Editing Westminster (section)

===Recorded origin===
A charter of 785, possibly a forgery, grants land to ''the needy people of God in Thorney, in the dreadful spot which is called Westminster''. The text suggests a pre-existing monastic community who chose to live in a very challenging location.

The recorded origins of the Abbey (rather than a less important religious site) date to the 960s or early 970s, when [[Saint Dunstan]] and [[Edgar of England|King Edgar]] installed a community of [[Benedictine]] [[monk]]s on the site.<ref name=wpage>{{cite web|title='Benedictine monks: St Peter's abbey, Westminster', in A History of the County of London: Volume 1, London Within the Bars, Westminster and Southwark|first=William|last=Page|location=London|year=1909|pages=433–457|url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/london/vol1/pp433-457|access-date=28 July 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180729013141/https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/london/vol1/pp433-457|archive-date=29 July 2018|url-status=live}}</ref>

Between 1042 and 1052, King [[Edward the Confessor]] began rebuilding St Peter's Abbey to provide himself with a royal burial church. It was the first church in England built in the [[Romanesque architecture|Romanesque]] style. The building was completed around 1060 and was consecrated on 28 December 1065, only a week before Edward's death on 5 January 1066.<ref>Eric Fernie, in Mortimer ed., ''Edward the Confessor'', pp. 139–143</ref> A week later, he was buried in the church; and, nine years later, his wife [[Edith of Wessex|Edith]] was buried alongside him.<ref>Pauline Stafford, 'Edith, Edward's Wife and Queen', in Mortimer ed., ''Edward the Confessor'', p. 137</ref> His successor, [[Harold Godwinson|Harold II]], was probably crowned in the abbey, although the first documented coronation is that of [[William the Conqueror]] later the same year.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://westminster-abbey.org/our-history/royals/william-the-conqueror |title=William I (the Conqueror) |publisher = Westminster-abbey.org |date=2016 |access-date=21 July 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160916025458/http://westminster-abbey.org/our-history/royals/william-the-conqueror |archive-date=16 September 2016 |url-status=live }}</ref>
[[File:BayeuxTapestryScene26.jpg|thumb|upright=1.7|left|St Peter's Abbey at the time of King [[Edward the Confessor]]'s funeral, depicted in the [[Bayeux Tapestry]]]]

The only extant depiction of Edward's abbey, together with the adjacent [[Palace of Westminster]], is in the [[Bayeux Tapestry]]. Some of the lower parts of the monastic dormitory, an extension of the south transept, survive in the Norman Undercroft of the Great School, including a door said to come from the previous [[Anglo-Saxons|Saxon]] abbey. Increased endowments supported a community that increased from a dozen monks in Dunstan's original foundation, up to a maximum of about eighty monks.<ref>Harvey 1993, p. 2</ref>