ANGLO-SAXON AND ANGLO-NORMAN ARCHITECTURE
In Great Britain, even more than on the Continent, the architecture of
the past reflects national character, its distinctive peculiarities
having been the outcome of local conditions differing widely from those
that obtained elsewhere, which largely modified the styles introduced
from without. On the arrival of the Romans in the first century of the
Christian era, there were, with the exception of the monoliths on
Salisbury plain known as Stonehenge and other prehistoric relics, the
origin of which has never yet been discovered, no buildings of greater
pretension than mud huts or circular stone or wooden houses with a hole
in the tapering roof through which air was admitted and smoke dispersed.
The houses, palaces, and churches erected by the invaders were, as
proved by the remains at Silchester, Wroxeter, and elsewhere, of the
type of those of Imperial Rome, and on them many British masons were
employed, who thus acquired a knowledge of the principles of
construction that stood their successors in good stead. Those
successors, however, showed no desire to perpetuate the style introduced
by the conquerors, and when the latter withdrew in the 5th century the
buildings they left behind them were allowed to fall into rapid decay.
[Illustration: Example of Saxon Arcading]
[Illustration: Example of Saxon Arcading]
Very quickly too did most of the converts to Christianity relapse into
heathenism, and although the lamp of faith was long kept burning in
Ireland and in Scotland, no trace exists of the churches in which the
little remnant of the followers of the Redeemer met for worship. Of
those built later under the auspices of Saints Augustine, Paulinus, and
other early bishops, not one escaped destruction, but there is strong
evidence to prove that they were of the basilican apsidal plan, that
never took very deep root in England, but was in many cases ousted by
the sanctuary with a square-shaped eastern extension.
It is usual to give the term Anglo-Saxon to all relics of buildings in
Great Britain, that can be proved to date from between the early 7th
century and 1066, but Pre-Conquest would be more strictly accurate,
Anglo-Saxon architects having contributed but little to the evolution of
style, for they were wanting in initiative, rarely trying experiments
with new features as was the constant custom of their Norman successors.
To this, however, there was one brilliant exception in Bishop Wilfrid of
York, who greatly improved the primitive church, built by King Edwin in
the capital of his see, that was later destroyed by fire, and erected
noble minsters at Hexham and Ripon, of which the fine crypts with
massive pillars still remain beneath the considerably later buildings.
In the south of England, too, there was considerable architectural
activity in the 7th and 8th centuries, whilst in the 9th the return of
King Egbert from his long exile at the Court of Charlemagne appears to
have led to the introduction in Wessex of the Oriental branch of the
Romanesque style to which the cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle belongs.
[Illustration: Tower of Sompting Church, Sussex]
The chief characteristics of the so-called Anglo-Saxon style are the
great height in comparison with the length and breadth of a building, a
rectangular plan, massive square towers, unadorned angular or
semicircular arches, stunted clumsy-looking columns with roughly carved
or plain capitals, long narrow round-headed deeply recessed windows,
massive walls without internal decoration, with on the exterior a
somewhat ornate surface ornamentation, combined with a series of
peculiar clamps known as quoins at the angles of the walls, greatly
strengthening the structure. There were no aisles or transepts in early
Anglo-Saxon buildings, but the chancel was divided from the nave by an
arch sometimes with and sometimes without carving.
It is supposed that most of the early Anglo-Saxon churches were built of
wood, and at Greenstead in Essex an example remains of the mode in which
such buildings were constructed, though the probability is that none of
the original material remains. Of the stone buildings that succeeded
those in the more perishable material a few only are still in existence,
including the Abbey Church of Deerhurst near Towkesbury, the oldest
consecrated building still in use in England, the Tower of Earl's Barton
Church in Northamptonshire, parts of Barfreston Church, Kent, that has a
fine Norman doorway: Sompting Church, with the unusual feature of a
gabled tower with a spire, and that of Worth, both in Sussex, the latter
with rudimentary transepts and a semicircular apse, with which may be
mentioned S. Lawrence at Bradford-on-Avon, Wilts, of somewhat uncertain
but probably later date than any of these, for it has a square Eastern
end and decorative arcading on the upper portion of the walls, prophetic
of coming changes.
Certain portions of St. Martin's Church, Canterbury, notably a doorway
in the chancel and parts of the foundations, are supposed to have
belonged to a Saxon church of earlier date than the crypts of Hexham and
Ripon already referred to, and which was preceded by an even more
ancient building, one of the very first places of Christian worship
erected in England.
