The Crypt, Canterbury Cathedral From an Edwardian Post Card

What Happened to Thomas à Becket? - The Possibilities

At the present time, and pending any new evidence, there are several possibilities as to what might have happened to the mortal remains of St. Thomas.

There seems to be several options which are listed as they come to mind, not in order of the probablity of the particular event:

That the bones were disposed of as ordered by The King:

If the bones were indeed burnt as instructed by Henry VIII and the act could well have been supervised by Thomas Cromwell who was known to have visited Canterbury at the time.
One other item that could support this situation relates to the former Archdeacon of the Cathedral during this period, Archdeacon Nicholas Harpsfield, who was supposedly imprisoned, like so many other clerics, for refusing to take the oath to the King as the head of The Church of England. Apparently, in the margin of a register completed by the Archdeacon (and this is something that I still have to check), there is a note which reads, "the bones of St. Thomas burnt this day, God help us." The balancing entry to this states that Harpsfield became Archdeacon after the death of Henry and during the short reign of Mary Tudor and was not actually anywhere near Canterbury in 1538.

This leads on to another point:

Pure supposition is, that knowing what was about to happen, the monks of Canterbury, took the bones of The Saint out of the shrine and exchanged them for others that might have been dug up from their own burial ground. This was known to have happened at other Cathedrals.
A particular theory, still unproven, is that the bones still lie in another tomb, still in the Trinity Chapel. The tomb is supposed to belong to Odet de Coligny.
Against this possibility there is the fact that the monks may have been in fear of their own existence and not wanted to have risked tampering. At the same time, the obvious question is, why, during the reign of Mary Tudor, did the bones not appear again? The answer to this question could just be continued political uncertainty or the fact that the few that might have carried out the deed were no longer "in the area".

If the relics of The Saint had been moved, then where had they moved to:

The Eastern Crypt ©P.E.Blanche

The picture on the left is a section of the picture that appears at the beginning of this set of pages. The first Shrine of St. Thomas stood between the first and second pillars. In the background, you can just see a third pillar. In 1888, a grave was found between these two pillars and the bones that were found inside were examined. There has been all kinds of conjecture about these bones since 1888 although it was thought at the time, because of a wound on the side of the skull, that they were the bones of St. Thomas. A further examination of this same grave in 1949 suggests that the wound to the head was unlikely to have been caused by a sharp cutting weapon like a sword and there were other things, such as the possible age at death that seems to result in a conclusion that it is unlikely that these were the bones of The Saint.
One thing is not absolutely clear from the investigations on this grave site and that is, whether there was any attempt to see if the burial site, which was very shallow, contained a second or additional coffin or tomb below the one that was first discovered.
A report on the bones that was produced following the 1949 second opening of this site indicates that some of the bones were actually animal bones. This could indicate that the collection was hurredly put together at some point for burial here. But whay would that be and particularly in a spot so close to where St. Thomas had originally lain?

The possibility that the relics lie in The Chapel of St. Mary Magdalen in the Crypt is explored on a separate page.

Conclusion:

Quite frankly, I wonder whether there is or ever will be a conclusion, short of a JCB digger unearthing an unmarked grave by accident in the area of The Cathedral Precincts one of these days. There certainly is the possibilty that St. Thomas does still remain is his Cathedral somewhere but it is also quite possible that the instructions given by Henry VIII were actually carried out.

I'm also not quite sure what the Dean and Chapter of the Cathedral might do if the relics of this long-lost Catholic Saint did turn up, despite his obvious and important association with The Cathedral. There would be some most peculiar decisions to be made. But then again, it is suggested that there have been a select group of people through the ages that do know where the final resting place is. Perhaps the fact that it has never been divulged is exactly because no-one knows what a correct decision would be?

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