From the high altar we look down to the west end, and see above the choir
screen the painted glass of the west window which was inserted in the
reign of George II. To our right is the tomb of Aymer de Valence, and
the smaller contemporary monument of the first bride ever married in the
Abbey, Aveline, Countess of Lancaster. In the foreground is the ancient
mosaic pavement, which was laid in the thirteenth century, when this part
of the church was built; and beyond the altar rails we see the
comparatively modern stalls of the choir and the still more recent organ
case. The pulpit marks the intersection of the sanctuary with the north
transept.
* * * * * *
Facing east we look directly towards the Holy of Holies, the Sanctuary,
where, raised high on a {57} mound of sacred earth, brought from
Palestine, is the shrine of Edward the Confessor, girdled by a half
circle of royal tombs. Between us and the saint's feretory is a
fifteenth-century screen, which is faced on this side by a modern
reredos, designed by Sir G. Scott. In front of this is the high altar.
Some way below the level of the floor, on either side of the altar, are
the bases of two pillars, which formed part of the original Norman
church, and have helped the experts to fix the exact proportions of the
Confessor's building.
Edward the Confessor was not canonised for nearly a hundred years after
his death, in spite of the repeated appeals made to Rome by the
Westminster abbots. In the meantime his coffin lay before this altar in
a plain stone tomb, which was adorned by a rich pall, the gift of William
the Conqueror. When at last our founder's name was added to the roll of
saints, the body was transferred (October 13, 1163) to an elaborate
shrine, in the presence of Henry II. and his then friend the Archbishop,
Thomas à Becket. When this part of the old church was destroyed to make
way for Henry the Third's new building, the old shrine was removed to a
temporary chapel, while a new and more magnificent one, which we shall
examine more {58} closely presently, was prepared by the same Italian
workmen who were employed on the pavement, and afterwards to decorate the
tombs of Henry III. and Queen Eleanor of Castile. The materials--the
mosaic, the coloured marbles, and the porphyry--used for this beautiful
pavement, which was put down in 1268, as well as for the royal tombs,
were, like the designers and craftsmen themselves, brought from Rome by
Abbot Ware, who, with his successor, Abbot Wenlock, lies beneath the
mosaic work which Ware had supervised. The whole design, now partly
covered by an ancient Persian carpet, represents the probable duration of
the world according to the Ptolemaic system. To our left are three
artistic tombs, which belong to a later date, the early fourteenth
century, and are no doubt by the same unknown artist. In shape they
resemble the hearses which used to stand in the church before and for a
time after the burial of all distinguished persons. The recumbent
figures take the place of the effigies of the deceased, which were
usually made of wood, in the likeness of the dead person. These were
first carried at the funeral, and afterwards laid upon the hearse. The
little statuettes all round the sides are intended for the mourners, and
above are represented the lighted {59} torches and wax tapers, which
covered the hearse. In the small tomb nearest to us lies Aveline, wife
of Edmund Crouchback, Henry the Third's second son, whose own far more
elaborate sepulchre is nearest the altar. Edmund and Aveline were the
first couple ever married in the present church. Their wedding, in fact,
took place only a few months--in the spring of 1270--after the choir and
transepts had been opened for service. But the north aisle of the choir
was certainly completed before this marriage took place, for upon the
wall are the arms of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester and King of the
Barons, in close juxtaposition with the fleurs-de-lis of France. In 1263
a grand temporary reconciliation was patched up between Henry III. and
the proud Earl, which was ratified at Boulogne in the presence of the
French King, St. Louis the peacemaker. These shields must therefore have
been carved here at about that time--in any case before Simon's fall; he
was killed in 1265 at the battle of Evesham. The arms of Aveline's rich
and powerful father, William de Fortibus, are in this same aisle. The
heiress herself died young, leaving no children, and her husband
inherited her vast wealth, with which he endowed the powerful house of
Lancaster. Edmund took {60} a foreign bride after Aveline's death, and
resided much with her in Provins, whence he brought the red roses which
became the Lancastrian badge. His eldest son, Thomas, the second Earl of
Lancaster, met his death on the scaffold through the machinations of
Aymer de Valence--a tragic sequel to the friendship between their
fathers, Edmund Crouchback and his uncle William de Valence, who were
brothers at arms, and had often fought side by side in the Holy Land.
