ARCHITECTURE.
[IN this chapter, the account of Aubrey’s visit to Old Sarum, and the
traditions connected with the erection of Salisbury Cathedral, although
they furnish no new facts of importance, will be read with interest;
especially on account of the reference they bear to the enlightened and
munificent Bishop Ward. A memoir of that prelate was published by Dr.
Walter Pope, in 1697 (8vo); and some further particulars of him, as
connected with Salisbury, will be found in Hatcher’s valuable History
of that City.—J. B.]
THE celebrated antiquity of Stonehenge, as also that stupendious but
unheeded antiquity at Aubury, &c. I affirme to have been temples, and
built by the Britons. See my Templa Druidum. [The essay referred to was
a part of Aubrey’s Monumenta Britannica, the manuscript of which has
strangely disappeared within the last twenty yeares. I have given an
account of its contents in the Memoir of Aubrey, already frequently
referred to,(page 87). Aubrey was the first who asserted that Avebury
and Stonehenge were temples of the Britons. He was also the first
person who wrote any thing about the forms, styles, and varieties of
windows, arches, &c. in Church Architecture, and his remarks and
opinions on both subjects were judicious, curious, and original.—J. B.]
Here being so much good stone in this countrey, no doubt but that the
Romans had here, as well as in other parts, good buildings. But time
hath left us no vestigia of their architecture unlesse that little that
remains of the castle of Old Sarum, where the mortar is as hard as a
stone. This must have been a most august structure, for it is situated
upon a hill. When the high walles were standing, flanked at due
distances with towers, about seven in all, and the vast keep (arx) in
the middle crowned with another high fortification, it must needs
afford a most noble view over the plaines.
(The following account I had from the right reverend, learned, and
industrious Seth Ward, Lord Bishop of Sarum, who had taken the paines
to peruse all the old records of the church, that had been clung
together and untoucht for perhaps two hundred yeares.) Within this
castle of Old Sarum, on the east side, stood the Cathedrall church; the
tuft and scite is yet discernable: which being seated so high was so
obnoxious to the weather, that when the wind did blow they could not
heare the priest say masse. But this was not the only inconvenience.
The soldiers of the castle and the priests could never agree; and one
day, when they were gone without the castle in procession, the soldiers
kept them out all night, or longer. Whereupon the Bishop, being much
troubled, cheered them up as well as he could, and told them he would
study to accommodate them better. In order thereunto he rode severall
times to the Lady Abbesse at Wilton to have bought or exchanged a piece
of ground of her ladyship to build a church and houses for the priests.
A poor woman at Quidhampton, that was spinning in the street, sayd to
one of her neighbours, “I marvell what the matter is that the bishop
makes so many visits to my lady; I trow he intends to marry her.” Well,
the bishop and her ladyship did not conclude about the land, and the
bishop dreamt that the Virgin Mary came to him, and brought him to or
told him of Merrifield; she would have him build his church there and
dedicate it to her. Merrifield was a great field or meadow where the
city of New Sarum stands, and did belong to the Bishop, as now the
whole city belongs to him.
This was about the latter end of King John’s reigne, and the first
grant or diploma that ever King Henry the Third signed was that for the
building of our Ladies church at Salisbury. The Bishop sent for
architects from Italy, and they did not onely build that famous
structure, and the close, but layd out the streetes of the whole city:
which run parallell one to another, and the market-place-square in the
middle: whereas in other cities they were built by chance, and at
severall times.
I know but one citie besides in England that was designed and layd out
at once as this was; and that is Chichester: where, standing at the
market-crosse, you may see the four gates of the city. They say there
that it was built about the same time that New Salisbury was, and had
some of those architects.* The town of Richelieu was built then by the
great Cardinall, when he built his august chasteau there.
*[Salisbury has little parallelism to its neighbour Chichester, which
is of Roman origin: the former being truly English, and perfectly
unique in its history and arrangement. Aubrey has omitted to notice the
rapid streams of water flowing through each of the principal streets,
which form a remarkable feature of the city.—J. B.]
Upon the building of this cathedrall and close the castle of Old Sarum
went to wrack, and one may see in the walles of the close abundance of
stones, finely carved, that were perhaps part of the church there.
After the church and close were built, the citizens had their
freestone, &c. from thence. And in Edward the Sixth’s time, the great
house of the Earle of Pembroke, at Wilton, was built with the mines of
it. About 1660 I was upon it. There was then remaining on the south
side some of the walles of the great gate; and on the north side there
was some remaines of a bottome of a tower; but the incrustation of
freestone was almost all gone: a fellow was then picking at that little
that was left. ’Tis like enough by this time they have digged all away.
