the cathedral from the castle gardens(from a photograph by f. g. m. beaumont).
Mr. Pearson has also been intrusted with the direction and superintendence of the last great restoration, which has been devoted chiefly to the famous west front. After its underpinning in 1888 a thorough repair of it was undertaken. This was absolutely necessary, for, in many places, the facing was leaving the core, and, in some, pieces of it had already fallen. Manyof the stones needed replacing; in all such cases careful copies were substituted one by one. The great west doorway was thoroughly restored, its shafts were given separate bases once more, and new doors took the place of the old. The works, of this period also, were carried as far as possible by the dean and chapter, but on the 27th of October, 1892, an influential meeting was held at the Mansion House to find funds for their continuance. Subsequently the north flanking tower—in its then form, the work of the eighteenth century—was demolished, and entirely rebuilt for the second time, both it and its fellow being now raised again to their original height. A comparison withthe illustration given on p.26of the front as it was in 1719, shows how careful and accurate the restoration has been. The north aisle end was at the same time restored to its old form, and the northern gable turret,—a curious specimen of fifteenth century work, which many were sorry to see disappear,—replaced by a copy of its fellow on the south.
After the death of Canon Burrows, in 1892, the new font, just within the west door, was erected by subscription, as a memorial to him.
The last piece of work that we have to record is the inclosure of a series of new vestries along the south side of the crypt. These have been paid for “with American dollars,” the proceeds of Dean Hole’s recent lecturing tour on the other side of the Atlantic.
The cathedral still has great and pressing needs. The most crying is, perhaps, the fitting of roofs to Sir G. Scott’s gables in the eastern part, for their present isolated condition makes them unpleasantly conspicuous. This the dean is anxious to see undertaken next. A spire is also much wanted; the present tower, especially since it has been dwarfed by the raising of the transept roofs, looks scarcely worthy of a moderately important parish church, much less of a cathedral. However, when it is found possible to undertake the change, it should be remembered that Rochester is a small cathedral, and that the opposite fault to the present insignificance must also be avoided. The new spire must neither be too lofty nor too elaborate. Finally, as Sir Gilbert Scott pointed out, the parapets of the nave and its aisles are unworthy of the building, and a considerable amount of internal repair is necessary. These matters will have to be seen to as soon as the requisite funds can be found.
THE EXTERIOR, MONASTIC BUILDINGS, ENCLOSURE, AND GATES.
Rochester lies within a bend of the Medway and is bounded by that river on the north and west. It is girt round by chalk hills, which, on the two sides mentioned, look down on it from across the stream. Its houses have now begun to climb the hills in greater numbers, but the space that used to be enclosed by the old city walls lies very low, the only piece of rising ground within their line being the mound on which the castle stands. The cathedral church is one of the smallest in England, and occupies a lowly position immediately beneath this mound and the mighty keep that crowns it. It can claim attention therefore neither by magnitude and grandeur nor by prominence of position. Its tower is, however, next to the castle keep, the most conspicuous object in the town, and this fact makes our regret the greater, that it is not more worthy of its position.
The cathedral, though unable to bear comparison in the matter of size with most others, and though by no means an imposing building, is a very interesting structure and well worthy of all the study and care bestowed upon it. It bears in itself many marks of its eventful history, and the work of finding these and solving their significance is a most attractive one. Many of its features, too, are important architecturally. The crypt, the Norman work in the nave, the great west doorway, and that leading to the chapter-room, all rank among the best examples of their respective kinds in England.
An excellent bird’s-eye view of the cathedral can be obtained from the castle, either from the keep itself, or from a convenient opening in the outer wall. On the church’s own level goodviews can be obtained of almost all the principal parts, though in some directions buildings interfere. The famous west front can be well studied from the road before it; and from a favourable position on the other side of the old cemetery, a good north-west prospect can be obtained. Passengers along the High Street are now, by the substitution of an iron railing for a former wall, enabled to gaze on the north side of the choir and the ruins of Gundulf’s tower, across a stretch of turf that generally bears visible testimony to Dean Hole’s love of flowers. A general view of the whole south side, together with the few remains of the monastic buildings, can be obtained from the road through the precinct; and, of the exterior of the building, the east end alone cannot be well seen except from private ground. There are other, more distant, views, which are both interesting and picturesque.