A defaced painting on the ambulatory side of Edmund's tomb once showed
the figures of ten Crusaders; amongst them may have been portraits of the
uncle and his nephew; they died (1296) within a week of one another, on
an ill-fated expedition to Gascony, which ended in defeat and disaster to
the English force. All these three monuments--Aymer's is between those
of the Earl and Countess of Lancaster--repay a close study, but we can
only glance at them now. Notice the noble and dignified recumbent effigy
on Aveline's tomb, which is dressed in the simple costume of a grand dame
of the thirteenth century; it was formerly painted and gilt; some traces
of the red and white paint, also the green vine leaves, still remain
beneath the canopy. At the feet two dogs are snapping at {61} one
another in play. The two warriors are depicted in life and in death:
above each is an armed equestrian figure with visor up, while below lie
their quiet images in the sleep of death. The royal prince has a finer
monument with a triple canopy, otherwise there is little difference
between the two. The picture of Richard II. in his brilliant youth hangs
opposite his relatives. The King, whose destiny seemed so fair, but
whose tragic fate must move our pity, is here represented in the
coronation robes holding the orb and sceptre, and seated in St. Edward's
chair upon the ancient stone of Scone, which his ancestor, Edward I.,
wrested from the Scots. Behind the portrait a piece of tapestry, which
used to be in the great schoolroom, recalls the fact that the whole
sanctuary was hung with arras and also wainscoted in Queen Anne's time.
The remains of the sedilia south of the altar date from Edward the
First's time, and were for long believed to form the canopy of an ancient
Saxon tomb, which the monks moved here from the Norman Chapter House and
called by the name of King Sebert, their traditional founder. We can see
this better from the ambulatory, also the curious skull and cross-bone
ornament which is all that is left of the tomb of Anne of Cleves, Henry
{62} the Eighth's repudiated wife, the only one of all his wives who was
buried in the Abbey. She was interred here with a pompous funeral
service by order of her friend and step-daughter Queen Mary.
Let us return now to the iron gate which divides the south ambulatory
from the transept. Just inside is a small chapel, called after St.
Benedict, the founder of the Benedictines, to which order the Westminster
monks belonged, and where his head was long kept. The chapel is not
open, but easily seen from outside. Within is the fine altar tomb of
Simon Langham, first Abbot of Westminster, then Archbishop of Canterbury,
through whose munificent bequest his energetic successor, Litlington, was
able to add to the monastic buildings and cloisters. Other burials of
interest took place in this chapel. The tomb which usurps the place of
the altar is that of Frances, Countess of Hertford, daughter-in-law to
the Protector Somerset, by whose orders these altars were destroyed, and
sister to that famous Admiral, Lord Howard of Effingham, whose fleet
drove the Spanish Armada from our shores. A well-preserved
seventeenth-century brass, raised a few inches above the floor, gives us
the portrait of Dr. Bill, the first Dean after Elizabeth reconstituted
the {63} collegiate body, which had been originally founded by her
father, Henry VIII., but was suppressed by her sister Mary. Bill lived
only a year at the Deanery, but during that short period he drafted the
statutes, the nucleus of which remains unaltered to the present day,
although the details have been considerably changed. His successor,
Gabriel Goodman, whose kneeling statue is against the south wall, was in
office throughout nearly the whole long reign of Queen Elizabeth, dying
only two years before his friend and patroness. We must not linger in
this little chapel, for voices from the past are calling us to hasten
onwards toward the burial-place of kings.
* * * * * *
[Illustration: The South Ambulatory, looking west down the South Choir
Aisle]
* * * *