English MonasteriesThompson, A. Hamilton (Alexander Hamilton)
History
English Monasteries
Thompson, A. Hamilton (Alexander Hamilton)
Monasteries -- England
§ 42. The plan of Haughmond and Lilleshall, in which the presbytery
walls remained unpierced, while they were flanked with aisle-like
chapels, is found in some Premonstratensian churches, as at Dale.
At West Langdon the chapels were continued the whole length of the
presbytery. Usually, however, they stopped short of the east end. The
aisleless projection thus formed might contain, as at Alnwick, the high
altar. But at St Radegund's near Dover, the eastern bay was the Lady
chapel, and between it and the high altar was a space for processions,
entered by doorways in the walls which divided it from the aisles and
in the screen on either side of the high altar. In many Augustinian
churches a further development of this plan is found, in which the
chapels are real aisles, divided by arcades from the presbytery, as
at Cartmel and Lanercost, and the eastern arm is so lengthened as to
include the quire or a portion of it. At St Frideswide's, Oxford (now
Christ Church cathedral), Repton and Dorchester, where the plans are
somewhat complicated by the addition of one or more extra chapels on
one side, the high altar was, as at Cartmel and Lanercost, in the
eastern bay, and the procession in going from one aisle to another had
to pass in front of it. The aisled portion, however, was sometimes
planned, as at Bristol, to include the quire and presbytery and a
bay for the processional path behind the high altar: this was also
the plan of the church of secular canons at Southwell. The eastern
limb of Christchurch, Hants, is similar in plan to that of Bristol;
but here the high roof stopped above the altar, and the roofs of the
processional path and Lady chapel, as at Winchester, are on a level
with those of the aisles, while above them is an upper story or loft,
formerly the chapel of St Michael. The ground-plan of the Cluniac
church of Castle Acre was enlarged on the lines followed at Cartmel
and Lanercost: that of Wenlock approximated to those followed at
Bristol and Christchurch. Variations of these types of plan are seen
in the thirteenth-century enlargements of the Benedictine churches of
Rochester and Worcester, in which the quires were placed in the eastern
arm. Both churches have eastern transepts, and in both cases the high
vault was continued to the end of an aisleless eastern projection, in
which the high altar stood at Rochester with a clear space behind it.
At Worcester the aisleless bay was the Lady chapel, and the high altar
stood west of the processional path.
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