The Central Toweris the first feature to claim our attention now that we are come to the description of the exterior and its parts. The earliest tower over the crossing was raised, in 1343, by Bishop Hamo de Hythe, who crowned it with a spire of wood, covered with lead, and placed in it four bells, named Dunstan, Paulinus, Ythamar, and Lanfranc. This spire and the masonry of the tower caused great anxiety at the end of the seventeenth century, but with some not very considerable repairs then, and some slight ones later, lasted until 1749. Its height was 156 feet, but the authorities for its form do not at all agree. It is given a very uncommon shape in the north prospect by Daniel King, reproduced on p.14. This seems to be followed by many engravings which, however, bring no additional testimony, for they do not correct great faults in other parts of it, such as the insertion of a bay too many in the nave, and the ignoring of a story in the transept ends. The north-west view from Harris’s “History of Kent” (1719) makes the spire octagonal, and it appears of this form in many small sketches. Other engravings, as another view in Harris’s own book, show it square, but without the peculiar treatment of the middle of each side, and with something simpler and plainer than the pairs of dormer windows in the plate by King. Some reasons may, however, be given for thinking the latter’s version of the spire correct, though his engraving is elsewhere so inaccurate. Such are: (1) its abundant detail, perhaps too abundant, as others do not supporthis dormer windows, for instance; (2) the fact that Browne Willis, in his “Mitred Abbies,” refers to this “draught” (when used to illustrate Dugdale’s “Monasticon”), in preference to attempting a description himself; and (3) that the tiny view shown on the portrait engraving of Dr. Thorpe that forms the frontispiece to his “Registrum Roffense,” agrees with it well when we take into consideration the smallness of its scale. The tower was square, without either battlements or corner pinnacles, and the spire rose directly from it. On the west side, it will be noticed, the blind arcading under a string course at the height of the ridges of the transept roofs, terminated downwards on the lines of a pointed gable, and we may hence conclude that the nave used to have a high-pitched roof before its present flat one.
The spire raised in 1749 was octagonal, and rose directly from the tower. It had neither parapet nor corner pinnacles to hide the transition from the square to the octagon, nor splaying to make this change less abrupt. Its form is shown in the 1816 view (p.31), and Mr. Sloane’s model of its woodwork is still to be seen in the crypt, in a very damaged state. A curious instance of the inaccuracy of some old engravings occurs in two plates by Metcalf, and by Ryland after B. Ralphe, which reproduce the same view of this cathedral, and are, apparently, only variations of the same plate. They represent the tower itself as octagonal, make it of excessive breadth, and give it three windows in each face.
The new spire was demolished, after an existence of a little less than eighty years, by Mr. Cottingham, who took down at the same time most of the old tower, and raised the present rather plain one, which bears no spire. Our illustrations render any description of the form of this tower unnecessary. It did not meet with approval, even before it was made more insignificant in appearance by Sir Gilbert Scott’s heightening of the transept roofs. An apologist for Mr. Cottingham says that he was not altogether responsible for its faults, since he was compelled to modify his design, through a strong conviction among the townspeople, especially among the local builders, that he was overloading the supporting piers. He obtained expert opinion that they were capable of bearing twice the weight, but at last yielded, though he complained that by his so doing his work was spoiled.
north-east view, with ruins of gundulf’s tower(from a photograph by messrs. carl norman and co.).
The Bellsare hung in this tower. They are six in number,and their sizes range from 34 to 52 inches. Mr. Stahlschmidt, from whose “Church Bells of Kent” the following particulars are derived, regrets that he could find nothing of the bell-history of the cathedral between 1343, the date of Bishop Hamo’s four, whose names have just been given, and 1635, the year in which the present third bell was, according to its inscription, made by John Wilner. In 1683 Christopher Hodson, a London founder, re-cast the fifth and tenor bells for£120. The contract, which describes him as of St. Mary Cray, where he had probably a branch establishment, still exists, and he seems to have done the work near by, perhaps even within the precincts. The treble was re-cast by John Wood, of Chancery Lane, in 1695, at a cost of£9, and the contract for this work also is still preserved. In 1711 Richard Phelps, a well-known founder, supplied an estimate for the re-casting of a cracked bell (the fourth) weighing 15 cwt. He did not, apparently, obtain the commission, for this particular bell is recorded to have been re-cast during the next year by James Bagley, of Cripplegate, London, on behalf of his father Matthew, who was then near the end of his career. After finishing this work James, on his own and his father’s behalf, warranted the bell sound, and, further, that the second, which he agreed to turn, “the striking sides being much worn,” should be “as good as a new bell and retain the same note.” This, the second, bell is the only one that bears no inscription; the fifth has, besides its inscription, the royal arms on its waist. The treble was again re-cast by Pack and Chapman, of London, in 1770, and in 1834 the tenor was re-made by Thomas Mears. After all these re-castings, it would be interesting to know how much old metal, from Bishop Hamo’s or even older bells, the present peal still contains. Mention will be made of some very early bells when Gundulf’s tower is described.
