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St Bartholomew the Great is the oldest parish church in London. It was founded in 1171 by Rahere who legend says was the court jester to King Henry I. Rahere founded a priory here to give thanks to God and St Bartholomew for saving him from death by malaria when he was in Rome.

Rahere’s tomb can be seen here beyond the Norman arches. In June 1868 it was opened and one of his sandals was taken away. This so angered Rahere that it is said that his ghost still wanders the church looking for his missing footwear.

Simon Jenkins in ‘England’s Thousand Best Churches’ says of St Bartholomew the Great “The interior of St Bartholomew’s is among London’s most atmospheric. Not here the clean lines or cleared spaces of a Perpendicular or Georgian preaching house. This is a church of accretions and secret places, of incense, of sudden heights and unexpected shafts of light.” “Here is one of the last places where a fragment of the City’s pre-Victorian townscape can be savoured... the most impressive Norman remains in inner London after the Tower of London.”