The archaeology of St. Paul’s Cathedral up to 1666

This article summarises recent archaeological work in and around St Paid’s Cathedral, London, and reviews the evidence for the cathedral site from the Roman period, through the ten centuries from the foundation of the cathedral in 604 until the Great Fire of London in 1666 which destroyed the medieval building. Archaeological sources include observations since 1675, salvage work north of the cathedral in 1969, and interventions from 1994 to the present, both inside and around the Wren building. Four subjects are briefly reviewed: the evidence for the Saxon cathedral and its relation to Roman topography; the Romanesque cathedral; the Gothic cathedral; and the works of Inigo Jones in 1633-41. Recent archaeological work, though small in extent, has been the catalyst for bringing together all the evidence, over the last three and a half centuries, for the archaeological story of St Paul’s.