supported by detached pillars, decorated with grotesque heads and
small figures of bishops. The wall behind is richly carved with
diaper designs, shewing much freedom and variety. This screen was
once decorated with colours and gilding, traces of which are still
visible. It appears to have suffered a good deal at the hands of
iconoclasts; many statues have doubtless been removed, and one must
be very cautious with regard to the decoration which remains, as it
was considerably restored by a mason named James Pink during the
second half of last century. The screen now carries the organ
erected in 1826.
“The two side doorways leading into the north and south aisles of
the choir are somewhat earlier than the screen between them. They
are beautiful examples of carving, dating from the end of the Early
English period. The exquisite openwork foliage which runs round the
arch is executed with the utmost skill and care, and is without the
laboured effect of so much of our later stone-work. The injured
parts were carefully restored about 1770 by James Pink, who was
also employed by Essex on the canopy of the reredos. The doorways
have modern iron gates.”--(A. F. K.)
The =Choir= now includes St. Hugh’s Choir and two bays of the Angel Choir
beyond.
=St. Hugh’s Choir= is the earliest example of pure Gothic in the world.
People are frequently disappointed in it because of its low vault and
squat arches; but it must be remembered that the fall of the central
tower in 1237-1239 greatly damaged this part of the building. In order
to strengthen the choir some heavy columns without capitals replaced the
original slender shafts. The arches were also partly reconstructed.
Arcaded screens between the piers divide the choir from the aisles north
and south, and aid in the support.
“The foliage of the capitals is exquisitely beautiful, and though
distinguished technically by the name of _stiff-leaf foliage_,
because there are stiff stalks to the leaves rising from the ring
of the capital, the leaves themselves curl over in the most
graceful manner, with a freedom and elegance not exceeded at any
subsequent period. The mouldings are also as bold and as deep as
possible, and there is scarcely a vestige of Norman character
remaining in any part of the work.”--(R.)
Viollet-le-Duc, who fixes the date of St. Hugh’s Choir at 1220 or 1210
at the earliest, says:
“We have in Normandy, especially in the cathedral of Rouen and the
church of Eu, architecture of the date of 1190; it is purely
French, that is to say, it corresponds exactly with the
architecture of the ‘Isle de France’ except in certain details. At
Eu, at the cathedral of Le Mans, at Seez, we have architecture
which resembles that of the choir of Lincoln, but that architecture
is from 1210 to 1220, it is the Norman school of the Thirteenth
Century. There is, indeed, at Lincoln, an effort at, a tendency to
originality, a style of ornament which attempts to emancipate
itself; nevertheless the character is purely Anglo-Norman.
“The construction is English, the profiles of the mouldings are
English, the ornaments are English, the execution of the work
belongs to the English school of workmen of the beginning of the
Thirteenth Century.
“On the exterior the choir of the Cathedral of Lincoln is
thoroughly English or Norman, if you will; one can perceive all the
Norman influence; arches acutely pointed, blank windows in the
clerestory, reminding one of the basilica covered with a wooden
roof; a low triforium; each bay of the aisles divided into two by a
small buttress; shafts banded. In the interior vaults which have
not at all the same construction as the French vaults of the end of
the Twelfth Century; arch-mouldings, slender and deeply undercut;
the abacus round; the tooth-ornament; which do not at all resemble
the ornaments which we find at Paris, Sens, St. Denis, etc.”
The =Choir-Stalls=, dating from the Fourteenth Century, are among the
finest in England. Pugin considered them quite the best.
“The stalls are in two rows, the upper of 62 seats, and the lower
of 46; the former number has now been increased by six and the
latter by two. The upper stalls have elaborate trefoiled canopies,
surmounted by an intricate maze of buttresses and pinnacles, rising
to a height of 24 feet 6 inches above the choir floor. The niches
above the canopies have recently been filled with statues of saints
in the Anglican Calendar. The stalls in both rows are provided with
hinged seats or _misereres_, intended to serve as supports in the
long services during which the occupants of the stalls were
required to stand. These seats, as well as the elbow-rests and
finials, are richly carved with those grotesque subjects in which
the Mediæval artist so greatly delighted. The carver has given full
scope to a most fertile imagination. Scriptural subjects do
certainly occur on some of the _misereres_ in the upper row, but
others are of a playful character. The fox is seen preaching to
birds and beasts, and then running riot among them; monkeys are at
play, or occupied in the more serious business of hanging one of
their number and burying him afterwards; we also find men fighting
with wild animals; the labours of husbandry; kings, knights,
ladies, dragons, griffins, lions, hogs, and wyverns. Whether there
is a hidden meaning in any of these quaint subjects, it is perhaps
difficult now to say, but the preaching fox is certainly
suggestive.”--(A. F. K.)
