The surprising secrets of Durham Cathedral revealed

Most of them walked in through the north door, admired the nave, looked at the tomb of St Cuthbert and left.

Here are the surprising secrets they may have missed.

It contains the world’s first structural pointed arch

Before Durham, every great building in Europe used rounded, Roman arches.

The cathedral’s builders, working on the nave between 1093 and 1133, were the first in the world to use a structural pointed transverse ribbed vault, the architectural invention that made Gothic cathedrals possible.

Without the engineers who worked out the geometry in this building in the north of England, there would be no Notre Dame, no Chartres, no Westminster Abbey as we know them.

(Image: Phoebe Abruzzese)

The walls and ceiling were originally painted in vivid colour

The pale sandstone interior you see today is not what medieval worshippers experienced.

The cathedral’s ceilings, walls and columns were originally painted in rich blues, reds and gold, and traces of the original paint survive in places if you know where to look.

The great cylindrical pillars of the nave, each 6.6 metres round and 6.6 metres high, almost certainly blazed with colour when first carved.

The Sanctuary Knocker on the north door gave murderers 37 days of protection

The bronze lion’s head on the north door is one of the most recognisable objects in the cathedral, but most people do not know what it was for.

Any fugitive who reached the door and grasped the ring, regardless of what they had done, was granted 37 days of sanctuary inside the cathedral.

Monks were stationed in a small room above the door, watching day and night, ready to ring the Galilee bell the moment someone seized the knocker.

The fugitive was given a black gown with St Cuthbert’s cross on the shoulder, housed in a small room, and fed at the abbey’s expense.

After 37 days they had to choose: face trial, or confess their crime, swear never to return to England, and walk to the coast.

The right of sanctuary was abolished in 1624. The knocker on the door today is a replica; the 12th-century original is in the cathedral museum.

It houses the tomb of the Venerable Bede

The Galilee Chapel at the west end of the cathedral is the resting place of Bede, the 7th-century monk from Jarrow who wrote the first history of the English people and is one of only two English people ever declared a Doctor of the Church.

Bede rarely left his monastery at Jarrow during his lifetime, but his remains were brought to Durham in 1022, placed initially with St Cuthbert’s relics, and moved to their permanent home in the Galilee Chapel around 1370.

There is a story that a monk tasked with composing a Latin inscription for the gravestone was struggling to find the right words, and left blanks overnight, only to find in the morning that an unseen hand had filled them in.

The Bishop’s throne is taller than the Pope’s

Bishop Hatfield, who served in the 14th century, allegedly sent representatives to Rome specifically to measure the height of the papal throne so he could order one an inch taller.

The Cathedra at Durham remains, on that basis, the highest bishop’s throne in Christendom.

It was a prison for 2,500 Scottish soldiers

During the English Civil War, worship at the cathedral was suspended entirely. Between 1650 and 1651, 2,500 Scottish prisoners of war captured at the Battle of Dunbar were held inside the building.

They burned almost everything wooden to keep warm through the winter, but left the medieval Prior’s Clock completely untouched.

The reason, according to tradition, is that a thistle, the emblem of Scotland, is carved into the clock, and the prisoners respected it too much to destroy it.

(Image: NORTHERN ECHO)

It holds the only surviving copy of the 1216 Magna Carta

Durham Cathedral’s collection contains three issues of Magna Carta, from 1216, 1225 and 1300, along with three Forest Charters.

The 1216 copy is the only surviving example of that particular issue anywhere in the world.

Three clauses from the 1225 issue remain in force in English law today.

The Prince Bishops were a state within a state

The cathedral was the spiritual centre of one of the most unusual political arrangements in English history.

From 1075, the Bishops of Durham held the powers of a sovereign ruler within the territory between the Tyne and the Tees, with the right to raise their own army, mint their own coins, levy their own taxes and hold their own courts.

This arrangement lasted, largely intact, until 1836, when the palatinate rights were finally transferred to the Crown.

The last Prince Bishop, William Van Mildert, used what remained of his wealth to co-found Durham University in 1832.

(Image: NORTHERN ECHO)

It costs £6 a minute to maintain

The cathedral holds more than 1,700 services a year and is free to enter.

Running costs stand at approximately £60,000 per week, around £6 per minute, funded entirely by donations, visitor income and charitable support.