is a spacious building, unequalled in point of ornamental decoration by
any similar structure in the kingdom. It not only gives a most prominent
feature to the area in front of the county hall, but is a general and
interesting object of attraction to strangers.
[Picture: Market House]
The principal front is to the west, over the portal of which are the arms
of Queen Elizabeth in high relief, and the date 1596. On each side of
this portal is an open arcade, consisting of three round arches, which
form the main building; above these is a series of square mullioned
windows, surmounted by a rich fanciful parapet consisting of curved
embrasures, which rise at certain distances into a kind of pinnacle.
Above the northern arch is the following inscription, having on one side
the arms of France and England quarterly, and on the other those of the
town:—
The xvth day of June was this building begun,
William Jones and Thomas Charlton, Gent. then
Bailiffs, and was erected and covered in their time.
1595.
Immediately over this is a tabernacled niche, containing a fine statue of
RICHARD DUKE OF YORK, in complete armour; one hand is supported on his
breast, and the other pointing below to a device of three roses carved on
a stalk. A tablet corresponding with the town arms, finely sculptured in
relief, on the left hand of the figure, records its removal from the
tower on the Welsh bridge, in 1791. In the same situation on the
corresponding end of the hall is the figure of an angel in a canopied
niche, bearing a shield of the arms of France and England quarterly.
This originally stood within the chamber of the Gate Tower at the Castle
Gates, from whence it was preserved when the remaining portion of that
ancient barrier gave way to modern houses in 1825.
The basement of the Market House is 105 feet long by 24 feet wide, and is
used on Saturdays as the corn-market; at other times it forms an useful
promenade, especially in wet weather.
The inscription on the north end has often excited surprise, how so large
and ornamental a building could have been completed within a period of
less than four months. The nature of the case would seem, that the
stone-work and timber-framing had perhaps previously been wrought, so
that no time might be lost, and the utmost endeavours used, in the
re-edification of a building which was almost indispensible at that
period,—when corn was for the most part brought to market in the _bulk_,
and not sold by _sample_ as in the present day. This conjecture is
somewhat confirmed by the following extract from a manuscript chronicle
in the possession of the writer:—
“1595. In the month of January this year the old building in the
Corn Market Place was agreed to be taken down, and the timber-work
thereof was sold, and another with all speed was to be erected with
stone and timber in the same place, and a sumptuous hall aloft, with
a spacious market house below for corn was begun, the foundation and
fencing whereof was a quarter of a year before it was finished, and
the stone work was begun upon the 15th day of June following, and was
finished and almost covered in before the bailiffs of the said year
went out of their office the Michaelmas following.”