The West Fronthas recently been very carefully restored. Its great central window, and the flat gable above, belong to the Perpendicular period, but all the rest is either original Norman work, or as accurate a reproduction of this as possible.
In design the façade surpasses those of many cathedrals. The aisle ends, for instance, are not here, as in some cases, carried as screens to a greater height than is structurally necessary. This is more correct and, at the same time, allows the flanking towers to be more imposing and effective.
The nave end, the main central portion of the front, contains the great west door, to be described later, and over it the great window, inserted during the second half of the fifteenth century. The dripstone of the window terminates in two carved heads. On each side of the doorway is a round-headed recess, and on the level of the door-arch, and interrupted by it, runs a row of blind arcading, the shafts of which rise from plinths, that project in carved heads from an elaborate string course. The first complete bays of this arcade, on the north and south sides of the door, contain niches, within which statues of two bishops, Gundulf and John of Canterbury, were placed, in 1894, by the Freemasons of Kent. These statues are not at all worthy of praise. The space between the heads of the arcade and the decorated string course, crossing at the level of the window sill, is filled with a diaper pattern. There are three more blind arcades above, all interrupted by the window, before we come to those that run round the gable turrets. The lowest has a band of chevron moulding crossing the tops of its shafts, while carvings fill the lunettes in its heads. Next come two rows of a double interlacing fret, and then another string course, from which the second row of arcading springs. This has semicircular heads, with zigzag ornament, and a double series of intersecting arches above, like an arcade on Anselm’s Tower at Canterbury. The topmost arcade of the three rises over another string course and is round-headed like the rest. Its arches do not, however, like theirs, run on continuously but form two groups of two on each side. The crenellated gable parapet rises from a string course with five sculptured masks, and has plain shields on its battlements. Of the gable turrets the northern has, in the last restoration, been made to match the southern. Both are now octagonal, and have two arcaded stories. Their tops are pyramidal, and ribs run down the edges from the curious conical cap, which crowns the apex of each.
The aisle ends stand back somewhat. Each has a lofty, ornamented arch, rising to the height of the sill of the central window, and containing, recessed within its upper part, a semicircular headed window. We see, higher up on each side, a single narrow light, and higher still an arcaded lean-to. At the end of the north aisle is a pointed doorway, inserted for the use of St. Nicholas’ parishioners in 1327.
We will now conclude our account of the front in its presentform, with a description of its flanking towers. The northern is square for its whole height, and has four rows, one above the other, of blind arcading. The southern, with the same number of arcades, is also square in its lower portion, but, for the two upper rows becomes octagonal, and finally terminates in an octagonal pyramid. The spire of its fellow on the north can scarcely be called octagonal; it is square, with the angles only slightly cut down, and with slight splaying at its base. On the summits of both are curious conical caps (like those described as surmounting the gable turrets), from which ribs run down the angles. The arcades are continued round the outer sides of the lower parts of the towers, and right round when the roofs of the aisles are passed. The heads of all the arches are as usual semicircular, and the second arcade from the top is filled with a diaper of semicircles arranged in a curious scale-like pattern.
Generally, as we have said, except for the great Perpendicular window and the gable above it, the front shows the design of the later Norman builders. The window that they constructed in it was possibly wheel-shaped, but we have no representation of the cathedral previous to its supplanting. The parts of the front that show their old form now have not, however, all continuously retained it. At the time of the erection of the Perpendicular clerestory to the nave, the northern gable turret was rebuilt in the curiously plain, octagonal, flat-topped form, which the oldest engravings of the front illustrate. It has only quite recently been altered again to the earlier shape of its fellow on the south; and is the only feature in which there is any conspicuous difference between the front as now seen and as shown in our early eighteenth century view. An earlier, seventeenth-century view exists, in which, if it were not so inaccurate, the front would have the same appearance. In this, however, as in his north prospect, Daniel King shows his great liability to err. We can point to the insertion of one tier of arcading too many in the central portion of the front, and to the omission of the windows at the ends of the aisles, as well as of the small door.