At the east end of the stalls on the south side rises the =Bishop’s
Throne= with tall Gothic canopy. It was designed by James Essex in 1778,
and carved by Lumby. Opposite is Sir Gilbert Scott’s =Pulpit= of carved
oak (1863-1864).
The brass chandelier of sixteen lights, suspended from the vault, is
dated 1698; and the brass eagle lectern, 1667.
The stone =Reredos= is a mixture of work of the Thirteenth Century and
that of James Essex in the Eighteenth Century. James Pink carved the
central canopy in 1769 after designs by Essex.
The =Eastern Transept= was also the work of St. Hugh. He joined the ends
by means of an apse, which extended to the second bay of the Angel
Choir. Some historians say that he was buried in the northern of the
four chapels that he built along the apse.
St. Hugh died in London in 1200. When his body arrived in Lincoln it was
met by King John and carried on the shoulders of archbishops and bishops
to the Choir that he had erected. He was buried on November 24; and,
according to an old ballad:
“A’ the bells o’ merrie Lincoln
Without men’s hands were rung,
And a’ the books o’ merrie Lincoln
Were read without man’s tongue;
And ne’er was such a burial
Sin’ Adam’s days begun.”
Pilgrims came in such numbers to his shrine that it was deemed necessary
to make his tomb more important, and the apse was removed for the famous
=Angel Choir=, which, like the Choir of St. Hugh, marks a new period in
the history of architecture.
“Thus the Angel Choir of Lincoln was erected to contain the shrine
of one of Lincoln’s noblest bishops and one of England’s greatest
saints, whose lowly tomb, placed in a corner at his own desire for
fear of its being in the way, had become the resort of such a vast
concourse of pilgrims as to require the transformation of the
eastern arm of the minster. In 1255, license was obtained from
Henry III. for the removal of part of the eastern city wall, which
stood in the way, and in the next year the Angel Choir was probably
begun. The work was carried on so rapidly that within a quarter of
a century the translation took place. The choir was not, however,
fully completed till the Fourteenth Century was well on its way.
“The 6th October, 1280, was the proudest day in the
[Illustration: LINCOLN: ANGEL CHOIR]
[Illustration: LINCOLN: CHOIR, EAST]
history of the city. Perhaps never, before or since, has such an
august assembly gathered within her walls. The body of the Saint of
Lincoln was to be translated to the costly shrine in the centre of
the Angel Choir. The ceremony was magnificent. Edward himself was
present, and supported on his own shoulder the saint’s remains as
they were carried to their new resting-place; with him was his
beloved queen Eleanor, whose effigy was so soon to be placed
beneath the same roof. The king and queen were accompanied by
Edmund, Earl of Kent, brother of Edward, and his wife; the Earls of
Gloucester and Warwick; the Archbishop of Canterbury; the bishops
of Lincoln, Bath, Ely, Norwich, Worcester, Llandaff, Bangor, and
St. Asaph; the bishop-elect of Exeter; and two hundred and fifty
knights. The shrine, ornamented with gold and silver and precious
stones, was raised on a lofty stone pedestal, and about thirty
years after was protected by an iron grille, wrought by Simon the
Smith. It is recorded that the fastenings of the grille were still
to be seen in the pavement at the middle of the last century, but
all traces have now entirely disappeared. It must have been soon
after the translation that the head was removed from the body, and
enclosed in a metal case, enriched with gold and silver and
precious stones. A keeper was appointed to guard the precious relic
during the day, and two had this charge at night. Yet, in spite of
all such precautions, it was stolen from the church in the year
1364; the head was thrown into a field, and the case sold in London
for twenty marks. The thieves were robbed of their ill-gotten gains
on their way back, and were afterwards convicted of the crime, and
hanged at Lincoln. The head was found and restored to the
cathedral. The treasurer, John de Welburne (d. 1380), either
restored the old shrine or made a new one of the same
materials.”--(A. F. K.)
