THE CATHEDRAL BUILDERS.*
THE first and most obvious intention of the title by which Mr. Prior indicates the subject of his book is to answer the question,—Who built the Cathedrals ? When a Cathedral is built nowadays this question is answered for us. There is a competition among architects, and in due time we hear the name of the successful candidate; there is a contractor who does not fail to advertise himself to possible employers ; there are donors whose names are duly recorded in subscription. lists; and there is an army of actual workers, graduated and disciplined according to the modern method of the division of labour. What do we find answering to these in the mediaeval buildings P The architect comes first, and he, it may be said at once, did not exist. A theory has been started that there was what may be called a perambulating guild of craftsmen, "free masons" in fact, who held the office of architect in commission, and designed the Cathedrals of Europe ; but Mr. Prior will have none of it ; the body has, he thinks, been too successful in concealing all traces of its existence to allow us to believe in it. Doubtless some one had an idea, more or less definite, of what was wanted to be done, but there was no architect in the modern sense of that word. Neither was there a contractor, as we now conceive of that person with his specifications and estimates. Even when we hear of this or that Bishop or Abbot having built such-and-such a church we must take it with a qualification. Mr. Prior quotes Matthew Paris to the effect that "it was incumbent to speak of a building or great work as the work of the Abbot 'for the glory of that
• W. M. Thackeray, The New Sketch Book!. being Essays now Collected from
:01UCe.'." That the great man himself sometimes took rule :or..-measnring-eord or chisel in hand is • probably true; but that the Work ale, whole was democratically shared among the actual workers in a way that we find it difficult- to conceive is certain: Of 'course there was a foreman ; such a person • there must be in every company of workers. Now and'. then we know his name.. We have an account of the re- building of the Cathedral of Canterbmy after the fire of 1174 from a contemporary chronieler, Gervase, whose narrative, says Mr.' Prior, "is so accurate and circumstantial that a' . surveyor might, to-day, measure up and certify. to the work of each year.":- Among Gervase's details are the names of the " master-masons"- who looked- after the work. The first of these was a Frenchman, "William of Sens." When he was- compelled by an accident to give up his place, it was filled by `.` William the Englishman?! It is ¬able fact that the Englishmen did not oontinue without change the style and method of his .predecessor. His work had characteristics of its own, and, though it was generically the same as the Continental, had -a differentia which may be described as insular.' We may find an illustration in a case which doei not fall within Mr. Prior's purview. Wadham College, Oxford, was built (in 1610-13) by such a master-mason. We know that his name was William Arnold, and that he received El a Week for forty weeks; and 10s. for forty more, besides his mason's wages ; and we are able to estimate his work, for the College remains substantially the same as he built it nearly three centuries ago. He may be described as the: last- of a class which had flourished for many centuries,- and. he is all the more interesting because he was a contemporary of the first of the architects, Inigo Jones. Mr.] Prior has much to tell us about the craftsmen—about what they had in common, and how they differed—but we can- not attempt ,to epitomise it. It must suffice to say that his abeount is most enlightening, both as regards the succession of architectural styles and the variations which contemporary examples of these styles exhibit. One interesting detail we may. mention. As a set-off against the diffusion of artistic skill which made it possible for the ordinary journeyman to execute details of the most refined ornament, we have the fact that the necessities of building compelled the employment of much unskilled labour, though this, it is true, belongs mostly , to • an earlier time. The scale of the Norman work was enormous.. "One single pier of Durham quire is enough for half • the pillars of Westminster Abbey." The result was sometimes this, that what looked as if built for eternity fell into, ruin while comparatively new. Scamped work and building for the spectator have been known in all ages.
Another aspect of Cathedral building which Mr. Prior helps us to see isits relation to the politics, the religion, and, it may be said, the general life of the time. Nothing, for instance, could be more marked than the effect of the Norman Conquest on English architecture. The Norman influence had obtained' a foothold for itself, anticipatory of its final victory, in' Westminster Abbey. The great majority of the ancient seats of English Bishops were occupied by Benedictine foundations, strongholds of what was, for a time at least, a foreign Power. Quite at the other end of the scale is the late development of towers and steeples, built for the town which surrounded the monastery rather than' for the monastery Welt This shows itself in the latest bindings of some of the foundations of Regulars. As Mr. Prior Puts it, " signifiCantly in the last moments of monastic existence there appears an eagerness on the part of the monks to play the wise steward, and, ere they were dismissed, to make friends with popular architecture." And he instances the Bell Harry Tower of Canterbury, built by Cardinal Morton (1410-1500), and the bell-towers of -Fountains and Furness "as bids for popular recognition." Here, again, we see bow different . forms 'of religious observance supplied motives of architec- tnral development. The crypt had always been the scene of relic-worship. But when pilgrimages became popular, and the 'shrines of saints attracted multitudes of visitors'whose spiritual devotion directly, and secular outlay indirectly, filled the monastic coffers, the crypt was abandoned, and the 1ll :ee:Worship transferred to a moin convenient site above ground. The growing devotion to the Virgin, again, reaulted . in the building of lady-chapels, and here the secular Cathedrals could make up for their deficiency in the matter of relics, and compete successfully with their monastic rivals. Our own time has witnessed a very remarkable development of the same kind. The neoXrothic moveinent- in architecture had c'orreeponded with a timultaneons movement in theologY and the forms of WorehiP. • A school of :thought' which
regarded the Reformation- • as a disaster• was naturtilly anxious to banish all post-Reformation a work • from -s the
churches. We quote Mr. Prior's' words with the •fullest sympathy:— . •
"In nitmbere of our churches, at the end of the ;seventeenth century and during part of the eighteenth, were set up solid, sober works of.English craftsmanship, which nineteenth century.purism has now for the most part thrust out.. The .fervour Of Eevival Gothic' has Made its fanatics shameless iconoclasts. The.restOring horde, as very Vandals, have broken- dciww the• sanctuaries of beauty that George Herbert celebrated, and,- if one. may continue the metaphor,-have set .up therein the fetishes of a commercial
worship.' •
Only we should put "reactionary" for " commerciaL" Mr. Prior goes on to give. a melancholy list. of these vandaliiins. One of them„ the destruction . of .. the Arundel ,Screen, at
Chichester, brought down the spire.
The illustrations have all the excellence which we should expect from the associations of the volume. The great majority are representations of the . exterior and interior' Of English Cathedrals, in many cases reproduced from drawings
made before the days of restoration. • Four are Printed. in colours from illuminated manuscripts. The relevance of these is not at first sight obvious.. The intention. to give an' idea
of the skill in harmonising colour which our ancestors had attained.. We have to' imagine the effect which the interiors Of our Cathedrals, now so Cold and monotonous, niust have produced when they were clothed from rod to Pavement With these splendours.
Previous page
