Teynham Church: Architectural Notes

( 145 ) TEYNHAM CHURCH: ARCHITECTURAL NOTES. BY ]?. C. ELLISTON ERWOOD. TEYNHAM CHURCH, dedicated to St. Mary, and situated approximately in the centre of the parish, occupies a somewhat prominent position between the Dover road to the south and the Swale northwards. The building consists of a nave, with north and south aisles, north and south transepts, a chancel, and a western tower, which last is peculiar in that it is flanked north and south by unusual westward extensions of both aisles. The general impression gathered by a superficial survey is that of a thirteenth-century cruciform building, with a few later additions, and thus it is described in most of the published accounts. A more careful investigation, however, reveals details that, if not affording absolutely complete evidence on all points, at any rate indicate a structure of earlier date; and this evidence, joined to the fact that a considerable proportion of English thirteenth-century cruciform churches has evolved from a much simpler building, is sufficient to establish a twelfth-century church, whose plans and details can be laid down with some degree of certainty. The suggested development of the church is illustrated by the small block plans (Fig. 1), and may be briefly outlined before proceeding to detail the data on which they are based. 12th Century (early).—The church consisted of a simple nave and square-ended chancel. The existing arcades preserve the lines of the north and south walls of the church, and the portions of wall above these arcades may conceivably be of this early date, though there is nothing save theory to substantiate it. The chancel would occupy the interior of the present crossing, while the west wall of the nave would TEYNHAM CtlVRCh FLANS "SHOWING DEVELOPMENT Scale -i h H h 10 7.0 SO 40 50 Early Laic XII CENTVRY. Eisr. 1- \iCtnX-- cboocel shown by broken halchinq. eft •3 H Kj W K a tf to Q w fed o E4 H IS a ^3 cj > s! O H XIII CENTVRY, F.c.e-E. ncnxix TEYNHAM CHURCH: ARCHITECTURAL NOTES. 147 occupy the site of the present west wall, part of which may well be original (see G-eneral Plan, Fig. 3). This small church conforms fairly well in general proportion with those dealt with by Canon Livett in his paper on Early Norman Churches in Archceologia Cantiana, Vol. XXI.; the original church at Teynham being, however, about one-third larger in most dimensions than those of Paddlesworth and Dode described therein. 12th Century (later).—Aisles were added north and south to the earlier building, necessitating the piercing of the original walls with arches, forming thus an arcade of three bays. Two buttresses were built, masking the junction of the extensions to the west front, and serving also to support the* weakened arcade walls. These aisles were 9 feet wide— somewhat in excess of the usual dimension for early aisles —but from the fabric it is evident they were constructed before the transepts. The appearance of the church at this stage may be gathered from Pig. 2, where the building is shewn with low aisle walls and roof, covering in one continuous span, nave and both aisles. 18th Century.—The normal development of the thirteenth century produced a cruciform church, practically that which remains now. An extended chancel and north and south transepts were built around the small twelfth-century chancel, and, in addition, a tower was erected at the west end between the two early buttresses. Later Worh.—Subsequent additions were chiefly in thenature of insertions, but the two flanking additions to the tower require further consideration, which will be afforded later. I t now remains to examine the structural and other evidence for this development theory. One of the most noteworthy features about the building is the extraordinary variety of building material used in its construction. Besides the ordinary flint nodules, tufa, Eeigate stone, Kentish marble, Caen stone (one piece in the north wall of the transept bearing typical twelfthcentury chevron moulding, and another a roughly incised 148 TEYNHAM CHURCH: ARCHITECTURAL NOTES. "scratch" dial), ragstone, sarsen, beach pebbles, