The groups often contained a number of religious people such as priests, monks and nuns. When pilgrims gathered in a group, the group could be made up of many different kinds of people, both rich and poor, noble and humble. Robbers often attacked people along the roads. In the days before modern banking, every traveller had to carry a lot of money to pay for food and accommodation (a place to sleep). Pilgrims used to gather in groups because it was dangerous to travel alone. This was a good place to meet because people from the north could cross the Thames River by London Bridge.Ĭanterbury is in the south-east of England. The Canterbury Tales tells of the meeting of a group at an inn in Southwark, which was a village south of the Thames River and now making up part of London. Many pilgrims used to meet together in London. In the late Middle Ages his shrine made Canterbury one of the four most important pilgrimage places in Europe. He is regarded as a martyr for the Christian faith and as a saint by both the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches. Soon, some people said that Thomas Becket was a saint, and that his bones could work miracles. He had a magnificent tomb built for his old friend. He had an argument with his old friend, King Henry II, and in 1170 he was murdered by some of the King's knights on order from the King. Thomas Becket had been the Archbishop of Canterbury in the 1100s. Canterbury Cathedral was a famous pilgrimage site because it contained the shrine (a place for remembering) of Saint Thomas Becket. In the Middle Ages, many Christian people went on pilgrimages to Jerusalem, Rome, Santiago de Compostela and Canterbury.

They are travelling to an important sacred site. The Canterbury Tales is about a group of people who are pilgrims.

The canterbury tales books