Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Norwich Part 6

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Choir, looking West.]

The arrangement of the presbytery, as we have already noted when referring to the plates here reproduced from Britton, has undergone many changes; in the beginning of the century the level of the floor of the choir was continued until between the third and fourth bay from the tower in the presbytery, where it rose by five steps to the level of the sanctuary floor. Harrod speaks of two steps up at the third pier past the tower, and three at the fourth or point of the junction of the apse.

In Dean Goulburn's time, the sanctuary s.p.a.ce was enlarged by being brought forward one bay. The present floor, designed by Sir A.W.

Blomfield in gla.s.s mosaic and porphyry, was executed by Powell Brothers. Then also was added the somewhat elaborate communicants' rail, executed in bronze and spars. In enlarging the sanctuary, Dean Goulburn moved the three steps from the fourth pier past the tower to the third, and at the same time the two steps at the third pier were moved forward to the first past the tower. And now again, during the recent works of reparation, the presbytery floor has been brought forward at one level to the tower arch, where it descends to the level of the choir floor by five steps: screens which filled the first bays on either side were removed, and similar flights of steps now descend from the presbytery and the north and south aisles. The c.u.mbrous stalls were also removed, and in part refixed in the nave.

The stained gla.s.s which fills the clerestory windows of the apse dates from 1846, and was made by Yarrington. The window in the triforium just above the altar contains modern stained-gla.s.s, dedicated to the memory of Canon Thurlow.

#Monuments in the Presbytery.#--The monument of Herbert, the first bishop of Norwich, and the founder of the cathedral, was raised in the centre of presbytery, before the high altar. It was so much injured during the time of the Rebellion that a new one was erected in 1682; this again was levelled, and a slab placed in the floor at the same place now remains.

In the second bay eastward from the tower (south side), marked 10 on plan--Bishop Goldwell's (1472-99) chantry, and the altar tomb, remarkable for the effigy in full pontificals (see ill.u.s.tration). Bloxam remarks that it is "the only instance of the monumental effigy of a bishop, prior to the Reformation, in which the _cappa pluvialis_, or processional cope, is represented as the outward vestment instead of the casula or chesible." The tomb is placed to the south of the recess; in the s.p.a.ce east was an altar.

In the third bay eastward was Bishop Wakering's (1416-25) tomb, the only part of which now remaining is visible from the south aisle, and consists of a series of panels with plain shields and figures two by two, with the several instruments of the Pa.s.sion. There were formerly steps down into the south aisle from this bay. In the same place is a monument to Bishop Overall (d. 1619).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Detail of the Presbytery Clerestory and Vaulting.]

In the fourth bay (marked 11 on plan) the altar tomb of Sir William Boleyn of Blickling (d. 1505).

Of the fourth bay eastward from tower on the south side (marked 9 on plan), Sir Thomas Browne says: "On the north of the choir--_the presbytery is meant_--between the two arches, next to Queen Elizabeth's seat, were buried Sir Thomas Erpingham and his wives, the Lady Joan, etc., whose pictures were in the painted gla.s.s windows next to this place, with the arms of the Erpinghams. The insides of both the pillars were painted in red colours, with divers figures and inscriptions from the top almost to the bottom, which are now washed out by the late whiting of the pillars.... There was a long bra.s.s inscription about the tombstone, which was torn away in the late times, the name of Erpingham only remaining."

During the recent works, under this same spot was found a leaden coffin enclosing human bones, which were possibly the remains of Sir Thomas Erpingham.

An amusing tale is told by Harrod of Roger BiG.o.d's burial in the cathedral. He was the founder of Thetford Priory, and died in 1107, leaving directions that his body should be buried in his own monastery.

The prior of Thetford was much perplexed to hear that Bishop Herbert had taken possession of the body, and had determined that it should be interred with all the due solemnities at Norwich. Herbert was anxious to secure for his own foundation so valuable a source of income as the offerings and celebrations at the tomb of a pious man like BiG.o.d; and no doubt the prior was not actuated alone by love for his departed abbot.

The bishop won, and Roger BiG.o.d was buried in the cathedral, possibly in the same crypt which is supposed to contain the bones of Herbert himself.

#The North Transept#, like the south, is without aisles or triforium, the wall s.p.a.ce up to the clerestory level being decorated with wall arcading, varying considerably in position and detail in each compartment. The clerestory follows round from the nave, and overhead is the later lierne vault. It was, together with the eastern arm of the cathedral, closed for two and a half years, during which period the whole of the lime-white and paint encrusting the stonework was flaked off. The work, so far as we can understand, was really a restoration, inasmuch as the original stonework was restored to view. The level of the floor was made to correspond with that of the choir, and a raised wooden floor with the benches thereon removed. The transepts were built by Herbert, the first bishop and founder. Both originally had an apsidal chapel on the eastern wall, but only that on the north arm remains, and access to this now is not possible from the transept. Dedicated at one time to St. Anne, it is now used as a store-house.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Choir Apse.]

