Some Observations on the Building Sequence of the Nave of Rochester Cathedral

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE BUILDING SEQUENCE OF THE NA VE OF ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL J. PHILIP McALEER The nave of Rochester Cathedral is the product of three obvious periods of construction. 1 To the earliest belong the first two storeys of the six western bays, easily recognisable because of the heavy piers and semicircular arches characteristic of the Romanesque. To the latest period belong all the clerestory windows, and the wooden roof, with the tracery forms and four-centred arches typical of the Perpendicular. The work of the second period is less immediately visible upon entry from the west, as it constitutes the two eastern bays of the nave. This work of c. 1300 marks the beginning of an intended reconstruction of the nave in the Decorated Gothic style, which proceeded no further after the central tower was completed c. 1343. As a result, the Romanesque work was spared, although we do not know the reasons why the reconstruction of the nave ceased. 1 The basic architectural histories of the cathedral are: G.H. Palmer, The Cathedral Church of Rochester (Bell's Cathedral Series, 1897), especially 9-10, 43-8 for the Romanesque building; and W .H. St. John Hope, 'The Architectural History of the Cathedral and Monastery of St. Andrew at Rochester', Arch. Cant., xxiii (1898), 194-328, and xxiv (1900), 1-85, also published separately (1900; all further references will be to this later edition), especially 22-34. For a summary history and description, see J. Newman, West Kent and the Weald (The Buildings of England), 2nd Edn. (1976), 470-81. For his articles on Rochester Cathedral, Hope made use of the notes and drawings of James Thomas Irvine who, on and off over a period of twenty years (c. 1874-94), worked on the restoration of the fabric under Sir G. G. Scott and J.L. Pearson. lrvine's papers are preserved in the Kent Archives Office (Maidstone), DRc/Emf 77/1-134; as the cataloguer commented, 'a brief study of [his articles] reveals most clearly St. John Hope's debt to Irvine, which, despite hi􀂙 acknowledgement,is far greater than might be imagined'. A description of the items from Irvine's papers relevant to this study is presented in the Appendix. 149 J. PHILIP McALEER Shortage of the necessary funds may have been one of them, although other reasons are possible, even likely. The surviving bays of the Romanesque nave have a number of distinctive characteristics, and not a few puzzling features. Among the former is the rather unusual feature of each pair of piers being of a different design, rather than, as is more often the case, either a uniform series, or the alternation of two contrasting forms such as the great round and compound piers at Durham Cathedral. Both distinctive and puzzling is the design of the second storey which has a passageway through the thickness of the piers in each bay, and two centre shafts set on the inner and outer edges of the wall. Stepping into the aisles another puzzling feature is revealed: the aisle is neither vaulted nor covered by a wooden ceiling at the level between the nave arcade and the second storey; instead, the roof is found at the level just below the clerestory sill. The history of the construction of the nave has always presented a problem: that is, how much of the present structure incorporates or represents masonry that should be associated with the first Romanesque church, usually said to have been begun by the second Norman Bishop, Gundulf of Bee (1077-1108), c. 1080.2 Indeed, the problem is really a set of problems, for it has been questioned if the nave of Gundulf s church was ever completed. Futhermore, Bishop Ernulf (1115-24), who is generally credited with having rebuilt the original east end, as he had at Canterbury, 3 altering its plan to include a crypt and a flat-ended choir with an ambulatory above, is also often credited with a reconstruction or completion of the nave. Therefore, what work now visible in the nave can be associated with him? And it also may be asked if any work in the nave is later than the period of Ernulf? 2 The attribution is based upon or inferred from statements by Eadmer and Gervase of Canterbury: Eadmer, Historia Novorum in Anglia, (Ed.) M. Rule (Rolls Series, lxxxi, 1884), 1S (' .. . Gundulfus nomine, ab eodem ibi subrogatus episcopus est. Per hunc vetustam ecclesiam episcopatus cum fabrica adjacente subvertit, et nova quaeque extruxit'.); Gervase of Canterbury, Opera Historia, (Ed.) Wm. Stubbs (Rolls Series, lxxiii, 2 vols., 1879, 1880), ii, 368 (Actus Pontificum, while speaking of Archbishop Lanfranc: 'Ecclesiam quoque Sancti Andreae Roffensis, quam rex olim fundaverat Ethelbertus, renovavit, consummavit, quam etiam preciosis ornamentis et monachis ditavit'.); 0. Lehmann-Brockhaus, Lateinische Schriftquellen zur Kunst in England, Wales und Scholl/and von Jahre 901 bis zum Jahre 1307, S vols. (19S5-60), ii, nos. 3711 and 3712, respectively. 3 William of Malmesbury, De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum, (Ed.) N.E.S.A. Hamilton (Rolls Series, Iii, 1870), 138 ('Cantiae dejectam priorem partem ecclesiae, quam Lanfrancus aedificaverat, aedo splendide reerexit, ut nichil tale possit in Anglia videri in vitrearum fenestrarum Luce, in marmorei pavimenti nitore, in diversicoloribus picturis'.); Lehmann-Brockhaus, op. cit., in note 2, i, no. 730. 150 THE NAVE OF ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL Although early sources maintain that the church begun by Gundulf was rapidly completed with aid from Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury,4 a consecration is not recorded until 1130.5 That date, however; could mark the dedication of the new choir begun by Ernulf, rather than the completion of the entire fabric. Even then, construction in the twelfth century was not ended, as the west front is generally considered to contain details suggesting work in the 1150s or 1160s, or even later. 6 Writing in the early 1930s, Sir A. W. Clapham concluded: 'The surviving remains of the early church at Rochester are thus very scanty, including only parts of the outer walls of the nave aisles and perhaps the core of some of the nave piers'. 7 Twenty years later, T.S.R. Boase wrote: 'There is structural evidence that on the south side of the nave the earliest Norman work has been encased by this newer more ornate style, whereas the north arcade and aisle were built from the start in the new manner, which may well mark the completion of Gundulfs church by Ernulf'. 8 The little guide book to the cathedral by Francis Underhill and Ernest M. Blackie has this to say: 'In the south aisle of the nave are the rude early arches of Gundulf's Church of 1080. Forty years later Ernulf cased the plain columns and enriched the inner sides of the arches with mouldings; but the round arches of the aisle remain in their primitive simplicity'. 9 Fundamental to these later authors was the 4 (Ed.) T. Hearne, Textus Roffensis (1720), 143, and (Ed.) H. Wharton, Anglia Sacra, 2 vols. (1691), ii, 280; also Gervase of Canterbury, Loe. cit., in note 2. 5 Gervase of Canterbury, op. cit., in note 2, ii, 383; Palmer, op. cil., in note 1, 10; Hope, op. cit., in note 1, 34. 6 Cf. Palmer, op. cit., in note 1, 9-10, 46, and Hope, op. cit., in note I, 33, with A.W. Clapham, English Romanesque Archilecture, ii. After the Conquest (1934), 143, Pl. 28 (1160-70); G. Webb, Architecture in Britain: The Middle Ages (The Pelican History of Art, 1956), 49, Pl. 43B (mid-twelfth century); Newman, op. cit., in note 1, 472 (mid-twelfth century). L. Stone, Sculpture in Britain: The Middle Ages (The Pelican History of Art, 1955), 246, n. 17, and Pl. 65, dated the tympanum and column figures of the central portal as c. 1150-55, or no later than 1155-60. Slightly earlier, T.S.R. Boase, English Art, 1100-1216 (The Oxford History of English Art, 1953), 205-