Our next view of the front dates from 1816, and shows the form in which it was left by the great changes of 1763 and the succeeding years, when the northern flanking tower, having been found to be in a dangerous state, was quite taken down.Its rebuilding (up to only half its former height) and that of the upper part of the adjoining north aisle end, was completed before 1772 at any rate, and was professedly as accurate a reproduction as possible of the older work. It was finished off with battlements. A comparison makes manifest other changes besides that in the height. The first arcade was at a lower level; in the aisle end the narrow light disappeared; and the old lean-to was replaced by a blind arcade of three arches, the central higher than the others. A little later the south-western tower was correspondingly lowered, but no further changes were made in it, and soon afterwards a precinct gateway that used to stand against it was cleared away.
caps of west door north sidecaps of west door, north side(from a photograph by h. dan).
The front then remained untouched until 1888, when underpinning was undertaken preparatory to a thorough restoration. After much of the older work had been carefully repaired—in some places renewed stone by stone—an attempt was made to undo all the work of the eighteenth century architects. All that they had erected was taken down and rebuilt, and all that they had demolished, as accurately as possible replaced. The work was carried out under the direction of Mr. J. L. Pearson, and for the skill and care shown in it, he has deserved, and receives, much praise. It is regretted however by many that he did not preserve the north gable turret as he found it, since it was so curious a specimen of fifteenth century restoration. One may hope too that smoke and weather will soon tone down the new masonry so that it may be in less glaring contrast with the old.
caps of west door south sidecaps of west door, south side(from a photograph by h. dan).
The great West Doorway, like the rest of the original work remaining in the front, dates from later Norman times,—the first half of the twelfth century. It is formed by five receding arches, and every stone of each of these is carved with varying ornamental designs. Between the second and third ofthem runs a line of cable moulding, an ornament which occurs also inside the door. Each arch has its own shaft, and the groups of five on each side are elaborately banded. The shafts have richly sculptured capitals, and in those on the south side, as well as in the tympanum, the signs of the Evangelists appear. The shafts second from the door on either side are carved with statues, two of the oldest in England. These are much mutilated, but they were thought worthy of great praise by Flaxman. That on the spectator’s left is said to represent King Henry I., and the other his wife, the “good Queen Maud.” This attribution is probably correct, as these sovereigns were both great benefactors to the cathedral, and were living when the front was being built. The figure of the queen has suffered the more; it is recorded to have been especially ill-used by the Parliamentarians in the days of the great Civil War. The tympanum contains a figure of Our Lord, seated in Glory, within an aureole supported by two angels. His right hand is raised in benediction, and his left hand holds a book. Outside the aureole are the symbols of the four Evangelists: the Angel of St. Matthew and the Eagle of St. John one on each side above the Winged Lion of St. Mark and the Ox of St. Luke similarly placed below. A straight band of masonry crosses beneath the lunette, and has carved on it twelve figures, now much mutilated, but supposed to have represented the twelve Apostles. All the sculptured work of the portal has suffered greatly from age and exposure and from the hand of man. In the recent restoration the coping has been renewed, the shafts have been given separate bases once more, and many of the most worn stones have been replaced by new ones carved in facsimile. Mr. Clifford’s beautiful drawing of the doorway (facing p.3) is especially valuable as he was able to take exact measurements of all itsparts while the repairers’ scaffolding was still standing. The doors that he pictures have since been replaced by a more elaborate pair with richly scrolled hinges and strengthening bands of iron.
This entrance is one of the best known features of the cathedral, so it will be interesting to quote the words of a few great authorities concerning it. Fergusson, speaking of the cathedral in his “Illustrated Handbook of Architecture,” says: “Its western doorway, which remains intact, is a fair specimen of the rich mode of decoration so prevalent in that age. It must be considered rather as a continental than as an English example. Had it been executed by native artists we should not entirely miss the billet moulding which was so favourite a mode of decoration with all the nations of the north.” Kugler, the great art historian, also thinks it continental in style, and compares it with the architecture of the south-west of France. We even find it spoken of, on account of the richness of its ornamentation, as Saracenic in character. The late Prof. Freeman, in his “History of Architecture,” is liberal with his praise, and probably all Roffensians, at any rate, will agree with him, when, in speaking of Norman doors with tympana, he says: “the superb western portal at Rochester Cathedral is by far the finest example of this kind, if not the finest of all Norman doorways.”
The doorway is structurally interesting, as we have therein exemplified a curious mode of forming a straight head over an aperture. The arches of course bear all the weight of the super-structure, but the straight band of masonry on which the figures of the Apostles are carved has to support both itself and the stonework of the tympanum. The method by which it is enabled to do this is as follows: the stones, the joints being vertical, are locked into one another by semicircular ridges fitting into corresponding indentations. Mr. Smirke, writing on aperture heads in “Archæologia,” vol. xxvii., said that he thought these excrescences, or in masons’ language, “joggles,” insufficient for security, and suggested that perhaps inside, out of sight, the joints radiate like those of a skeme arch. He also commented on the irregularity of the stones used here and throughout the whole front. Another fact worthy of remark is that the semicircular arches of the doorway are struck from slightly different centres.
