Wimborne Minster (church)

Wimborne Minster
Wimborne Minster
Country	United Kingdom
Denomination	Church of England
Website	www.wimborneminster.org.uk
History
Dedication	Saint Cuthburga
Specifications
Tower height	Central Tower: 84 ft (26 m) West Tower: 95 ft (29 m)
Bells	13 change ringing bells, 2 clock bells
Tenor bell weight	29 long cwt 2 qr 20 lb (3,324 lb or 1,508 kg)
Administration
Parish	Wimborne Minster
Diocese	Salisbury
Province	Canterbury
Clergy
Rector	The Revd Canon Vanessa Herrick
Laity
Organist/Director of music	David Gostick
Listed Building – Grade I
Official name	The Minster Church of St Cuthburga
Designated	14 June 1952
Reference no.	1119581

Wimborne Minster, known locally as the Minster, is the parish church of Wimborne, Dorset, England. The Minster has existed for over 1300 years and is recognised for its unusual chained library (one of only five surviving chained libraries in the world). The Minster is a former monastery and Benedictine nunnery, and King Æthelred of Wessex is buried there.

The Minster is dedicated to Saint Cuthburga (sister to Ine, King of Wessex and wife of Aldfrith, King of Northumbria) who founded a Benedictine abbey of nuns at the present day minster c. 705. Saint Walpurga was educated in the monastery, where she spent 26 years before travelling to Germany, following the missionary call of her mother's brother Saint Boniface. Leoba was also educated in this place. A monastery for men was also built around this time, adjacent to the abbey. Over the next hundred years the abbey and monastery grew in size and importance.

In 871 King Ethelred I of Wessex, elder brother of Alfred the Great, was buried in the minster. Alfred was succeeded by his son Edward the Elder in 899, and Ethelred's son Ethelwold, rebelled and attempted to claim the throne. He seized a nun, probably of Wimborne, and made a stand there, probably because of its symbolic importance as his father's burial place, but he was unable to gain enough support to fight Edward and fled to the Vikings of Northumbria.