Talk:St Paul's Cathedral
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Does anyone know what the quote "Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee." means to St. Paul's Cathedral?
- It has nothing to do with St Paul's per se; it is a line from a poem by John Donne, who was Dean of St. Paul's in the early 17th century (i.e. before the fire; his monument is one of the few which survive from the old St. Paul's. Doops | talk 06:45, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
Design
I remember watching a TV programme a couple of years ago about the building of the cathedral (which was mainly about the astonishing level of corruption in public life at that time - the foreman of the works was paid peanuts, but made a large fortune out of the building). The approved design had (I think) a smaller dome with a tower on the top, and Wren kept the dome covered up until it was built so nobody could object to his preferred but rejected design until it was too late. However, I have no evidence for this other than my leaky memory, and church architecture isn't my thing. Does anyone else know more? --Andrew Norman 12:52, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)
Found some information about this on the BBC website, and I'll add it now. --Andrew Norman 15:30, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)
I remember seeing a TV programme which mentioned a story about the crest of a Phoenix on the portico of the south end of the cathedral (/media/wikipedia/en/b/b3/StPaulsCathedralSouth.jpg). I'm not sure how accurate this is, but Wren asked a workman to find a piece of stone to be used to mark out the centre of the dome on the ground during construction after the original burnt down. The workman returned a piece of a gravestone with RESURGAM on it. Apparently this is Latin for "I will rise again", and this inspired the Phoenix crest with the word Resurgam written underneath it, also appropriate as a Phoenix is supposed to rise from the ashes. Would this be worthwhile on the main page?
Name
St Paul's Cathedral spells it St Paul's and not St. Pauls on their website... I was going to move the article to either St. ... or Saint ... but apparently the Dean of St Paul's refers to it as St Paul's. Pedant 2005 July 2 03:07 (UTC)
tax
Anybody have a useful source to hand so we can supply the details about the coal tax used to fund the construction? Doops | talk 06:43, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
Photographs
I have removed this image from the article because I am unsure about its copyright status, and it doesn't "fit" in the Historical Images gallery. I've placed a similar example (with a PD status) in line with all the other images. Just as an aside, the actual building is unusual in that it's an extremely good photographic subject, but very difficult to capture in its entirety. I wonder if we can find an image from after the Blitz when much of the surrounding buildings were levelled, or maybe a moderen aerial photograph? --Surgeonsmate 17:48, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
I've moved a contemporary image out of the Historical Images gallery. I really like the way that the Historical Images gallery gives a series of views of the history of the building, especially the way Wren's design replaced the rather grim-looking Old St Pauls. Perhaps it is overkill to have another gallery for modern images, what do others think? --Surgeonsmate 11:52, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
Date of completion
Where does 20 October 1708 comes from? According to the Cathedral's official site, it was completed on 1710. User:Ejrrjs says What? 08:57, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
- I'm not an expert on St Pauls (though I'd like to be!) and every source I can find on the web says that completion was in 1710, when the architect's son laid the topmost stone on the lantern, the building being from bottom to top, rather than the more usual east to west for a project of this size. (Building east to west meant that the completed portions could be used before the whole was complete, the usuable space growing progressively larger.) See the BBC article.
- We're going to look right gooses in 2009 if the 300th birthday party (complete with royal attendance, set of stamps, opening of Pret a Manger in the basement etc.) hasn't happened yet and we say it should have been in 2008. Perhaps our authority will be so immense by that stage that the Cathedral administration will bring the party forward, but this remains to be seen. --Surgeonsmate 17:11, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Listing
There's no online database of current listed buildings, but there is one of images of buildings which were listed as of 2000 - it's here: [1]. St Paul's is shown as "Grade A" for some reason - I have no idea what that means, I thought the listings were always numbers (Westminster Abbey is Grade I). --ajn (talk) 16:35, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Height
Does anyone know the height of St Paul's?
- 365 feet, according to http://www.virtualtourist.com/.
- Standing over 355 feet says http://stpauls.co.uk// (search for "feet" and read the 1710 article).
- This image from that same site says 355.5 feet: http://stpauls.co.uk/images/cut-away.gif The discrepancy (from 365 feet) looks like it might be the height of the cross atop the ball.
Legend of St Paul's?
Well, not a legend per se...
I briefly heard a saying in my history class, stating that if St Paul's is detroyed, Britain would follow. Did I hear this correctly or is that attributed to a different cathedral?
- Colosseum. The rooks of the Tower of London. --Wetman 20:35, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
WW2 bomb damage
The article says that the cathedral survived despite its being struck by "a" bomb, and in essence this is true. However, this BBC article says that on both 10 October 1940 and 17 April 1941, bombs did cause quite severe damage to the building, but that hasty cleanup work was done to preserve the myth of St Paul's "indestructible" status. Should that be mentioned here? Loganberry (Talk) 13:10, 15 May 2006 (UTC)