The vault was added by Bishop Nykke, and was necessitated by a fire in 1509, which consumed the wooden roofs of both transepts. During the recent works the small arcading immediately under the line of the vault was discovered walled up, the builders of the later vault in all probability having done this, as in many cases the line of the vault cuts over the arcading. This was opened up, and is distinctively interesting in helping to reconstruct the original finish to the Norman work under the roof.

#The Tower and Triforium Walks#, to which access is gained by a staircase in the east wall of north transept, are of much interest. In the triforium the imposition of the later work on the Norman is clearly noticeable, and the original Norman triple windows walled up with the wall shafts which once supported the semi-arches of the triforium roof.

Some of the best views of the interior are to be gained from the triforium and clerestory paths.

#Interior of Tower.#--A continuation of the same staircase leads to the clerestory, and from thence access is gained to the tower galleries.

Above the arches of the crossing there is a vaulted pa.s.sage in the thickness of the tower walls, with six arches pierced in the inner wall, so that the parts of the interior can be seen from this walk. Above occurs a smaller wall arcade, stopped before reaching the angle to admit of large circular holes being deeply recessed in the walls; and above this again another vaulted gallery, with three windows on either side, pierced through the tower. In the lower of these walks openings occur through the thickness of the walls into the presbytery, the nave, and transepts, just under the vaults, and interestingly quaint peeps can be gained through them.

The #Processional Path#, or aisles to the presbytery, consists of four bays to the north and south, with quadri-part.i.te vaulting, with a similar five following round the line of the apse. A door in the north aisle leads out into the gardens of the bishop's palace, and from thence the exterior of this part of the cathedral is best seen.

Crossing the north aisle to the presbytery, at the fourth bay eastward past the tower, marked F on plan, there occurs a curious bridge chapel spanning the aisle, access thereto being gained by a newel staircase on the north side. In our notes on the Presbytery, we have referred to the uses a.s.signed to this structure and its connection with the Easter sepulchre. It formed the ante-chapel to the reliquary chapel projecting northward from the outer wall of the cathedral; it probably was built as a bridge so that relics and symbols might be exhibited thereon to processions pa.s.sing along underneath. It is decorated in character, and the vault is constructed of chalk. The chapel above is decorated with frescoes, the subjects of which are as follow:--In the western quarter of the four-part vault, The Blessed Virgin between SS. Margaret and Catherine; in the eastern, SS. Andrew, Peter, and Paul; in the northern, SS. Martin, Nicholas, Richard; in the southern, SS. Edmund, Lawrence, and a bishop; a figure of Christ occurs centrally. Copies of these frescoes have been made in facsimile, and hang in the aisle and consistory court. Pa.s.sing through the small door in the north wall of the north aisle before mentioned to the outside, the lines of the reliquary chapel can be plainly seen, and also of another to the west; the position of both these chapels is shown by dotted lines on the plan.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Detail of the Clerestory, North Transept.]

A coped coffin lid of Purbeck marble, now in the aisle of presbytery, should be noticed; an inscribed bra.s.s once occupied the bevelled edge.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The South Aisle of Presbytery, looking East.]

#The Chapels.#--In the Norman cathedral, grouped round the east end of the presbytery, was a trefoil of chapels; the one on the north, the Jesus Chapel, yet remains, and as well its fellow on the south. The Lady Chapel, or easternmost of the three (shown on plan by dotted lines) was succeeded by an Early English building, which, in its turn, was destroyed; the entrance arches, of beautiful proportion, alone remaining.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Norman Work in the Lantern of Tower.]

#The Jesus Chapel# formerly belonged to the bishop. On plan its shape is that of segments of circles joined, the altar placed in the smaller part. A simple wall arcade runs round the lower half, the whole being covered by a plain quadri-part.i.te vault. The windows are insertions of Perpendicular work, varied in character from the Norman work of the chapel itself. The mural colouring is a restoration; it may be something like the original, but the general effect is somewhat garish.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Ante-Reliquary Bridge Chapel.]

The altar consists of a slab of grey Barnack-stone, with Purbeck inlaid, the whole being supported on shafts.

The tomb of Sir Thomas Wyndham, now in the north of nave, at one time stood here, as also the pelican lectern now in the choir.

In Britton, the chapel is shown divided off from the aisle by a stone screen of Perpendicular character; this was removed, and used to form in part the present screens dividing the ante-choir from the aisles.

A room over the Jesus Chapel, once the plumbery, is now used as a museum.

The Entrance which led to the Lady Chapel is immediately behind the apse, and takes the form of a double arch with cl.u.s.tered columns to the jambs and central pier; the archivolt is deeply moulded and enriched with the typical Early English "dog-tooth" ornament. In the spandrel over the pier, and between the archivolts, is a quatrefoiled opening fitting just under the line of the semi-circular Norman vault. The arches, walled-in up to the impost level, are now filled with gla.s.s, as well as the opening. The original circular Norman Lady Chapel was destroyed in part by the fire of 1169; it was repaired by Bishop De Turbe (1146-74), but it was not until the time of Walter de Suffield (1245-57) that it was decided to pull it down and rebuild a chapel in the style of the period--viz. Early English; it was this later building that Dean Gardiner (1573-89) destroyed.

