Bedern Chapel

Former chapel of the Vicars Choral of York Minster

Location of plaque: Bedern Chapel, Bedern

In the year 1252 the Vicars Choral of York - the priests who sang mass and conducted daily prayer and worship in York Minster - were formed into a college and assigned their own precinct next to the cathedral. This became known as Bedern, from the early English words bede (prayer) and aern (house).

There were initially 36 Vicars - and they lived a fairly privileged lifestyle by the standards of the times. Drawing much of their income from singing masses for the wealthy dead, they were self-governing, choosing their own warden and possessing extensive estates. They dined together once a day, usually at 5pm, and archaeological evidence suggests that they lived well with a high-status diet, including venison.

They had an established hierarchy and their warden set certain rules - including one that stipulated new members should be confined to the precinct for the first six months.

Despite the apparent strictness of their lives, however, evidence suggest that the Vicars were not above temptation. Some seem to have gambled with dice (strictly forbidden) and others to have worn expensive jewellery and even silks. And there's more: written records reveal that there were some striking examples of indiscipline, including brawling, riotous drinking, carrying swords and ... women. Quite a few women. For the Vicars Choral, having a regular mistress (presumably as opposed to women of any other sort) was treated with leniency.

Despite being responsible for leading so many services at the Minster, for many years the Vicars had no chapel of their own. In the mid 1300s two Vicars - Thomas de Otteby and William Cotyngham - decided to pay for one themselves, a further sign of their wealth. Their chapel, completed in 1349, was consecrated by the Archbishop of Damascus (a suffragan of York). The chapel was well furbished, including with six stained glass windows.

The wealth and status of the Vicars gradually declined over the centuries. They survived in much reduced form, however, until 1868, when the remaining Vicars ceded their rights in Bedern to the ecclesiastical commissioners.

The chapel itself, which had been extended in 1400 and refurbished three times in later centuries, was damaged by fire in 1876. This perhaps explains its outward-leaning walls. Near derelict and no longer a place of worship, it was stripped and the roof and walls were lowered. A closing service was held in 1961. It survives today as the workshop of the York Glaziers’ Trust.