Abstract

the london journal, Vol. 46 No. 1, March 2021, 112–116 Reviews St Stephen’s College, Westminster: A Royal Chapel and English Kingship, 1348–1548.By ELI- ZABETH BIGGS. Pp. v + 248 + 6 illustrations + 1 map. Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2020. £60. ISBN 0955-2480. Hardback. St. Stephen’s College would have been well known to Londoners in the fifteenth and early six- teenth centuries, because it’s chapel and cloister welcomed anyone approaching Westminster Abbey, the palace, and its attendant courts from the Thames. The college was dissolved in 1548 in the second chantries act, and the chapel, which had been taken over as a meeting place for the Commons, burned in 1834 along with the Old Palace of Westminster. With both the loss of most of its archive and its fabric, St. Stephen’s as an institution and place is less well-known now. Elizabeth Biggs’ not only assembles what we know about the college but situates that information in a robust analysis of the college’s relationship to royal piety and government practice. Founded in 1348 by King Edward III, St. Stephen’s College and Chapel were intended as a royal foundation to honour dynasty and the royal dead, and to serve as a