Home▸Society & Economics▸Canterbury: The Cathedral City Behind Chaucer's Pilgrims

⛪ Canterbury: The Cathedral City Behind Chaucer's Pilgrims

A 3D explorer of Canterbury Cathedral's ribbed Gothic vault and the medieval pilgrim routes from London, Winchester, Dover and Rochester that converged on the shrine of Thomas Becket.

Society & Economics3DModerate60 FPS

A 3D explorer of Canterbury Cathedral's ribbed Gothic vault and an interactive map of the medieval pilgrim routes from London, Winchester, Dover and Rochester that converged on the shrine of Thomas Becket.

🔬 What It Demonstrates

How Gothic ribbed vaulting channels the roof's weight down through piers to open up walls for stained glass, and how the real-world distances of medieval approach roads shaped how long a pilgrimage to Canterbury actually took.

🎮 How to Use

Switch between the nave interior and the city map, pick a pilgrim route to see its distance and travel time, and adjust party size, walking speed and time of day to change the light raking through the vault.

💡 Did You Know?

Canterbury Cathedral was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988, and the ancient Pilgrims' Way along the North Downs still roughly traces one of the routes travellers used to reach Becket's shrine.

⚙ Under the hood

A 3D explorer of Canterbury Cathedral's ribbed Gothic vault and the medieval pilgrim routes from London, Winchester, Dover and Rochester that converged on the shrine of Thomas Becket.

HistoryArchitectureHeritageCitiesThree.js

3D · Three.js / WebGL renderer · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install