Fergusson called the Angel Choir “the most beautiful presbytery in
England.” It dates from 1256 to 1280, when the Early English was merging
into the Decorated. The sculptural angels that ornament the spandrels of
the triforium account for the name.
“It is in five bays carried eastward at a uniform height and
breadth with the choir of St. Hugh. Lincoln stone is used
throughout, relieved with shafts and capitals of Purbeck marble.
The spandrels of the great arches, which are plain in other parts
of the building are here decorated with sunk geometrical forms.
Each bay of the triforium is divided, as elsewhere, into two
arches, both of which enclose two sub-arches; but the details are
richer than in the earlier parts of the minster. The clerestory has
one window of four lights in each bay, with an eight-foil and two
trefoils in the head. The compartments of the vault were originally
coated with plaster, which has been scraped away so as to shew the
stone surface underneath. It is a question whether it does not now
look better than with the old plaster, and the gaudy colouring
which once, most probably, decorated it. The springers of the
vaulting are supported by slender shafts, which rest on elaborately
foliaged corbels in the spandrels of the great arches. The
beautiful foliaged bosses along the ridge rib are best seen from
the triforium or the clerestory.”--(A. F. K.)
In olden times the Angel Choir contained the Shrine of St. Hugh and a
monument to Queen Eleanor, of which the one now standing in Westminster
Abbey is probably a copy. It was an altar-monument of marble with the
Queen’s effigy in gilded brass, and was destroyed during the Civil Wars
in the Seventeenth Century. Eleanor died not far from Lincoln, from
which city the funeral procession started to London. A modern stone
monument, with a brass effigy of Queen Eleanor, was placed under the
East Window in 1891.
Just behind the reredos there is a row of four table-tombs. The north
one was placed there by Bishop Fuller, to mark the resting place of =St.
Hugh=; next comes =Bishop Fuller= himself (died 1675); next, =Bishop
Gardiner= (died 1705); and next, =Subdean Gardiner= and his daughter,
Susanna (died 1731 and 1732). Near the latter stands the alabaster and
red marble monument to =Dean Butler= (died 1894). In corresponding
position and next to St. Hugh’s tomb we see =Bishop Wordsworth’s= effigy
under a tall ornate Gothic canopy. This Bishop of Lincoln (died 1885),
was a nephew of William Wordsworth. Nearer the East Window we find a
group of Fourteenth Century monuments to the =Burghersh= family, one of
whom was Bishop of Lincoln (1320-1340), and another, a hero of Crécy,
and Constable of Dover, and Warden of the Cinque Ports. Opposite is the
monument to =Nicholas de Cantelupe= (died 1355), a mutilated effigy under
a Gothic canopy. Near it lies =Prior Wimbische=. His effigy, also
headless, lies under a canopy.
Leland, writing in the time of Henry VIII., mentions two mutilated
tombs: =Catherine Swynford=, the third wife of John of Gaunt, made Earl of
Lincoln in 1362, and that of her daughter, Joan Beaufort, who married
the Earl of Westmoreland.
On the north side of the choir is the =Easter Sepulchre=, a fine piece of
Thirteenth Century carving, in the Decorated style. It consists of four
canopies with trefoiled arches. Three sleeping soldiers ornament three
of the panels.
On a spandrel on the north side, under a corbel above the most easterly
pier, sits the =Lincoln Imp=--one of those grotesques that the Mediæval
carvers delighted in creating; and here he has been sitting with crossed
leg and grinning grimly for centuries. He is of the same family as =The
Devil Looking over Lincoln= (see page 309).
In the =South Aisle= of the choir we pause again before another spot,
sacred in Mediæval days. Here stood until the Seventeenth Century the
=Shrine of= =Little St. Hugh=, a child said to have been crucified by the
Jews in 1255. According to the ballads the ball of the eight-year-old
boy fell into a Jew’s garden; and when he ran in to get it, the Jews
murdered him.
The canons of Lincoln obtained the body and buried it in the Cathedral.
Hugh became a local saint; and the Jews of Lincoln were promptly
persecuted. When the stone coffin was opened in 1791, the skeleton of a
child three feet long, encased in lead, was found.
=Henry of Huntingdon= (died about 1155), the chronicler of Lincoln, was
also buried in this aisle.
