkpage. For me, there is a critical difference between the date a building was founded/established and the date it was completed. You want to change the current Category, "681 establishments", to the sub-category, "Religious buildings and structures completed in 681". But they are very different. Historic England, "founded by Osric c681", and Pevsner, "the minster was founded c.679 by Osric", broadly agree as to the date of foundation. But nothing of that early building survives. The foundation stone of the cathedral that stands today and which is the subject of this article, was laid in 1089, 400 years after the founding date, and HE goes on to describe the rest of the building thus: "includes major portions of the Romanesque church built 1089-1100 for Abbot Serlo, the nave completed 1104-22, the timber roof of nave replaced by vault completed 1242; south aisle of nave rebuilt in Decorated style 1319-29; south transept remodelled with innovative use of Perpendicular details 1331-6; presbytery remodelled in developed Perpendicular style 1337-67, followed by the north transept 1368-73; the two west bays of nave and west front rebuilt and the south porch added c1420; central tower rebuilt c1450; Lady Chapel rebuilt late C15", before detailing major repairs of the 18th/19th and 20th centuries. Given this building history, it seems to me very misleading to the reader to describe the cathedral as "complete" by 681. If they went to Gloucester and did a circuit of the building, they would not see one stone which dates from 681. How then can our article suggest that the building was complete by that date? KJP1 (talk) 10:04, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
 * The expanded entry on Gloucester in Pevsner and Metcalf's The Cathedrals of England takes us a little further. The original building was Osric's, of 681. In 909, Ethelflaed founded St Oswald's Priory on, or near?, the site, which became St Peter's Abbey. Then, in 1058, Aldred of Worcester founded a new church, Gloucester Abbey?, "a little further from the place". This in turn, or on a site close by, was replaced by the beginnings of the building we see today, the abbey of Serlo, begun in 1089. The genesis is very confusing, but the bottom line is that nothing, or almost nothing, of the present building had been begun by 681, let alone been completed by that date. KJP1 (talk) 11:48, 30 January 2021 (UTC)

Re-order and expansion
I've done a bit of work on this. In brief: A couple of things. The architecture section is quite brief, and that for the main building, almost completely unreferenced. I'll have a go at expanding this. I'm unsure as to the value of the Timeline, again it's almost completely uncited. And I'm unclear what the book in Further reading is adding. Does it contain useful information on music at Gloucester? If so, could it not be used and cited in the body? Thoughts, on these issues, and any others on how the article might be improved, would be much appreciated. KJP1 (talk) 15:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
 * re-ordered;
 * put the images in galleries to avoid long strings;
 * sfn'd - only 4 books, so hope not too annoying for anyone;
 * added listing details.

Bits and pieces
KJP1 (talk) 18:22, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
 * V&A candlestick - Commons
 * Domesday Book
 * Shakespeare 4th Folio

Merged material from Gloucester Abbey
I have merged in material from Gloucester Abbey prior to converting that page into a Re-direct of this. The Talk and the History are both preserved at the re-direct page,. Thanks and acknowledgement to all authors who contributed to the Abbey article. My apologies in advance if I've not gone about it correctly. KJP1 (talk) 14:37, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

Francis Niblett
I've removed this addition as I can find no mention either of the architect or of the source. It can go back in with proper sourcing, of course, KJP1 (talk) 03:08, 23 November 2023 (UTC):
 * "The ceiling of the south choir aisle was carefully rebuilt 1878 by Francis Niblett using some of the original stone work that could be salvaged (ref: Francis Niblett Architect - local publication - D Alderton 1923 p88."

KJP1 (talk) 03:08, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

Age contradiction
In the article there's a paragraph which says:

Modern period
''The cathedral celebrated its 900th anniversary in 1989. In 2015 Rachel Treweek was installed as bishop, the first woman to be appointed to a diocesan bishopric in the history of the Church of England. In September 2016 Gloucester Cathedral joined the Church of England's 'Shrinking the footprint' campaign, intended to reduce the Church of England's carbon emissions by 80% by 2050. The cathedral commissioned a solar array on the cathedral roof which is expected to reduce the cathedral's energy costs by 25%. The installation was completed by November 2016, making the 1,000-year-old cathedral the oldest one in the UK with a solar installation.''

The start of the paragraph says it celebrated its 900th anniversary in 1989 and the end of the paragraph says it was 1000 years old in 2016. But if its 900th was in 1989 wouldnt that make it 927 years old in 2016 not 1000? I realise it says 1000 in the source and there's no source for the '900th anniversary in 1989' part but isn't there a way that we can rectify this contradiction without braking any of Wikipedia's rules? Thomas Norren (talk) 05:36, 31 March 2024 (UTC)


 * It's a bit of journalistic licence. The traditional founding date is 1089. I've tweaked it. KJP1 (talk) 07:58, 31 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sweat, thank you Thomas Norren (talk) 08:08, 31 March 2024 (UTC)