In these days of telephones, telegrams, express trains, automobiles,
newspapers and printed books, it is difficult for us to realize that in
mediaeval times thought traveled but slowly, and that two cities a few
leagues apart were much more widely separated than they would now be if
divided by the ocean. To-day a piece of news, an invention, some new
artistic method, is flashed around the world and at once meets the eye
of millions of readers. All this excites no comment. When, however, we
notice that in some mediaeval period a novelty in one country very
shortly thereafter appeared and was used in a neighbouring one, we are
forced to conclude that there must have been some very unusual
occurrence to have so far set at naught the difficulty of news
transmission to which we have just referred. The history of the middle
ages does not contain a stranger example of such a rapid spread of
something novel than that presented by the story of how and of why
William of Sens (who, in building the Cathedral of Sens, constructed the
first thoroughly Gothic church) came to have the honour of introducing
Gothic architecture into England by a call to rebuild Canterbury
Cathedral. It so happened that just as he was completing his great work
and disclosing to the world the new beauty of Gothic architecture, Pope
Alexander III, exiled from Rome, took up his residence at Sens
(September 30, 1163, till April 11, 1165). It is recorded that on the
19th of April, 1164, surrounded by a gorgeous array of cardinals and
bishops gathered there in attendance upon the papal residence, he
consecrated the altar of the Holy Virgin in the cathedral then rapidly
approaching completion. Where the Pope was, there also was the centre
of the Christian world, and thither of course repaired the clergy from
all parts of Europe. These distinguished pilgrims were witnesses
of William's first bold attempt at the pointed arch, the chief
characteristic of his great cathedral. To see was to admire. Its beauty
was so striking that they could not fail to remember and recount it when
they returned to their home towns, thus stimulating other architects to
copy this new architecture. Never before nor since had a builder so well
timed a gathering of admiring ecclesiastics. Among those who came, and
saw, and remembered, was Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury,
himself an exile from his see. He dwelt four years at Sens (1166-70) and
what he saw there impelled him to invite William of Sens in preference
to all the English architects to rebuild the Cathedral of Canterbury. It
would seem strange even now, and a thing worthy of comment, if a French
architect were chosen to construct an important English church, but how
much more extraordinary was it that Thomas a Becket should have taken
this step in 1174, after the disastrous fire which destroyed the earlier
church on the site of the present Cathedral of Canterbury. William
succeeded in completing the choir as it stands to-day, but it cost him
his life, for as he was superintending the finishing touches of his
great work, he fell from a high scaffold and received injuries from
which he died. Through this introduction of the young French Gothic into
England he exercised a noteworthy influence upon the beginnings of
ecclesiastical Gothic in that country. We have told this story here
because we know the architect and the glazier worked hand in hand. This
association grows more interdependent as the Gothic blossoms into
decoration and as more wall space is devoted to windows. It is fair to
assume that the stained glass style then prevailing in France must have
accompanied its sister, Gothic architecture, upon the latter's invasion
of England, and an examination of the early medallions at Canterbury
tends to confirm this theory. Since a Becket was having the new Gothic
of Sens copied, why not also its admirable glazing? In any event we know
that French glass was well known and much admired by the English, and
later we shall recount several instances of its being brought to glaze
English churches, and even requirements made in English contracts that
French and not domestic glass should be provided. While it is true that
the early glass of Sens Cathedral is not so abundant as that of the
sixteenth century, we have come here at this time because nothing finer
is known than the few medallion windows which remain to us along the
north wall of the choir. They date from the end of the twelfth century
and are large, strong in tone, and in excellent preservation. The
clerestory lights of the choir are filled with attractive examples of
grisaille enlivened by large geometric figures in points of red, blue,
etc. These designs are constructed with slender lines and without too
much colour, so that plenty of soft silvery light is admitted to
illuminate the choir below. So well lighted is it from the clerestory
above that we are forced to conclude that all the chapel embrasures
below must at one time have been filled with the gloom-producing
medallions. It is unfortunate that the original set of medallions below
is not complete, because if it were, we would now be able to see, thanks
to the charming grisaille in the clerestory, a perfect combination of
the well-lighted choir surrounded by the sombre gleam of its protecting
chapels. Such a combination is rare. At Tours, at Troyes, even at
Bourges, we find ourselves wishing that we had a little more light from
above to set off by contrast the dark splendour of the jewelled caverns
below. The clerestory at Sens shows us just the luminous effect which
we have sought elsewhere, but, alas! our coloured dusk below, which
should go hand in hand with it, has been almost entirely dissipated. As
a result we are left with an impression of too bright an interior. The
minster gloom with all its dignity is gone! We shall return later to
Sens to see its splendid glass of the sixteenth century (see page 218).