Salisbury.—Edw. Leigh, Esq. “There is a stately and beautifull minster,
with an exceeding high spered steeple, and double crosse aisle on both
sides. The windowes of the church, as they reckon them, answer just in
number to the dayes; the pillars, great and small, to the houres, of a
full yeare; and the gates to the moneths.”—[“England Described; or,
Observations on the several Counties and Shires thereof, by Edw.
Leigh.” 1659. 8vo.]
“Mira canam, soles quot continet annus, in unâ
Tam numerosa ferunt sede fenestra micat.
Marmoreaq{ue} capit fusas tot ab arte columnas
Comprensus horas quot vagus annus habet.
Totq{ue}patent portæ, quot mensibus annus abundat,
Res mira, et vera, res celebrata fide.”—DANIEL ROGERS.
’Tis strange to see how errour hath crept in upon the people, who
believe that the pillars of this church were cast, forsooth, as
chandlers make candles; and the like is reported of the pillars of the
Temple Church, London, &c.: and not onely the vulgar swallow down the
tradition gleb, but severall learned and otherwise understanding
persons will not be perswaded to the contrary, and that the art is
lost.[Among the rest Fuller, in his Worthies of England, gave currency
to this absurd opinion.—J. B.] Nay, all the bishops and churchmen of
that church in my remembrance did believe it, till Bishop Ward came,
who would not be so imposed on; and the like errour runnes from
generation to generation concerning Stoneheng, that the stones there
are artificiall. But, to returne to the pillars of this church, they
are all reall marble, and shew the graine of the Sussex marble (sc. the
little cockles), from whence they were brought. [These pillars are not
made of Sussex marble; but of that kind which is brought from a part of
Dorsetshire called the Isle of Purbeck.—J. B.] At every nine foot they
are jointed with an ornament or band of iron or copper. This quarrie
hath been closed up and forgott time out of mind, and the last yeare,
1680, it was accidentally discovered by felling of an old oake; and it
now serves London. (From Mr. Bushnell, the stone-cutter.)
The old tradition is, that this church was “built upon wooll-packs”,
and doubtlesse there is something in it which is now forgott. I shall
endeavour to retrieve and unriddle it by comparison. There is a tower
at Rouen in Normandie called the Butter Tower; for when it was built a
toll was layd upon all the butter that was brought to Rouen, for and
towards the building of this tower; as now there is a [duty] layd upon
every chaldron of coales towards the building of St Paul’s Church,
London: so hereafter they may say that that church was built upon
New-Castle coales. In like manner it might be that heretofore, when
Salisbury Cathedral was building, which was long before wooll was
manufactured in England (the merchants of the staple sent it then in
woolpacks beyond sea, to Flanders, &c.), that an imposition might be
putt on the Wiltshire wool-packs towards the carrying on of this
magnificent structure. There is a saying also that London Bridge was
built upon wooll-packs, upon the same account.
The height of Our Lady steeple at Salisbury was never found so little
as 400 foot, and never more than 406 foot, by the observations of Thom.
Nash, surveyor of the workes of this church: but Colonell John Wyndham
did take the height more accurately, An° 1684, by a barometer: sc. the
height of the weather-dore of Our Lady Church steeple at Salisbury from
the ground is 4280 inches. The mercury subsided in that height 42/100
of an inch. He affirms that the height of the said steeple is 404 foot,
which he hath tryed severall times; and by the help of his barometer,
which is accurately made according to his direction, he will with great
facility take the height of any mountain: quod N.B. [Col. Wyndham’s
measurement has been adopted as correct by most authors who have
written on the subject since.—J. B.]
Memorandum. About 1669 or 1670 Bishop Ward invited Sir Christopher Wren
to Salisbury, out of curiosity, to survey the church there, as to the
steeple, architecture, &c. He was above a weeke about it, and writt a
sheet or a sheet and a halfe, an account of it, which he presented to
the bishop. I asked the bishop since for it, and he told me he had lent
it, to whom he could not tell, and had no copy of it. ’Tis great pity
the paines of so great an artist should be lost. Sir Christopher tells
me he hath no copie of it neither.
This year, 1691, Mr. Anth. Wood tells me, he hath gott a transcript of
Sir Chr. Wren’s paper; which obtain, and insert here. I much doubted I
should never have heard of it again.