The Mayor and Corporation of Rochester still have the right of entry in their robes and with their insignia of office by the great west door. We find the privilege of having their insignia borne in the cathedral on record as early as 1448 in indentures between Bishop Lowe on the one part, and the bailiff and townspeople of Rochester on the other. The titles “mayor” and “citizens” were only granted later by Edward IV., in a charter dated December 14th, 1461. In the indentures it was agreed, among other matters, that the bailiff and his successors might cause to be carried, before him and them by their sergeants, their mace or maces—and the sword likewise if the king should ever give them one—not only to and in the parish church, but also in the cathedral and cemetery, especially on festival days, and processions, and solemn sermons, and at the reception and installation of bishops, and at all other fit times. On the other side they were to make no execution or arrest within the precinct of the monastery and the palace of the bishop, except the same should be specially required of the bishop or prior whenever the same was made. Similar rights were granted to the dignitaries of other cities about this time. For instance, in 1447 they were conceded at Exeter, and at Worcester in 1462. A sword did not become a part of the Rochester insignia until quite recently, after the castle had been acquired as the property of the city. One, given by Alderman J. R. Foord in 1871, is now worn by the mayor as its constable. Besides the sword the insignia include a great mace, two sergeant’s maces, a silver oar (in token of admiralty jurisdiction over the Medway), two constable’s, and eight borsholder’s staves, besides the mayor’s chain and badge.
Pepys, speaking of the visit to the cathedral of himself and some friends in 1661, tells, in his diary, that they went “then away thence, observing the great doors of the church, as they say, covered with the skins of Danes.” He is so accurate an observer that this must be taken as conclusive evidence that there was such a tradition in his time, and some ground for it, though no other record of anything of the kind is to be found. However, even if it were likely, which many people will deny, that the skins of Danes were ever nailed to church doors at Rochester, it certainly is not that they would have been transferred by Normans from the Saxon cathedral to their new one, or that, if so transferred, they would have survived the firesand other dangers through which this afterwards passed. There are traditions of the existence of human skin on doors at Worcester Cathedral, where it is said to have belonged to a robber who stole the sanctus bell from the high altar, and at Hadstock and Copford, East Anglian churches. In these latter cases the Danes are again mentioned. In 1848 all these doors had been removed from their original positions (the old north doors of Worcester being still preserved in the crypt) but Mr. Way succeeded in obtaining fragments of the parchment-like substance from each for microscopic examination. They were declared to be, in each case, human in their origin, and to have belonged probably to fair-haired persons. These cases show flaying not to have been unknown in England, even, to judge by the Worcester case, after the Norman Conquest, and confirm the passages in records that seem to refer to its existence.
The Navehas nothing else remarkable in its exterior. The perpendicular windows in the north aisle wall, part of which was rebuilt in 1670, are two-lighted, with irregular quatrefoils in their heads. Those of the southern aisle, which was re-cased in 1664, are single-light, and only three in number,—in the second, third, and fourth bays from the west.
The insertion of Perpendicular windows in the aisles took place about the middle of the fifteenth century. The plainness of the south side, where the Lady Chapel does not hide it, is perhaps explained by the fact that it used to be hidden by the Cathedral Almonry. The westernmost bay of each aisle is plain, and the next on the north side contains the now walled-up Perpendicular doorway, inserted, when their new church was built, for the entry, in their solemn processions, of the parishioners of St. Nicholas, who passed out again by the west door. It is contained within a rectangular framework, and has quatrefoils in the spandrels.
In the corner between the south aisle and the transept is the PerpendicularLady Chapel, three bays long from east to west, and two in width towards the south. Its windows are three-lighted. They terminate in the obtuse arches of their time and have their heads filled with tracery. At about half its height each is divided by a transom or horizontal mullion, beneath which the lights have cusped heads. The chapel was originally vaulted, so is well buttressed, which the aisle walls are not. The north aisle wall has its bays marked by flatpilaster-like buttresses, and the southern has still less support, for the similar buttresses rise only to the original level of the ground, which is now cut away for a few feet along the side of the church.