On the north and south of the Angel Choir is a small chantry. That on
the north is the =Fleming Chantry=, built by Richard Fleming, Bishop of
Lincoln in 1419-1431, and the corresponding one the =Russell Chantry=,
built by John Russell, who held the See from 1480 to 1494. This is
similar to the Fleming Chantry, Perpendicular in style. Very similar is
the =Longland Chantry=, on the other side of the south door, or Bishop’s
Porch. This chantry was built by John Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, in
1521-1547.
There is no Lady-Chapel.
The great =East Window= is the finest specimen of its kind in England. It
is formed of eight lights; and the great wheel of the head is composed
of a six-foil, surrounded by six quatrefoils.
“Bar-tracery being fully developed, the general appearance of ‘the
window is rather Decorated than Early English, but the mouldings
still belong to the earlier style.’ ‘This window ... together with
the whole of that part of the choir is singularly and beautifully
accommodated to the style of the rest of the building.’”--(R.)
The glass is modern and deals with scenes from the life of Christ, and
the Old Testament.
“The aisle windows are each of three lights, with three circles in
the head, two filled with cinquefoils and one with a quatrefoil.
The two east windows of the aisles are similar to the others. The
wall below the windows is decorated all round with arcading of a
richer design than that in the nave. Two trefoiled arches are
included in a larger arch, with a quatrefoil within a circle
filling the head. The spandrels have sunk trefoils. The bosses of
the stone vaults to the aisles are carved with sacred subjects,
foliage, and grotesque figures.
“The east windows of the north and south aisles are filled with
beautiful stained glass of the Early English period. The subjects
are arranged within medallions, and, though somewhat difficult to
decipher, appear to represent scenes in the lives of two saints
whose story has many points of resemblance--St. Thomas of
Canterbury and St. Hugh of Lincoln. The glass is said to have been
moved about the end of the last century from the windows of the
nave aisles. The date of the medallions may be placed towards the
middle of the Thirteenth Century, about the time of the erection of
the nave, and, of course, earlier than the windows which they now
occupy. The _grisaille_ into which they are now reglazed, is
considered by Westlake to be the earliest in England.”--(A. F. K.)
One of St. Hugh’s characteristics was the peculiar double arcading on
his walls. We find it in the choir and transepts.
The =Western Transept= was begun by St. Hugh; and his work is thought to
end at the walls of the six chapels that run along the eastern side.
These are dedicated to St. Nicholas, St. Denis, St. James, St. Edward
the Martyr, St. John the Evangelist and St. Giles, and are separated
from the transept by screens placed between the piers. Four of these
screens are of carved oak and date from the Fifteenth Century; but the
one of carved stone is of the Fourteenth. The western transept is famed
for its two large circular windows in each end. As one looked upon the
Deanery and the other upon the Bishop’s Palace, they were called
respectively the Dean’s Eye and the Bishop’s Eye. These nicknames appear
in the _Metrical Life of St. Hugh_, written between 1220 and 1225.
The =Dean’s Eye=, in the north end, dates from about 1220. Here we have
not only exquisite tracery, but splendid glass of the Thirteenth
Century.
“It represents the Church on Earth and the Church in Heaven. In the
centre is our Saviour seated in the midst of the Blessed in Heaven.
Around are four large compartments, containing portions of
different subjects, which do not appear to have all originally
belonged to their present positions. The most interesting is that
shewing the translation of the relics of St. Hugh, represented as
borne on the shoulders of crowned and mitred personages. Of the
sixteen outer circles, the topmost represents our Saviour seated on
a rainbow; on either side are angels with the instruments of the
Passion; in the next circles St. Peter and other saints are
conducting holy persons to heaven; below these is the general
Resurrection; the lowest five circles each contain the figure of an
archbishop or bishop. The subjects can be best seen from the
neighbouring triforium or from the passage which runs just beneath
the window; it will be noticed that the glass in some of the
compartments is much mutilated, as might naturally be expected,
considering its antiquity. From below, the subjects are confused
and not easy to distinguish, but the rich and harmonious blending
of the colours can be seen to the fullest advantage, and the
general effect is much finer. Rickman believes the form of the
tracery to be quite unique in England, but states that there is a
window exactly similar at Laon.”--(A. F. K.)
An arcade of seven lancet arches runs beneath the window. The wall
behind is pierced with windows filled with fragments of old glass. Two
larger lancet windows brighten each side of the doorway. They contain
fragments of old glass. The western one represents angels playing
musical instruments in the midst of foliage. The other window is filled
with geometrical patterns. The doorway leads into the Dean’s Porch.
