The little church which Lanfranc destroyed and which had seen so many
vicissitudes, was probably a work of the end of the fourth century, at
any rate in its foundations. Eadmer indeed who tells us all we know of
it says that it was built on the plan of St Peter's in Rome. "This
was that very church," he writes, "which had been built by Romans as
Bede witnesses in his history, and which was duly arranged in some
parts in imitation of the church of the blessed Prince of the Apostles,
Peter, in which his holy relics are exalted by the veneration of the
whole world." We shall never know much more than Eadmer tells us, for
if the foundations still exist they lie within the present church. It
is recorded, however, that in the time of St Elphege the church was
badly damaged by the Danes, the archbishop himself being martyred at
Greenwich. No doubt as often before, the church was patched up, only to
perish by fire in 1067, the year after the Battle of Hastings.
When Lanfranc then entered Canterbury, he found his Cathedral a mere
ruin, but with his usual energy, though already a man of sixty-five, he
set to work to re-establish not only his Cathedral but also the
monastery attached to it.
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