English MonasteriesThompson, A. Hamilton (Alexander Hamilton)
History
English Monasteries
Thompson, A. Hamilton (Alexander Hamilton)
Monasteries -- England
§ 63. The buildings connecting the east and west ranges of the
Cistercian cloister were divided into three parts, with the
warming-house on the east, the frater in the middle and the kitchen
on the west, all entered from the cloister. It is probable that in
the first instance the Cistercian frater was built in the usual way,
with its major axis from east to west. This was always the plan of the
frater at Sibton in Suffolk: there are clear traces of it at Kirkstall,
and evidences of foundations at Fountains. In the Savigniac houses,
afterwards Cistercian, the frater seems to have been built from east
to west, and at Buckfast this position was apparently never altered.
But such fraters were cramped in size by their position between the
warming-house and kitchen, and, before the end of the twelfth century
they were built or, as at Fountains and Kirkstall, rebuilt at right
angles to the cloister with their major axes from north to south.
This gave more room for the kitchen on the west: it also permitted a
readjustment of the warming-house, and left room at the east end for
the insertion of a wide and convenient day-stair to the dorter, with a
landing at the head, from which, as at Fountains, access was given to a
room, possibly the treasury or muniment-room, above the warming-house.
We have no definite reason for the change of plan; but that it was
due to the uncontemplated growth of numbers in Cistercian houses is
at least probable. At Furness, where the dorter was of remarkable
length, the frater, built in place of the old frater of the Savigniac
monastery, had to be lengthened during the thirteenth century, the only
reason for which can have been that, even on the new plan, it afforded
insufficient room for all the brethren.
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