London Mithraeum

The London Mithraeum in London is a restored Roman temple built around 240 AD, located seven metres below street level beneath the Bloomberg building. Uncovered in 1954 by archaeologist W. F. Grimes, the site attracted 400,000 visitors in two weeks. Relocated after being improperly rebuilt on a car park roof, it displays Britain's earliest handwritten document, dated 8 January 57 AD, alongside 400 other Roman writing tablets.

London Β· from the walk β€œLondon's Big Kid Adventure” Β· audio ~4 min Β· Generated

London Mithraeum, 12 Walbrook, London EC4N 8AA

When was the London Mithraeum discovered by archaeologist W. F. Grimes?

So here's the story. This spot once sat on the east bank of the River Walbrook, a key freshwater source in Roman Londinium. That river's long gone now β€” buried under centuries of city β€” but back in around two forty AD, a Roman Londoner built a temple to the god Mithras on this reclaimed ground, right next to that river.......... Now, Mithras... this was no ordinary religion. Even in antiquity the rites were kept shrouded in secrecy, and male-only membership was proven with secret passwords and handshakes. Followers were organised into seven ranks, with the most senior being Pater, meaning father. Think of it as the original secret society of the City of London... long before the Freemasons ever turned up.......... The original temple was built partly underground, recalling the cave of Mithras where the Mithraic epiphany took place. Dark, windowless, lit by torches. And it sat here, forgotten, for over Seventeen Hundred years.......... Then comes nineteen fifty-four. London's still covered in bomb sites from the Blitz. Workers are clearing rubble to build a new office block, and the archaeologist W. F. Grimes is running a dig on a shoestring budget. Funds were growing short β€” it was reported that Grimes had only found the temple because a grant from the Ministry of two thousand pounds a year had kept him going. And here's the thing... on Saturday the eighteenth of September, nineteen fifty-four, on the Final day of planned excavation, the marble head of a statue of Mithras was uncovered from beneath the rubble. One more day and it would have been buried under concrete forever.......... What happened next was Extraordinary. Over a two-week period, an estimated four hundred thousand people flocked to the city to see the remains. On the first day alone, thirty-five thousand showed up! The News Chronicle reported β€” and I love this β€” "Sightseers Storm the Cordon." When darkness came, hundreds were still queuing. They got angry and dozens stormed through police barriers. So much for polite British queuing! The temple was twice discussed in Cabinet at the request of Prime Minister Churchill.......... But here's the bit that makes a cabbie's blood boil. After all that fuss... the temple was partially, and Poorly, reconstructed for visitors on a nearby car park roof. The reconstruction was built a hundred yards from the original site, and it had been re-orientated north-south whereas it should have been east-west. At one point, this priceless piece of history was stored in a builder's yard in New Malden. New Malden! I've dropped fares there β€” it's a nice enough place, but it's no home for a Roman temple.......... It wasn't until Bloomberg bought the site in twenty ten that things were finally put right. The temple now sits seven metres below modern street level in an exhibition space beneath the Bloomberg building. And when they were digging the foundations... guess what else they found? Archaeologists from Mola found over four hundred fragments of ancient Roman writing tablets β€” the largest and earliest collection of its kind in Britain, including the first known reference to London and the earliest hand-written document in Britain. The earliest dated tablet is a financial transaction from January the eighth, fifty-seven AD. A financial document... found right here in the heart of the City. Some things never change, do they?......... You can go down there for free, by the way. Seven metres underground, into the dark... where the haze and the light and the chanting take you back nearly two thousand years. It's one of London's best-kept secrets... and now you're in on it.

Nearby stories