Guild Chapel, Stratford

This is the Guild Chapel. It's right beside New Place, which was Shakespeare's final house. The Guild of the Holy Cross was already in existence in 1269 when Bishop Godfrey Giffard of Worcester granted a licence to the brethern of the Guild to build a chapel, which they did.

The present fabric of the chancel of the Chapel incorporates portions of the original building, but the nave and tower were added int he fifteenth century.
The chapel is probably most well known for this big painting here, which is a mural representing the Day of Judgement, otherwise known as the Doom. It was painted shortly after the year 1500. Even though it is faded, it was one of the largest surviving versions of its kind in Britain. It once formed part of a series of frescoes that lines the walls of the Guild Chapel.

Shakespeare's father was obliged to supervise the defacements of these decorations while serving as a Chamberlain to the Corportation of Stratford in 1563, the year before William Shakespeare was born.

More than twenty of the lost painting were discovered under whitewash in 1804, but those in the chancel did not survive the renovation to the Chapel undetaken in that year, and several of the others perished in 1835, when a gallery was erected at the west of the nave.

Following the removal of this gallery in November 1955, the last of the existing frescoes were brought to light. They are now preserved behind hinged sections of the wall. I assume that if you had a person working at the church they could show you - but no one was there when I visited.
Lovely stained glass, though. Not sure how old it is.
This is looking back from the front of the church. Yep, I was all alone in there.
I like the skull.
You can see some of the remnants of the painting on this wall.

These were an artist's reconstruction of the paintings in the church - what they would've looked like when brand new.
And here's what they look like now. Most of the color has faded, except for the green.

Again, quite a few strange gargoyles around here. The last one looks as though he's got a tongue-ring.

The brown buildings attached to the church make up the King Edward VI Grammer School. Shakespeare was apparently educated here, and it is still a school. The old school room (from the original school) is still used as a classroom here. You can't visit, because it's still a school.

These white houses, which are also attached to the church and school, are the almshouses. They were built in the early 15th century to provide homes for 'aged local people'. Apparently it is still used for this purpose. Awful pretty place to live!

Up next we're off to Warwick castle!

Holy Trinity Church, Stratford

This is the Holy Trinity Church in Stratford, most famous for being the church where Shakespeare is buried.

There is a record of a building on this site as early as 845. This building would've been most likely constructed of wood, and as such, nothing remains. The information booklet also says that it is most likely that the Normans rebuilt the church in stone but again, nothing remains. The present church dates from 1332, although they say that the transepts were built about 1210.

The church is not built in a straight cross, it is what they call a 'weeping chancel', meaning the top of the church is bent to the left. This is supposed to be symbolic because in all the pictures Jesus' head on the cross was to the left. Very strange but whatever.

While the best view of the church is from across the river, you'll have to make do with a peek between the trees.
Here is the entrance to the church. I imagine that there would've been statues in those two areas, but they are long gone.
There was, however, some pretty amusing gargoyles.


And some lovely stained glass. As you can see, they were working on about half of the church and had that part in scaffolding. There was still plenty to see, though.

These are misericords. Medieval carvers had considerable freedom in what they did and often seized the opportunity with relish and imagination, says the information booklet. The picture on the top shows a woman simultaneously pulling a man's beard, hitting him with a pan, and kicking him! Not sure what he did to deserve that... There are a total of 26 or so of these on the seats around the chapel, and they are all different.
This is a font that dates from the 15th century, and is most likely the one that Shakespeare was baptised in. It was probably removed in the 17th century when the Puritan zeal of Cromwell's commonwealth was at its height, but saved from totaly destruction by Thomas Paine, the parish Clerk, who died in 1747. Having for some years been used as a cattle trough, it was found in a local garden and restored to the chancel in 1823, albeit in broken form.
This, as I'm sure you can imagine, is Shakespeare's grave. He died on 23 April 1616. The fact that he is buried in a pretty important place in the church has nothing to do with the fact that he was a famous playwright (says the church), but that he was a 'lay rector'. He donated a considerable amount of money to the church, effectively buying his way into an important gravesite.

There is also a photo of the curse that appears carved into the stones, and it reads:

"Good friend for Jesus sake for be are

To digg the dust encloased heare.

Blese be ye man ty spares thes stones,

and curst be he ty moved my bones".

So basically, don't touch my shit or ye be damned! Hahaha.
This is the memorial above Shakespeare's grave. It was built by Gerard Johnson within a few years of Shakespeare's death. It was restores in 1974 after a lot of research into the original coloring, and apparently he was, in fact, originally painted somewhat orange.
Here's looking back at the church - you can see the scaffolding. Not sure what they are doing.
This is an 'ancient sanctuary knocker'. Not sure how old it is, it doesn't say, but apparently by grasping it, fugitives from the law could find safety in Holy Trinity Church for 37 days before facing trial.
And look! I found Ye Olde Harry Potter! Very very strange.

All in all I loved this church, it had a lot of history and was fun to visit. Up next is another church - the Guild Chapel.

Stratford Butterfly Farm

Shortly after we arrived in Stratford we headed over to the Butterfly Farm, which is apparently England's biggest. It was, in fact, quite lovely. Definitely puts the Calgary Zoo's butterfly section to shame. Utter utter shame.

The blue ones were my favorite - they were huge and very much attracted to my bright green shirt, which was lots of fun.

There was just simply a huge population of them - they were everywhere! No need to hunt for them, they swooped at you.
They also had birds! These are Chinese Button Quails, and I love them. They were so tiny, I just wanted to scoop them up and hold them!









Butterflies butterflies everywhere! I don't know what type of butterfly most of them are, so don't ask.
These are butterfly eggs! Crazy huh? They will eventually turn into caterpillars.
This butterfly liked Kirsten, too!


These were the blue ones that kept landing on me. This is the only one I got a picture of, since my camera is difficult to manage backwards. Kirsten got some pictures of the butterflies on me, I think.
It was neat watching their little feeder-tongue things come out to taste the orange. They tried it on my t-shirt as well, but apparently they didn't like the taste of cotton.
One more picture of the birds for the road. Aren't they cute!

Considering the admission price was so cheap, I would definitely recomend visiting if you like butterflies at all. They also had a section with large spiders and other crawly things like bettles and iguanas. Very cool indeed.