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The simplistic answer would be the cult of the martyred St Thomas Becket, whose magnificent shrine was the object of veneration and religious pilgrimages from 1220 to 1538.

This would be to ignore Canterbury's role as the mother Church of all England and the seat of the leading Archbishop in the country; it also ignores the magnificence of the building itself which was enough on its own to draw visitors.

Canterbury was also a primary seat of knowledge and learning, based at its two scriptoria (one at the Cathedral Priory and the other at nearby St Augustine's Abbey). Books from all over Europe were taken to Canterbury for copying, preserving texts dating back to the Carolignian and Late Roman era on a very wide range of subjects - Canterbury's monastic library was the envy of all England. A specific "Canterbury school" or style of writing and illumination was developed that allows scholars today to identify the source of texts now held elsewhere (some in Germany, Denmark and the USA) as being the scriptoria at Canterbury; this style influenced other monasteries such as the Cathedral Priory at Rochester.

It is often forgotten that there were also relics of a huge number of other Saints housed at Canterbury cathedral, even before Thomas Becket was sanctified.

Visiting the shrines of Saints was considered a religious virtue and a "credit" in progressing to Heaven. Some people sought miraculous cures for illnesses or deformities; others sought intercession and forgiveness for sins, or some other assistance. Pilgrims flocked to Canterbury in large numbers.

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13y ago

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