Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Chichester (1901): A Short History & Description of Its Fabric with an Account of the Diocese and See — John Shaqi
Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Chichester (1901): A Short History & Description of Its Fabric with an Account of the Diocese and SeeCorlette, Hubert C. (Hubert Christian)
History
Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Chichester (1901): A Short History & Description of Its Fabric with an Account of the Diocese and See
Corlette, Hubert C. (Hubert Christian)
Chichester Cathedral
The course of history that has been followed has led us through the
maze of some events which served to produce the cathedral that stands
among us now. The later centuries will not require as much attention,
since they afford but little material, comparatively, with which we
need delay; for the industry expended upon the fabric since this time
has produced little change in the general appearance of the building.
With the approach of the fourteenth century we meet a period when the
peculiarities of the work of the thirteenth century had become merged
in transitional forms, and from this application of ever-developing
ideas to accepted working principles came the well-known character
which English architecture displayed during that time. It was native
by parentage and birth; it represented the life which prevailed in the
ideas which were then the common currency. By it the ideals of thought
and imagination were expressed, until, later, they were represented in
other forms of art. At Chichester an early indication of the changed
treatment of older methods that was being developed experimentally is
shown by the portion which was added to the lady-chapel during the
episcopate of Gilbert de Sancto Leophardo. The architects and
master-builders devised for him the two new eastern bays complete,
together with the larger windows that were inserted in the walls of
that part of the chapel already built. Here again, as in the work set
in motion by his successor, the designers and builders made no attempt
to add these new portions in imitation of earlier ones. Then it was
Bishop Langton who, between 1305 and 1337, spent £340 "on a certain
wall and windows on the south side, which he constructed from the
ground upwards." [9] This work is principally to be seen in the great
south window of the transept, under which he provided for himself a
"founder's" tomb. In the gable above a rose window was inserted,
following the example of that earlier one in the east end of the
presbytery. The chapter-house above the treasury, or sacristy, was
also added when the new windows were inserted in the lower walls.
About the same time the doorway to the nave within the western porch
was constructed.
[9] Bishop Reade's Register.
[Illustration: THE SOUTH TRANSEPT, ABOUT 1836. _From Winkle's Cathedral
Churches_.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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