The so-called Pyx House in Westminster Abbey, a low narrow
solemn-looking vaulted room with a row of massive pillars in the centre,
and a single archway in the south transept, are all that are left of the
noble sanctuary built under the direction of the last of the Saxon
kings, but these relics, with a few conventual buildings, suffice to
connect with Anglo-Saxon times a church that is perhaps more intimately
associated than any other with the history of England from the close of
the 11th to the middle of the 16th century, it having been added to
under every successive occupant of the throne.
The Anglo-Norman style, that succeeded the Saxon, prevailed in Great
Britain from the conquest to the last decade of the 12th century,
becoming at that time either merged in or superseded by the earliest
phase of the Gothic.
Always most enthusiastic builders, the Normans found in the land of
their adoption fuller scope for their energies than in their own, and
before they became absorbed in the race they had conquered, they left
their impress throughout the length and breadth of their new domain,
monasteries, cathedrals, and parish churches, castles, and dwelling
houses rising up in every direction, all stamped with a most distinctive
character, the result of the welding into one of Anglo-Saxon and Norman
traditions, and the modification of a foreign style by local conditions
of material and environment. In many cases somewhat crude and heavy,
Norman work has yet always an imposing dignity, and is, as a general
rule, admirably suited to the site it occupies and the purpose for which
it is intended.
[Illustration: Plan of Norman Church]
[Illustration: Norman Capital. White Tower, London]
[Illustration: Base and Capital of Norman Pillar]
[Illustration: Norman Capital]
[Illustration: Norman Arcading]
[Illustration: Norman Window]
[Illustration: Norman Arcading]
[Illustration: Norman Window]
[Illustration: Norman Window]
The chief characteristics of Anglo-Norman ecclesiastical buildings are a
cruciform plan; the great length in comparison with the breadth of the
nave, which joins the choir without the intervention of a screen, such
screens as are _in situ_ being of much later date than the churches in
which they are found; columns of greater girth and height than the Saxon
type, some circular, others six or eight sided, the circular type
occasionally clustered in groups of six or more, with roughly carved
capitals of which the so-called cushion form is of most frequent
occurrence, upholding arches of wide span, massive walls, those of the
nave with rows of purely ornamental arcading, beautifully proportioned
triforia and clerestories; long, narrow, round-headed windows, two or
three being often grouped together; deeply recessed and finely decorated
doorways; strong external buttresses; twin western towers and a loftier
central one rising from the intersection of nave and transepts. With
certain notable exceptions referred to below, Norman churches have flat
timber roofs, but those of the crypt beneath them are generally of
groined stone with plain or only slightly ornamented ribs.
[Illustration: Norman Window]
[Illustration: Norman Doorway]
Another very distinctive characteristic of the Norman style is the
richness of the surface decoration of the interiors of cathedrals and
churches, the bases, shafts, and capitals of the columns, the arches,
headings of windows, mural arcades, &c. being all enriched with
mouldings of an infinite variety of form, including the so-called cable
resembling a rope, the billet not unlike short bits of rounded wood, the
chevron or zig-zag, the fret or fillet, the lozenge, the trellis, the
cone, the scollop, and wave with the so-called torus, a convex swelling,
and the cavetto, a hollow moulding, the last two used almost exclusively
on the bases of columns.
[Illustration: Norman Buttress]
[Illustration: Cable Moulding]
[Illustration: Billet Moulding]
[Illustration: Chevron or Zig-zag Moulding]
[Illustration: Diamond or Lozenge Moulding]
[Illustration: Trellis Moulding]
[Illustration: Cone Moulding]
[Illustration: Scollop Moulding]
Among noteworthy existing examples of the Anglo-Norman style are the
nave, transepts and western doorway of Hereford Cathedral; the choir,
transepts, and nave of Peterborough Cathedral; the naves of Gloucester,
Exeter, Chichester, and Ely Cathedrals; certain portions of Canterbury
Cathedral, including the choir chapels, part of the cloisters, the
baptistery tower, S. Anselm's Tower, and a fine staircase leading up
from the Close; the Chapter House of Worcester Cathedral; the greater
part of Norwich Cathedral, which, though it has the French chevet at the
eastern end, combines with it the distinctive English characteristics of
a nave of great length and long transepts, the former with fourteen
noble bays; the naves of S. Alban's Abbey, Southwell Minster, and the
Priory Church of Christchurch, Hants; portions of the nave and transepts
and the central tower of Christchurch Cathedral, Oxford; the beautiful
portal of Tewkesbury Abbey, the finest in England, and the doorway of
Hales Church, Norfolk, on which may be seen many of the characteristic
mouldings enumerated above.