Dean Goulburn, in his work on the cathedral, points out that it was the _cultus_ of the Blessed Virgin, which gathered strength all over Europe during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, that led to the erection of such sumptuous chapels as this thirteenth-century Lady Chapel of Norwich must have been. When the theological reaction followed, they fell into disuse and neglect, and their final ruin followed when it was found cheaper to pull them down than keep them in repair.

The beautiful proportion of the entrance arches still remaining, the archivolt enriched with the "dog-tooth" moulding--the only example of this particular ornament at Norwich--gives one an idea of what the chapel may have been like. During the recent works of reparation in the choir, pieces of stone were found with the "dog-tooth" built inwards: evidently the stone from the pulled down chapel had been used by the masons for the repair of the fabric.

#St. Luke's Chapel#, on the south side of the apse corresponding with the Jesus Chapel on the north, was formerly the chapel of the prior. It is now used as the parish church of St. Mary in the Marsh. It has been much restored, and the Decorated windows shown in Britton's view of the east end of the cathedral were replaced early in the sixties, by what the restorer would no doubt have called Norman.

The coloured gla.s.s was inserted to the east window in 1868, the south window in 1870, the west window in 1881. That in the east and south is by Hardman, in the west by Clayton & Bell. The gla.s.s in the south window forms a memorial to Adam Sedgwick, Professor of Geology at Cambridge, and canon of the cathedral for many years.

The room over the St. Luke's Chapel is used as the #Treasury and Muniment Room#.

#The Bauchon Chapel#--corrupted to Beauchamp--dedicated to St.

Mary-the-Less, projects to the south of the third bay of the presbytery aisle past the tower, (marked B on plan). It was founded in the fourteenth century and the vault added in the fifteenth century. Its bosses represent the Life, Death, and a.s.sumption of the Virgin. The chapel is now used as the consistory court. The bishop's throne, erected by Dean Lloyd late in the eighteenth century in the choir, has found a resting-place here.

A chapel, founded by Bishop Wakering, and which is said to have been used as the chapter-house after the demolition of that structure, came between the Bauchon Chapel and the east wall of the south transept. Its exact position is, however, doubtful. Harrod, quoting Blomfield, speaks of another chapel that was dedicated to St. Osyth, and which was paved in 1398.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Doorway and Screen between South Transept and Aisle of Presbytery.]

#The South Transept.#--The screen and doorway filling the Norman arch between the south aisle of presbytery and the south transept should be noticed; it is an interesting piece of work of late Perpendicular design. There is a tradition that the Puritans disliked especially any tracery that took the form of this piece of screen work, calling windows in which it occurred "wicked windows." The intersection of the lines of the tracery made the monogram of the Blessed Virgin; and the fanatics destroyed such work wherever noticed. The tale is interesting, though we cannot vouch for its truth.

[Ill.u.s.tration: View across the Apse from the Chapel of St. Luke.]

At the time the whitewash and paint covering the south transept was cleaned off a range of small arcading was discovered immediately under the line of the vault, as in the north transept, walled-up evidently when the vault was added.

The south transept had in Norman times a circular chapel projecting eastward similar to that remaining to the north transept. This was replaced by a later sacristy during the fifteenth century, and the line of this roof can be seen from the outside.

Across the south end there was formerly a stone screen built by Bishop Lyhart (1446-72) communicating with the vestry on the east side, and on the west with the staircase to rooms above the east walk of cloisters.

These rooms, as we have before noted, were in all probability the dormitories of the monks, placed that they might so conveniently gain access to the cathedral for the services.

On the top of Lyhart's screen came a clock; there are records in the sacrists' rolls of materials used in the construction of an earlier clock that was made between 1322-25--of two hundred pieces of Caen stone and ten of "Gobetz" used to make a base, and that for making thirty images to represent the days of the month, no less than 47s. 4d. was paid.

The vault was added by Bishop Nykke at the same time as that to the north transept; the carved bosses representing the early history of Christ--the Presentation, Baptism, etc. The painted gla.s.s window on the east side, the subject of which is the Ascension (after Raphael), was erected by the widow of Dean Lloyd about a century since. Speaking of its original position in the triforium of the presbytery, Britton says "it disfigures, rather than ornaments, its station"; it can safely be added that it fulfils the same purpose still.

#Monuments.#--Chantrey's statue of Bishop Bathhurst (d. 1837), originally in the presbytery, has been placed here in the south transept. The west wall has a memorial to the men and officers of the 9th (East Norfolk) Regiment of Foot who fell in China and j.a.pan.