The =Bishop’s Eye=, at the south and opposite end, is about a hundred
years later than its companion. It is Fourteenth Century and Decorated.
“It is filled with delicate and beautiful flowing tracery, which
has been compared to the fibres of a leaf. Rickman considers it to
be the richest remaining example of its period. It is enclosed
within a kind of arch formed by two rows of openwork quatrefoils;
an open frame-work of a similar nature is often to be seen round
circular windows in French cathedrals. The glass consists of
fragments from other windows, chiefly of the Early English period.
Although the pieces are placed quite at random, forming no subject
whatever, yet the effect of the colouring is good, especially when
seen from the opposite end of the transept. Of all the modern
windows in the minster, with their elaborate subjects, it may
safely be said that not one can be compared in effect with this
mass of glowing colour.”--(A. F. K.)
The four lancet windows below contain Early English glass, collected
from various parts of the Cathedral.
Near the Bishop’s Eye =John de Dalderby’s= shrine was situated. This was
of “massey silver” incrusted with diamonds and rubies. John de Dalderby,
Bishop of Lincoln from 1300 to 1320, was reverenced as a local saint.
Henry VIII. removed his altar-tomb, fragments of which may be seen near
the =Galilee Porch=, situated at the corner of the south arm of the
western transept, different in position to the Galilees of both Durham
and Ely. Lincoln’s was built about 1230 for the bishop’s state entrance.
The south and west ends are open; and it may, therefore, be entered from
either. Two enormous oak doors open from the east side into the
transept. The porch is vaulted and ornamented profusely with the
dog-tooth. The Perpendicular parapet running along the top of the porch
is, of course, a later addition.
Retracing our steps--no great hardship in a place of such beauty and
interest--we walk up the south-choir-aisle to the =Eastern Transept=,
where we have two semicircular chapels on the right hand, and on the
left the =Dean’s Chapel=. We are now at St. Hugh’s earliest work; and his
double arcading is again seen in the north wall leading to the
cloisters. Here also we find on two of the columns crockets that were
novelties at this period. They occur at Wells, the work of Jocelin. The
name of Dean’s Chapel is a misnomer--no one knows what it was used for
originally. It has been suggested that it was the original burial-place
of St. Hugh.
Two semicircular chapels also border the eastern side of the south end
of this transept, and the =Choristers’ Vestry= occupies the corresponding
corner to the Dean’s Chapel. A stone screen (Decorated) separates it
from the south aisle of St. Hugh’s Choir. The double arcading and
sculptured angels are constantly seen. Two other vestries lie beyond,
towards the south wall.
By means of an oak doorway, leading from the north wall of the eastern
transept, we enter a long, narrow passageway, with stone vaulting and
windows filled with tracery and glass. This takes us into the Cloisters,
for at Lincoln these secluded
[Illustration: LINCOLN: EAST WINDOW]
[Illustration: SOUTHWELL FROM NORTH-WEST]
walks lie on the north instead of the usual south side of the Cathedral.
Only three walks remain of the original constructions dating from the
end of the Thirteenth Century. The fourth walk (north) was replaced by a
colonnade, designed by Sir Christopher Wren, in 1674, whose uncle was
Bishop of Lincoln at that time.
From the east walk of the Cloister we enter the =Chapter-House=, which
dates from the early Thirteenth Century. It is a decagon, with two
lancet windows in each bay. First, on entering, we note the massive
central column with its ten Purbeck marble shafts banded together in the
middle. The Chapter-House has been restored, but it has not suffered.
The glass in the windows is modern. The arcade running below the windows
is ornamented with shafts of Purbeck marble, foliaged capitals, and a
great display of the dog-tooth. The stone vault is later than the rest
of the room and is very graceful.
Many fine views can be had of the East Front. The splendid Decorated
window is always the most conspicuous object. The window above it is
also Decorated and nearly fills the gable. In the trefoil over the top
circle is a figure of the Virgin. The richly crocketed pyramids of the
turrets on either side make a beautiful effect. The aisle windows are
separated from the big window by bold buttresses. Around the base runs
the arcade that we constantly find at Lincoln. The Chapter-House with
its sharply-pointed pyramidal roof groups beautifully with the rest of
the Cathedral.