[Illustration: Norman Church at Kilpeck]
Somewhat later in date and even more distinctively Anglo-Norman than the
examples quoted above, is the noble Cathedral of Durham, in which the
style reached its fullest culmination. It remains, with the exception of
the so-called Chapel of the Nine Altars that replaces the original apse,
very much what it was when first completed, and reflects the national
unity that was becoming ever more and more complete whilst it was being
erected. A very noteworthy feature of this most effective building, in
which every detail is subordinated to the general effect, is the vaulted
roof of the nave, one of the very few dating from Norman times,
significant of the approaching revolt against the flat roofs that had so
long been looked upon as essential. In spite of certain crudities of
structure it harmonises well alike with the vaulting of the aisles and
transepts of earlier, and of the choir of somewhat later date. The great
clustered piers alternating with cylindrical columns, the fine arches
spanning them, the beautiful triforia and clerestories, and above all
the long vista of nave and choir, combine to place Durham Cathedral in
the very highest rank amongst contemporary buildings either in England
or on the Continent, whilst in the Galilee Chapel, to which a porch,
replacing an earlier entrance, gives access, the details of the
transitional Norman style can be very clearly studied, the graceful
intersecting arches, upheld by slender coupled columns, recently
supplemented by additional supports, enriched with characteristic
mouldings, shadowing forth the approaching change to the early English
phase of Gothic.
Winchester Cathedral, originally a very typical Norman building designed
by William of Wykeham, retains its Norman framework, covered over, as it
were, with a drapery of detail in the latest development of English
Gothic, and with it may be named as characteristic Norman buildings with
Gothic additions, Peterborough Cathedral, all Norman except the west
front and eastern extremity of the choir; Malmesbury Abbey, with a
flat-roofed nave and vaulted aisles, the latter with pointed arches; the
Cathedral of Exeter; the Minster of Sherbourne; and portions of
Westminster Abbey.
Many parish churches, too, including those of Kilpeck in Herefordshire,
a very typical Norman building; Tickencote in Lincolnshire, with
intersecting pointed arches; S. Peter's in the East, Oxford, with a
groined vaulted roof; Barfreston Church, Kent, with a very beautiful
recessed doorway; Goring and Iffley in Oxfordshire; and above all, S.
Bartholomew's in London, date from Norman times, and, though they have
all been more or less modified by restoration, retain the general
characteristics of the period to which they belong.
[Illustration: Plan of Peterborough Cathedral]
Anglo-Norman secular architecture is characterised by much the same
qualities as ecclesiastical, the castles and residences of the
sovereigns and the nobles having been of dignified and impressive
appearance, well proportioned, and thoroughly in harmony with their
surroundings. During the reigns of the Conqueror and his successors many
noble strongholds were erected on points of vantage. The most important
feature, and in every case the first to be built, having been the lofty
central keep or donjon, the home of its owner in peace, and the last
refuge of a besieged garrison in time of war. In it was a fine hall, in
which the host received his guests, with a raised platform known as the
dais for the use of those of high rank, and the approach to it was
protected by a complex series of defences, including deep ditches or
fosses, walls with towers and turrets at intervals, forming two distinct
enclosures known as the outer and inner baileys, often covering a vast
extent of ground, the whole encircled by a deep moat that could be
filled with water when necessary. The great main entrance was flanked by
towers, and in connection with the heavy doors of solid oak was a
portcullis, that is to say, a grating of timber and iron bristling with
spikes, that could be drawn up from within, cutting off all access to
the inner precincts.
Some few Norman castles, all considerably modified to suit modern
requirements, are still in use as residences or public buildings,
including those of Windsor, Warwick (both specially typical), Norwich,
Dover, Richmond in Yorkshire, and the Tower of London; the keep of the
last named (known as the White Tower) and the chapel dedicated to S.
John being amongst the best examples of the Anglo-Norman style in
existence; whilst at Rochester, Colchester, Croft, Headingham, and
Kenilworth are extensive remains of other strongholds, that before they
fell into decay, must have equalled in grandeur those of Windsor and
Warwick. A very remarkable example of a private residence dating from
Norman times is Haddon Hall in Derbyshire, the seat of the Duke of
Rutland, which retains the original great hall with a dais and
minstrels' gallery, and a number of fine suites of rooms to which
various wings were added during the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries,
affording an excellent opportunity for the study of the development of
English domestic architecture.