The North Transeptis in the Early English style. Flat buttresses with offsets halve the sides and flank the end. The high gable, with three circular windows and flanking pinnacles, is the work of Sir G. Scott, who rebuilt it, in place of the low, commonplace one that had replaced it about seventy years before. He also raised the roof to its original pitch. The occurrence of blind arches between the windows here is to be noticed, making continuous arcades of which the heads are carried by single shafts. The windows in the northern bay of the west wall were all inserted by Scott, who found only dilapidated blind arcades there, and the doorway in its present form is also by him, he having found the old entry very ruinous. The east side used to be almost entirely hidden by Gundulf’s tower, and is still slightly concealed. It has therefore no windows except in the clerestory, and some bays even of this have none.
The South Transeptis of rather later date than its fellow, and belongs to the Early Decorated period. Its very interesting gable was lowered, with the roof, at the same time as that of the north transept, but has fortunately, like it, been replaced by Sir G. Scott. The chief authority for the restoration seems to have been an engraving in the 1788 edition of the “Custumale Roffense.” The gable stands back a little and has its base hidden by a parapet rising above a decorated string course. Beneath a sculptured bust, near the apex, is a chequer-work cross, and lower still a band of chequer-work bearing three shields of arms, the dark squares in each case being formed by flints. The central shield contains the arms of the see, that on the left three crowns, and that on the right a cross with martlets. The transept is well buttressed, and the gable is flanked by pinnacles, beneath which curious gargoyles project. The five graduated windows of the upper range have double shafts on each side, and the connected dripstone over the lower range ends in carved heads. The clerestory of the west wall looking out over the aisle and Lady Chapel roofs is similar to that on the east side and the quatrefoil heads of the two-light windows help to mark the entry into the Decorated period. The littleroom in the angle between the transept and the choir aisle is used as a vestry and will have to be mentioned again.
The North Side of the Choircan, as has been said, be well seen from the High Street. To one or two points in it attention may well be drawn. In the window heads, the dog-tooth moulding, the characteristic ornament of the Early English style, constantly occurs, and the openings often have side shafts. In the lower tier of the presbytery windows Decorated tracery has been inserted; elsewhere we have Early English work, or, frequently, a modern copy of it. The lowest row of windows lights the crypt. The gable at the end of the north choir transept, that above the east wall of its aisle and that at the east end of the church, are all by Sir G. Scott; they still require roofs of corresponding pitch, a need both great and conspicuous. The gables replaced by these present ones were flat and late in period. The east end and the transept end are both flanked by towers, with double gables crowned by curious little pinnacles, copied by Scott from one still remaining. The east gable has three graduated windows, that to the transept aisle a quatrefoil within a dog-toothed circle. The present form of the east end is altogether due to Sir G. Scott; and to it and its history we shall devote more attention in describing the interior of the church. This part of the fabric is well buttressed.
OfGundulf’s Tower, on the north side of the choir, between the main and choir transepts, only ruins now remain, but these are older than any other part of the church’s buildings still in existence above ground. The tower was certainly Gundulf’s work and built before his church. The construction of the latter rendered useless two out of the four long narrow windows that had been inserted in the tower, one in each side, on the ground floor, and they were therefore blocked up. The tower, though rather dilapidated, was still almost complete at nearly the end of the last century. A view in Grose’s “Antiquities,” vol. iii., shows it as it was in 1781. At that time it still rose as high as the parts of the church beside it, and traces are to be seen in the print of the flying bridge that formerly connected it with the Early English turret at the north-west corner of the choir transept. There is now, however, only a mere shell of the lower part left. The walls were 6 feet thick, inclosing a space 24 feet square. In the “Historyand Antiquities of Rochester” (1772), we are told that there were at that time traces of one floor at a height of 20 feet, and of another 25 feet above that. The walls then rose 20 feet more, giving a total height of 65 feet. During the Early English period the north-east angle, which stands quite clear of the church, was strengthened by massive buttresses, and a story, apparently of wood, was added on projecting arches resembling machicolations. This wooden story probably formed the bell chamber; the machicolation-like supports still existed in 1781.
There has been much discussion as to the original purpose of the tower. Some leading antiquaries of the eighteenth, and of the early part of this century, thought that the bridge entrance at the top was at first the only one and that the structure with its massive walls formed the cathedral treasury. It must be remembered, however, that the early English turret to which the bridge was thrown was not in existence until much later. The lower part still remaining is so dilapidated, with all its ashlar facing gone, that it seems impossible to fix the position of the original entrance. At the present day there are two entrances, one through a large opening in the north wall, the other through a doorway in the south-west corner formed by knocking out the back of an old recess.