[Soon after writing this passage Aubrey probably obtained a copy of Sir
Christopher Wren’s report, which he has inserted in his original
manuscript. It is dated in 1669, and occupies eleven folio pages. In
The History and Antiquities of the Cathedral of Salisbury, &c. (1723,
8vo.), it is printed, and described as “An Architectonical Account of
this Cathedral”, by “an eminent gentleman”. Part of the same report was
printed in Wren’s Parentalia (1750); and a short abstract of it will
also be found in Dodsworth’s Salisbury Cathedral (written by the late
Mr. Hatcher), p. 172. In a communication from the last named gentleman
in 1841, when he was engaged upon his History of Salisbury, he wrote to
me as follows: “I have lately fallen upon what appears to have been Sir
C. Wren’s original report relative to the cathedral; a very elaborate
report on the state of the building in 1691, by a person named Naish;
some good observations on the bending of the piers (anonymous); and
several estimates and observations made by Price. What I shall do with
them I have not yet determined.”—J. B.]
Wardour Castle was very strongly built of freestone. I never saw it but
when I was a youth; the day after part of it was blown up: and the
mortar was so good that one of the little towers reclining on one side
did hang together and not fall in peeces. It was called Warder Castle
from the conserving there the ammunition of the West.
Sir William Dugdale told me, many years since, that about Henry the
Third’s time the Pope gave a bull or patents to a company of Italian
Freemasons to travell up and down over all Europe to build churches.
From those are derived the fraternity of adopted Masons. They are known
to one another by certain signes and watch-words: it continues to this
day. They have severall lodges in severall counties for their
reception, and when any of them fall into decay the brotherhood is to
relieve him, &c. The manner of their adoption is very formall, and with
an oath of secresy.
Memorandum. This day, May the 18th, being Munday, 1691, after Rogation
Sunday, is a great convention at St. Paul’s Church of the fraternity of
the adopted Masons, where Sir Christopher Wren is to be adopted a
brother, and Sir Henry Goodric, of the Tower, and divers others. There
have been kings of this sodality.
At Pottern, a great mannour belonging to the Bishop of Sarum, is a very
faire strong built church, with a great tower in the middest of the
crosse aisle. It is exactly of the same architecture of the cathedrall
church at Sarum, and the windowes are painted by the same hand, in that
kind of Gothick grotesco. Likewise the church at Kington St. Michael’s,
and that at Sopworth, are of the same fashion, and built about the same
time, sc. with slender marble pillars to the windowes; and just so the
church of Glastonbury Abbey, and Westminster Abbey. Likewise the
architecture of the church at Bishop’s Cannings is the same, and such
pillars to the windowes.
At Calne was a fine high steeple which stood upon four pillars in the
middle of the church. One of the pillars was faulty, and the
churchwardens were dilatory, as is usual in such cases.—Chivers, Esq.
of that parish, foreseeing the fall of it, if not prevented, and the
great charge they must be at by it, brought down Mr. Inigo Jones to
survey it. This was about 1639 or 1640: he gave him 30 li. out of his
own purse for his paines. Mr. Jones would have underbuilt it for an
hundred pounds. About 1645 it fell down, on a Saturday, and also broke
down the chancell; the parish have since been at 1,000 li. Charge to
make a new heavy tower. Such will be the fate of our steeple at Kington
St. Michael; one cannot perswade the parishioners to goe out of their
own way. [In another of Aubrey’s MSS. (his “Description of North
Wiltshire”), is a sketch of the tower and spire of the church of
Kington St. Michael, shewing several large and serious cracks in the
walls. The spire was blown down in 1703, its neglected state no doubt
contributing to its fall. The following manuscript note by James
Gilpin, Esq. Recorder of Oxford (who was born at Kington in 1709), may
be added, from my own collections for the history of this, my native
parish. “In ye great storm in ye year 1703, ye spire of this church was
blown down, and two of ye old bells I remember standing in ye belfry
till ye tower was pulled down in 1724, in order to be rebuilt It was
rebuilt accordingly, and the bells were then new cast, with ye
assistance of Mr. Harington ye Vicar, who gave a new bell, on which his
name is inscribed, so as to make a peal of six bells. On these bells
are the following inscriptions:—1. Prosperity to this parish, 1726. 2.
Peace and good neighbourhood, 1726. 3. Prosperity to ye Church of
England, 1726. 4. William Harington, Vicar. A. R. 1726 (A. R. means
Abraham Rudhall, ye bell founder). 5. Has no inscription, but 1726 in
gilt figures. 6. Jonathan Power and Robert Hewett, Churchwardens,
1726.”—J. B.]
Sir William Dugdale told me he finds that painting in glasse came first
into England in King John’s time. Before the Reformation I believe
there was no county or great town in England but had glasse painters.
