A HERITAGE campaigner hopes he is getting close to success in his quest to get a historical banner installed in a medieval monument in Winchester.

Edward Fennell aims to place in Hyde Gate a banner that promoted a major exhibition in London.

The banner portrays part of a 10th-century charter for Hyde Abbey from King Edward in the gateway of that monastery.

Mr Fennell, of nearby Egbert Road, is heartened that the Liberal Democrat-run council is looking to renovate the gateway.

Hampshire Chronicle: The banner outside the British Library in London in 2018

A former Times legal journalist, Mr Fennell was one of the organisers of Hyde 900 in 2010 which celebrated the founding of Hyde Abbey, the last-known resting place of King Alfred the Great.

Mr Fennell has offered the city council the banner of the golden charter of New Minster/Hyde Abbey.  It was made for the British Library for its 2018 exhibition Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms - Art, Word, War.

It was used on the front cover of the catalogue and the banner itself hung over the entrance to the British Library during the exhibition.

Mr Fennell said: "It is completely weatherproofed and by chance or fate, has the perfect dimensions to fit into Hyde Gate. It would have cost hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds to print.

"It illustrates the handing over to the New Minster by King Edgar in 966 of its new royal charter. This is, in effect, the founding charter for Hyde Abbey. When New Minster moved to Hyde, the Charter came with the monks and was held for almost 500 years within yards of the gateway."

In an email to the city councillors, including leader Martin Tod and John Tippett-Cooper, Mr Fennell wrote: "After the London exhibition was over, I negotiated with the British Library for a transfer of the banner to the people of Winchester for public display. There is only one location which is appropriate - the Hyde Gateway itself. All it requires to display it is a maximum of six screws - the eyelets are already in place. Nothing could be simpler.

Hampshire Chronicle: Mr Fennell Mr Fennell

"So this is my final attempt to offer it to WCC for free. I cannot possibly see how or why you would turn it down."

His efforts have the support of eminent academics. 

Prof Simon Keynes, of Trinity College, Cambridge, in an email to Mr Fennell said: "King Edgar’s charter for the New Minster is one of the most extraordinary and beautiful books to survive from the period. It shows the crowned King Edgar (959-75) in the middle, holding a book (i.e. the charter, which is in the form of a book) in his left hand, and gesticulating towards Christ above, supported by four angels.

"Mary to his left and Peter [with his key] to his right. There is no other charter like it! It was, as you say, the foundation charter for the New Minster, dated 966, and of course the New Minster became Hyde Abbey, so nothing indeed could be more appropriate! It fully deserves and needs to be kept!"