Home»All Photographs»Cathedrals, Abbeys and Churches»Eastern England»Ely Cathedral - The Ship of the Fens

Another statement of the political reality of the Norman Conquest, built as a symbol of power after the final Angle Freedom Fighter Hereward the Wake surrendered his stronghold in 1070AD on the island od Ely amidst the marshlands of what is now Cambridgeshire. An abbey had existed on the site since the late 600s AD, founded by Ethelreda, a daughter of an Anglo-Saxon King and refounded as a Benedictine Abbey in about 970AD. The abbey became a Cathedral in 1105, instantly halfing the monastic revenues which then had to be shred with the bishop.