Old …… Harding, of Blandford in Dorsetshire, where I went to schoole,
was the only countrey glasse-painter that ever I knew. Upon play dayes
I was wont to visit his shop and furnaces. He dyed about 1643, aged
about 83, or more.
In St. Edmund’s church at Salisbury were curious painted glasse
windowes, especially in the chancell, where there was one window, I
think the east window, of such exquisite worke that Gundamour, the
Spanish Ambassadour, did offer some hundreds of pounds for it, if it
might have been bought. In one of the windowes was the picture of God
the Father, like an old man, which gave offence to H. Shervill, Esq.
then Recorder of this city (this was about 1631), who, out of zeale,
came and brake some of these windowes, and clambering upon one of the
pews to be able to reach high enough, fell down and brake his leg. For
this action he was brought into the Starr-Chamber, and had a great fine
layd upon him [£500. J. B.] which, I think, did undoe him. [See a
minute and interesting account of Sherfield’s offence, and the
proceedings at the trial, in Hatcher’s History of Salisbury, p.
371-374.—J. B.]
There was, at the Abbey of Malmesbury, a very high spire-steeple, as
high almost, they at Malmesbury say, as that of St. Paul’s, London; and
they further report, that when the steeple fell down the ball of it
fell as far as the Griffin Inne.
The top of the tower of Sutton Benger is very elegant, there is not
such another in the county. It much resembles St Walborough’s [St.
Werburg’s] at Bristoll. [The tower of Sutton Benger church, here
alluded to, has a large open-work’d pinnacle, rising from the centre of
the roof; a beautiful and very singular ornament. See the wood-cut in
the title-page of the present volume.- J. B.]
The priory of Broadstock was very well built, and with good strong
ribbs, as one may conclude by the remaines that are left of it yet
standing, which are the cellar, which is strongly vaulted with
freestone, and the hall above it. It is the stateliest cellar in
Wiltshire. The Hall is spatious, and within that the priour’s parlour,
wherein is good carving. In the middle of the south side of the hall is
a large chimney, over which is a great window, so that the draught of
the smoake runnes on each side of the chimney. Above the cellars the
hall and parlours are one moietie; the church or, chapell stood on the
south side of the hall, under which was a vault, as at St. Faithes
under Paules. The very fundations of this fair church are now, 1666,
digged up, where I saw severall freestone coffins, having two holes
bored in the bottome, and severall capitalls and bases of handsome
Gothique pillars. On the west end of the hall was the King’s lodgeings,
which they say were very noble, and standing about 1588. [Aubrey
records some further particulars of Bradenstoke Priory; a short account
of which edifice will be found in the third volume of the Beauties of
Wiltshire. The Gentleman’s Magazine, Nov. 1833, contains a wood-cut and
account of this old religious house. See also Bowles’s History of
Lacock Abbey.—J. B.]
The church of Broad Chalke was dedicated to All-Hallowes, as appeares
by the ancient parish booke. The tradition is that it was built by a
lawyer, whose picture is in severall of the glasse-windowes yet
remaining, kneeling, in a purple gowne or robe, and at the bottome of
the windowes this subscription: “Orate pro felici statu Magistri
Sieardi Lenot”. This church hath no pillar, and the breadth is thirty
and two feete and two inches. Hereabout are no trees now growing that
would be long enough to make the crosse beames that doe reach from side
to side. By the fashion of the windowes I doe guesse that it was built
in the reigne of King Henry the Sixth. [The church of Broad Chalk is
described in Hoare’s Modern Wiltshire, Hundred of Chalk, p. 148.]
The market-crosses of Salisbury, Malmesbury, and Trowbridge, are very
noble: standing on six pillars, and well vaulted over with freestone
well carved. On every one of these crosses above sayd the crest of
Hungerford, the sickles, doth flourish like parietaria or wall-flower,
as likewise on most publique buildings in these parts, which witnesse
not onely their opulency but munificency. I doe think there is such
another crosse at Cricklade, with the coate and crests of Hungerford.
Quaere de hoc. [There is not any cross remaining in Trowbridge; and
that at Cricklade, in the high street, is merely a single shaft, placed
on a base of steps. The one at Salisbury is a plain unadorned building;
but that of Malmesbury is a fine ornamented edifice. It is described
and illustrated in my “Dictionary of the Architecture and Archaeology
of the Middle Ages”.—J. B.]
The Lord Stourton’s house at Stourton is very large and very old, but
is little considerable as to the architecture. The pavement of the
chapell there is of bricks, annealed or painted yellow, with their coat
and rebus; sc. a tower and a tunne. These enamelled bricks have not
been in use these last hundred yeares. The old paving of Our Lady
Church at Salisbury was of such; and the choire of Gloucester church is
paved with admirable bricks of this fashion. A little chapell at
Merton, in the Earle of Shaftesbury’s house, is paved with such tiles,
whereon are annealed or enamelled the coate and quarterings of Horsey.
