Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 2 — John Shaqi
Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 2Turner, Dawson
History
Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 2
Turner, Dawson
Architecture -- France -- Normandy; Normandy (France) -- Antiquities; Normandy (France) -- Description and travel
Ralph de Tancarville, however, was not fortunate in the selection of
the inmates whom he planted in his monastery. His son, in the reign of
Henry Ist, dismissed the canons for whom it was first founded, and
replaced them by a colony of monks from St. Evroul. Ordericus Vitalis,
himself of the fraternity of St. Evroul, commemorates and of course
praises the fact. Such changes are of frequent occurrence in
ecclesiastical history; and the apprehension of being rejected from an
opulent and well-endowed establishment, may occasionally have
contributed, by the warning example, to correct the irregularities of
other communities. A century later, the abbot of St. Georges was
compelled to appeal to the pope, in consequence of an attempt on the
part of his brethren at St. Evroul, to degrade his convent into a mere
cell, dependent upon theirs.--The chronicle of the abbey is barren of
events of general interest; nor do its thirty-one abbots appear to have
been men of whom there was much more to be said, than that they arrived
at their dignity on such a year, and quitted it on such another. Of the
monks, we are told that, in the fifteenth century, though their number
was only eight, the dignitaries included, the daily task allotted them
was greater than would in any of the most rigid establishments, in
latter days, have been imposed upon forty brethren in a week!
Inconsiderable as is the abbey, in an historical point of view, the
church of St. Georges de Bocherville is of singular importance, inasmuch
as it is one of the land-marks of Norman architecture. William, in his
charter, simply styles himself _Dux Normannorum_; it therefore was
granted a few years before the conquest. The building has suffered
little, either from the hands of the destroyers, or of those who do
still more mischief, the repairers; and it is certainly at once the most
genuine and the most magnificent specimen of the circular style, now
existing in Upper Normandy.--The west front is wholly of the time of the
founder, with the exception of the upper portion of the towers that
flank it on either side. In these are windows of nearly the earliest
pointed style; and they are probably of the same date as the
chapter-house, which was built in the latter part of the twelfth
century. The effect of the front is imposing: its general simplicity
contrasts well with the rich ornaments of the arched door-way, which is
divided into five systems of mouldings, all highly wrought, and
presenting almost every pattern commonly found in Norman buildings. A
label encircles the whole, the inner edge of which is indented into
obtuse pyramids, erroneously called lozenges. The capitals of the
columns supporting the arch are curiously sculptured: upon the second to
the left, on entering, are Adam and Eve, in the act of eating the
forbidden fruit; upon the opposite one, is represented the Flight into
Egypt. Normandy does not contain, I believe, a richer arch; but very
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