Derbyshire (England) -- Antiquities; Derbyshire (England) -- History
The stone pulpitum, like that at Dale, occupied the space between
the two piers of the eastern crossing; but, unlike the Dale pulpitum,
the Repton one was a solid structure. It measures 5 ft. 4½ in. deep
from east to west, and is pierced by a central doorway 4 ft. 4½ in.
wide. Its eastward front, against which backed the return stalls,
measures 26 ft. 2 in., the total width of the quire. The westward
façade (except for the door-jambs, which are moulded and flanked on
either side by an ornamental buttress, and when uncovered in 1883
showed traces of brilliant scarlet and black colouring) was austerely
plain. Its flatness was relieved, however, by the loft above being made
to overhang. That this was so is deduced from the fact that had the
loft-floor not projected beyond the area of the base of the pulpitum,
there would have been insufficient room for anyone ascending to the
top to turn round on emerging from the staircase. The latter, 3 ft.
2½ in. wide, was hollowed out of the solid in the northern half of
the pulpitum, and raked upwards in a straight flight from south to
north. The “pair of organs” named in the inventory, stood, it may be
assumed, on the platform at the top. That the pulpitum itself must
have been coeval (_circa_ 1275–1300) with the piers and integral in
structure with them, is manifest from the plinth that forms the base of
pulpitum and piers alike being finished with the same hollow chamfer
continuously all round it. A curious feature is that, notwithstanding
there is a step leading up from the nave to the pulpitum door, on the
east side there is a descent of one step again on to the floor of the
quire. South of the pulpitum a screen of wood shut off the quire’s
south aisle (which is ten feet wide) from the transept. Another screen,
in line with the last-named one, extending 21 ft. 9 in., _i.e._, as
far as the south wall of the transept, enclosed the spacious chapel
of Our Lady, which was situated parallel to the quire, on the south
side of the quire’s south aisle. The former existence of these screens
is proved by holes sunk in the masonry to receive the timber work.
The north transept was too ruinous to furnish any indication of its
ancient screen arrangements; but there were found some signs of a
screen having stood between the first pair of piers in the nave (which,
exclusive of the aisles, is 22 ft. 2 in. wide). This would, of course,
be the position of the rood-screen proper.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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