It seems very likely that the tower was primarily intended to be a defensive work. Whatever its original purpose, however, it is certain that it was used for bells at a very early date. In or before 1154, for he died in that year, Prior Reginald “made two bells and placed them in the greater tower. One which was broken was applied to the making of another bell.” In support of the view that the tower was a defensive work the suggestion has been made that the metal thus re-used may have belonged to the original alarm bell. Two other bells came to the cathedral in the twelfth century, and were probably placed here at once as they are mentioned in the “Custumale Roffense,” written about 1300, as then hanging in the “greater tower,” a name by which this is distinguished from the long destroyed south one. Gundulf’s Tower is certainly, therefore, an early example of a detached campanile, and, if built as such, was probably the first in this country.
As has been before mentioned, its reduction to a mere ruin is of quite recent date. The author of the 1772 edition of the “History and Antiquities of Rochester,” thinking it a belltower, wrote in that work: “May the present reverend and learned gentlemen (the Dean and Chapter), and their successors, experience the necessity of finishing this venerable tower and applying it to the uses for which, it has been conjectured, it was originally intended.” In the second edition, of 1817, stands: “So far, we regret to say, is this ardent wish from having been realized, that a part of this ancient tower has lately been taken down to supply materials for the repairs of the church.” Denunciations follow of the action of the dean and chapter in thus demolishing one of the most curious and interesting pieces of architecture remaining in England.
The space between the tower and the church seems to have been floored and occupied by the wax-chandler’s chamber and the sacristan’s rooms. The remains of an oven and chimney, conjectured to have been used for the baking of altar-breads, have also been described.
The South Side of the Choirpresents no very remarkable features. A brief history of the efforts to save it during the latter part of last century, and in 1825 and the following years, has been given in our opening chapter. The wall of the choir aisle is supported by a flying buttress as well as by the small room in the corner between it and the south main transept. In the wall are three lancet windows, the easternmost with dog-tooth ornament, and a fine doorway, which used to open into the western range of the cloisters. The ends of the outer mouldings of the doorway arch, which also have the dog-tooth, bend round and upwards in an unusual way that is worthy of notice. All that can be seen of the transept end is by Cottingham. He gave it a new ashlar facing, which, as the wall was considerably out of the perpendicular, constituted an invisible buttress. His destruction of the old brick buttresses was a great improvement. The same architect found no gable, and built the present rather flat one containing a circle ornamented with zigzag mouldings. In the south wall of the transept aisle is a Decorated window with beautiful tracery. This window was of course an insertion. Remains of recesses on each side of it, like those still in the transept end, made this evident until 1825, when they were hidden beneath the smooth modern surface. The southern wall of the presbytery is almost entirely concealed by the eighteenth century chapter room, with its plain, square-headed, sashed windows. The clerestory, however,which is like that on the north side, appears over the red-tiled roof of that modern structure. In the basement on this side some windows have quite recently been inserted, to light the new vestries in the crypt, and a door opens into the cellar beneath the chapter room.
The Monastic Buildings and Cloistersoriginally stood in the usual position on the south side of the nave, and were apparently of wood, but these first structures having soon perished, their successors were erected in an uncommon position, said to be unique in this country, on the same side of the choir. At Lincoln, also, the cloister is indeed beside the the choir, but to the north of it. The earliest monastic buildings at Rochester were of Gundulf’s time; the next, in the new situation, were the work of Ernulf, who built the chapter house, dormitory, and refectory. Of these fine specimens of later Norman architecture, ruins still exist. The chapter house and dormitory formed the east side of the cloisters. Of the western wall of the chapter house three arches remain, with a recess, having zigzag mouldings continued down to its base, and not merely round the head, on each side of the central arch, between it and the others. The chapter house was an oblong room, as some remains of it within the deanery prove, and must have been fine and of ample size. It was raised above the ground level, and the space beneath, into which the three lower archways (now walled up) opened, was looked upon as an honourable place of burial; it was entered by the middle arch, the side shafts of which have fine and elaborate capitals, while the arch itself is richly sculptured and has elaborate zigzag and other mouldings. The panels round it are said to contain representations of the twelve signs of the zodiac, but all the carved work here (general in Caen stone) is so worn and decayed that it is impossible, in most cases, to feel sure of what was intended. The damaged state of all the carved work is possibly to some extent a result of the great fires of the twelfth century. Ernulf’s diaper occurs in the spandrels on either side of this central arch; and each of the outer arches has zigzag and billet mouldings and, within them, a row of a diaper pattern. Passing on to the south the next arch also has zigzag and circular mouldings, while its lunette is occupied by a relief, now so worn that the subject is scarcely discernible. It represents Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. The father holds his son with hisoutstretched left hand, and is about to slay him, when God’s hand appears in the clouds above. Behind Isaac is seen the ram that was afterwards to be offered in his stead, and in the opposite corner, behind Abraham, there seem to be traces of two small figures, probably the two servants who had been left at a distance to await the patriarch’s return. This interpretation is confirmed by three words of an inscription, which still remain round the inner part of the arch (Aries per cornua). Beneath the lunette runs a fine band of foliated ornament, including birds. The capitals are rich, and an angel and a bird appear in those on the south side. Continuing southwards the still remaining lower portion of the dormitory west wall has a blind arcade with double intersecting heads, semicircular like all the other arches here, but interrupted once or twice by an uncut arch.