It is pity that this fashion is not revived; they are handsome and far
more wholesome than marble paving in our could climate, and much
cheaper. They have been disused ever since King Edward the Sixth’s
time. [Aubrey would have rejoiced to witness the success which has
attended the revived use of ornamental paving tiles within the last few
years. Messrs. Copeland and Garrett, and Mr. Minton, of
Stoke-upon-Trent, as well as the Messrs. Chamberlain of Worcester, are
engaged in making large numbers of these tiles, which are now
extensively employed by church architects. Those individuals have
produced tiles equal in excellence and beauty to the ancient
specimens.—J. B.]
Heretofore all gentlemen’s houses had fish ponds, and their houses had
motes drawn about them, both for strength and for convenience of fish
on fasting days.
The architecture of an old English gentleman’s house, especially in
Wiltshire and thereabout, was a good high strong wall, a gate house, a
great hall and parlour, and within the little green court where you
come in, stood on one side the barne: they then thought not the noise
of the threshold ill musique. This is yet to be seen at severall old
houses and seates, e. g. Bradfield, Alderton, Stanton St. Quintin,
Yatton-Keynell, &c.
Fallersdowne, vulgo Falston, was built by a Baynton, about perhaps
Henry the Fifth. Here was a noble old-fashioned house, with a mote
about it and drawbridge, and strong high walles embatteled. They did
consist of a layer of freestone and a layer of flints, squared or
headed; two towers faced the south, one the east, the other the west
end. After the garrison was gonn the mote was filled up, about 1650,
and the high wall pulled down and one of the towers. Baynton was
attainted about Henry the Sixth. Afterwards the Lord Chief Justice
Cheyney had it About the beginning of Queen Elizabeth, ….. Vaughan of
Glamorganshire bought it; and about 1649, Sir George Vaughan sold it to
Philip Earle of Pembroke.
Longleate House is the most august building in the kingdome. It was
built by [Edward] Seymor, Duke of Somerset, Lord Protector,* tempore
Edward VI., who sent for the architects out of Italy. The length is 272
foot, the breadth 172 foot; measured by Mr. Moore, Clericus. It is as
high as the Banqueting house at Whitehall, outwardly adorned with
Dorick, lonick, and Corinthian pillars. Mr. Dankertz drew a landskip of
it, which was engraved. Desire Mr. Rose to gett me a print of it.
*[This statement is erroneous. Maiden Bradley, which is not far from
Longleat, has been a seat of the noble family of Seymour for many
centuries, and they have an old mansion there; but the family never
possessed Longleat. The latter estate, on the contrary, was granted by
King Henry VIII. to Sir John Horsey, and Edward Earl of Hertford, from
whom it was purchased by Sir John Thynne, ancestor of its present
proprietor, the Marquess of Bath. In 1576, Sir John commenced the
splendid mansion at Longleat, which some writers assert was designed by
John of Padua. The works were regularly prosecuted during the next
twelve years, and completed by the two succeeding owners of the
property. See Architectural Antiquities of Great Britain, vol. ii.—J.
B.]
Longford House was built by the Lord Georges, after the fashion of one
of the King of Swedland’s palaces. The figure of it is triangular, and
the roomes of state are in the round towers in the angles. These round
roomes are adorned with black marble Corinthian pillars, with gilded
capitalls and bases. ’Twas sold to the Lord Colraine about 1646. [It
now belongs to the Earl of Radnor. Plans, views, and accounts of this
mansion, as well as of Longleat and Charlton Houses, are published in
the “Architectural Antiquities”, vol. ii.—J. B.]
Charlton House was built by the Earl of Suffolk, Lord High Treasurer,
about the beginning of King James the First, when architecture was at a
low ebbe.
At Broad Chalke is one of the tunablest ring of bells in Wiltshire,
which hang advantageously; the river running near the churchyard, which
meliorates the sound. Here were but four bells till anno 1616 was added
a fifth; and in anno 1659 Sir George Penruddock and I made ourselves
church-wardens, or else the fair church had fallen, from the
niggardlinesse of the churchwardens of mean condition, and then we
added the sixth bell.
The great bell at Westminster, in the Clockiar at the New Palace Yard,
36,OOOlib. weight. See Stow’s Survey of London, de hoc. It was given by
Jo. Montacute, Earle of (Salisbury, I think). Part of the inscription
is thus, sc. “…… annis ab acuto monte Johannis.”