LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS: 

  Coventry, the three spires

  Arms of the town

  View from the top of bishop street

  Cook street gate

  Seal of the priory

  West end of the priory church

  Remains of the north-west tower in the eighteenth century

  St. Michael’s from the north

  St. Michael’s from the north-west

  Interior of the tower from below

  The west porch

  South porch from st. Mary hall

  South-west doorway

  Interior of st. Michael’s from the west

  Tower arch

  Bay of nave, north side

  Interior from the south door

  The choir from st. Lawrence’s chapel

  Poppy head, lady chapel

  Miserere, lady chapel

  Chest in north aisle

  The Nethermyl tomb

  The Swillington tomb

  Alms-Box

  Holy Trinity from the north (about 1850)

  Plan of Trinity church

  Interior of holy Trinity, from the west

  North side of nave-eastern bays

  Pulpit

  Archway between the north porch and st. Thomas’s chapel

  Alms-Box

  Church of st. John Baptist

  Plan

  Interior

  Clearstory windows

  The spire of Christ church

  Grey friars’ church (plan of crossing)

  St. Mary hall

  Plan

  Plan of st. Michael’s church

[Illustration:  View from the top of bishop street.]

CHURCHES OF COVENTRY

MONASTERY AND CITY

The opening words of Sir William Dugdale’s account of Coventry assert that it is a city “remarkable for antiquity, charters, rights and privileges, and favours shown by monarchs.”  Though this handbook is primarily concerned with a feature of the city he does not here mention—­its magnificent buildings—­the history of these is bound up with that of the city.  The connection of its great parish churches with the everyday life of the people, though commonly on a narrower stage, is more intimate than is that of a cathedral or an abbey church, but it is to be remembered that without its Monastery Coventry might never have been more than a village or small market town.

We cannot expect the records of a parish church to be as full and complete as those of a cathedral, always in touch through its bishops with the political life of the country and enjoying the services of numerous officials; or as those of a monastery, with its leisured chroniclers ever patiently recording the annals of their house, the doings of its abbots, the dealings of their house with mother church and the outside world, and all its internal life and affairs.