Imagine being walled into a tiny, coffin-like space for the rest of your life, never to leave, never again to see daylight nor feel the touch of human flesh, watching the years go by through a grille on the wall as you lose your mind, die, and are buried underneath.

Welcome to the world of the medieval anchorite.

In this harrowing talk, historian Matthew Green will transport you into the anguished psychological world of London’s anchorites and anchoresses, revealing why — far from being a terrible punishment — this ‘living death’ was in fact considered the noblest of vocations in the Middle Ages. So much so that there were ten-year waiting lists for every time a cell became available.

Hear about some of the most famed men and women who embraced the Order of the Anchorite, their elaborate initiation ceremonies, why this extraordinary phenomenon abruptly died out in the sixteenth century and where you can find surviving anchorholds today.

The talk is guaranteed to haunt your dreams. But surprise yourself and see if you can feel a tinge of nostalgia for this sequestered existence in today’s increasingly virtual world.

Tickets £12 including a Victorian punch and a 20% donation to a host of restoration projects at Brompton Cemetery. Please click here to purchase.

DR MATTHEW GREEEN
Dr Matthew Green has a doctorate from the University of Oxford in the History of London. He is the author of London: A Travel Guide Through Time (Penguin), described as 'immersive and all-sensory' (— Sunday Times), 'fascinating' (—Telegraph) and 'easily the best social history of London for a decade' (— Londonist). He runs immersive historical tours of London each week, including firm favourites The Coffeehouse Tour and Medieval Wine Tour, a six-part evening course on the history of London in Pimlico. His new book is Shadowlands: A Journey Through Lost Britain (Faber), a Times Top 10 bestseller, Waterstones Book of the Year, and praised by Iain Sinclair as 'a miraculous work of resurrection.’