Bury St Edmunds

Bury St Edmunds is a town in the county of Suffolk, England. It is the main town in the borough of St Edmundsbury and is probably most famous for the ruined abbey which stands near the town centre. The abbey is a shrine to Saint Edmund, the Saxon King of the East Angles, who was killed by the Danes in 869 AD. The town initially grew around Bury St. Edmunds Abbey, a site of pilgrimage, and developed into a flourishing clothmaking town by the 14th century. The town is closely associated with Magna Carta, in 1214 the barons of England met in the Abbey Church and swore that they would force King John to accept the Charter of Liberties, later known as Magna Carta.

Other Trivia

The abbey gardens had an Internet bench installed in the late 1990s, which allowed anyone to plug in a portable computing device and connect to the Internet. It was the first bench of its kind, though within the first week of it being there, two teenagers discovered a flaw: that one could also make free telephone calls from the bench. They contacted Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, in person to tell him about this problem.

Related Topics:
Internet - 1990s - Bill Gates - Microsoft

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The town has a small Theatre Royal which is a vital part of the town's cultural identity. The theatre will undergo a major renovation starting in late 2005. Every May, Bury St Edmunds holds its annual festival including concerts, plays, dance and culminating in fireworks.

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Bury St Edmunds boasts Britain's first internally illuminated street sign, the pillar of salt. When built, it had to be granted special permission because it did not conform to regulations.

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The rock bands Miss Black America and The Dawn Parade are from Bury. So is the author Alexander Deane.

Related Topics:
Rock band - Miss Black America - The Dawn Parade - Alexander Deane

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The name Bury is a form of borough, which has cognates in many languages e.g. German burg, Greek pyrgos; it originates from the Chaldean perach. For a fuller explanation, see borough.

Related Topics:
Cognates - German - Greek - Chaldean - Borough

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