  We study the critical region of lattice QED4 in the quenched approximation.
The issue of triviality is addressed by contrasting simulation results for
$<\bar\psi\psi>$ and for the susceptibilities with the predictions of two
critical scenarios -- powerlaw scaling, and triviality \`a la Nambu--Jona
Lasinio. We discriminate among the two possibilities with reasonable accuracy
and we confirm previous results for the critical point and exponents thanks to
new analysis strategies and good quality data. The interplay of chiral symmetry
breaking with the Goldstone mechanism is studied in detail, and some puzzling
features of past results are clarified. Chiral symmetry restoration is observed
in the spectrum: the candidate Goldstone boson decouples in the weak coupling
phase, while the propagators of the chiral doublets become degenerate. We also
present the first measurements of the full mesonic spectrum, relevant for the
study of flavour/ rotational symmetry restoration. The systematic effects
associated