new chapter room and ruins of the old(from a photograph by j. l. allen).
On the south side of the cloisters was the refectory; the lower part of its massive north wall still remains, and in it a fine doorway, with a groined lavatory and towel recess, thework of Prior Helias about 1215. The great thickness of the wall is, as will be explained shortly, probably due to the fact that it was originally a part of the old fortifications of the city on this side. The cellarer’s and other storerooms were, apparently, on the west side, and there seems to have been a smaller guesten-hall to the south-east. Some corbels that helped to support the cloister roofs are still to be seen, projecting from the south wall of the church, and from Ernulf’s buildings. The doorway opening from the church into the western range has been already described. Of this range itself nothing remains, but at its southern end there is yet to be seen, half buried, a late Perpendicular porch. This stands beside the road between the north main transept and the Prior’s Gate, and opens towards the episcopal precinct.
ruins of cloistersruins of cloisters, east range(from a photograph by h. dan).
Of the oldEpiscopal Palace, famous for having been the home, during his later years, of Cardinal Fisher, a considerable part still exists to the south-west of the cathedral, between it and Boley Hill. The palace was perhaps originally erected by Gundulf himself. It is said to have been rebuilt, after a fire, by Bishop Gilbert de Glanvill (1185-1215), though he may have found it sufficient to repair the shell then left, using Caen stone for the purpose. Another definite notice of the palace is found when we see Bishop Lowe, in 1459, dating an instrument from his “new palace at Rochester.” Here, again, it is probably a re-modelling and not a complete reconstruction that is referred to, but the re-modelling was certainly thorough, for many fifteenth century features are to be seen in the part that is left.
The main framework of the whole rectangular structure probably dates from Gundulf’s or, at the latest, from Bishop Ralph’s time; the simple plan and the walls, 3 feet in thickness, being such as might be expected in early Norman work. Thebuilding, which has a total length of 70 feet, is of stone, with a tiled roof, and now forms dwelling-houses. It has a massive buttress in the centre of the southern face, and the outlines of old windows can be traced in various parts. The western gable end, which can be seen from Boley Hill, is also interesting and worthy of attention. The cellars and vaulted passages extend even beyond the building to the eastward, and are very massive in their construction. Fragments of wrought masonry that probably once belonged to the chapel have been dug up; they were mostly portions of capitals, with beautiful foliated ornaments, or of column shafts.
Cardinal Fisher was the last Bishop of Rochester to reside here. He received a visit from Erasmus in 1516, and this great scholar gave a very bad account of the residence and its situation. Fisher himself complained of its dilapidated state and of the rats that infested it. Cardinal Wolsey stayed at the house with the bishop on the 4th of July, 1527, and wrote to the king on the next day: “I was right loveingly and kindely by him entertained.” After his cook’s attempt, in 1531, to poison him and his family at his London house, on Lambeth Marsh, Fisher stayed continuously at Rochester, until, in 1534, he was peremptorily summoned to the capital—never to return. The palace was continued to the bishops by the charter constituting the new establishment, but they neither inhabited it nor, in fact, lived much at Rochester at all. On the spot where its old prison used to stand within the palace precincts, the diocesan Register Office was erected in 1760.
The building at present known as the palace, in St. Margaret’s Street, has often been thought to be the old mansion with all these historical associations; it did not, however, become the property of the bishops until after 1674. In that year it was bequeathed by Francis Head, Esq., to his wife, with the arrangement that, after her death, “in case the Church of England does continue so governed by Bishops of the true Protestant faith,” it should be settled on the Lord Bishop of Rochester and his successors for the maintenance of hospitality near the cathedral church, and as an invitation to him to preach once a year each at the churches of St. Margaret and St. Nicholas in his cathedral city. This building has been little used by the bishops, and has generally been leased by them, like other residences of theirs, of which mention will be madein the chapter on the see and its history. The small episcopal revenue has usually only allowed of the maintenance of a single palace, though more may have been desired and even necessary.