St Peter's Monastery

One of the UK's first stone-built churches, St. Peter’s, built on land given by King Ecgfrith to St. Benedict Biscop in 673 AD, is the earlier of the twin site (along with St Paul's Monastery, Jarrow.) to come to life.

In the church can be seen the original carved stone within a reconstruction of the abbot’s seat among many artifacts uncovered during the 1960s archaeological excavation conducted by Dame Professor Rosemary Cramp of Durham University.

Under Benedict Biscop's inspirational leadership and that of his assistant and successor Ceolfrith, Wearmouth-Jarrow went on to become a wonder of its time: a powerhouse of intellectual endeavour. It nurtured the great scholar Bede, and was a place full of beauty and fine craftsmanship, also having assembled one of the greatest libraries to be found in Europe at the time. Its architectural style and the techniques used to build the twin monastery had hardly been seen in Anglo-Saxon England since the departure of the Romans three centuries earlier.

The Property included in the two parts of this serial Nomination includes all of the known standing and buried remains of both of the Anglo-Saxon monastic complexes which saw these great developments. Its direct association with Bede, Biscop and Bede's teacher Ceolfrith makes it one of the most influential monastic sites in Europe.

Many Northumbrian saints are connected with St. Peter’s Church along with the Venerable Bede, namely St. Hild, Abbess of Whitby, whom Bede describes as having entered convent life “on land to the north of the Wear”, and the abbots of the twin monastery: St. Benedict Biscop, the patron saint of Sunderland, St. Ceolfrid, St. Eosterwine, St. Hwaetbehrt and St. Sigfrid, and St. Lawrence, to whom a chapel was dedicated at St. Peter’s in the time of the abbots. 

Education is an important feature of the heritage of the Wearmouth-Jarrow monastery.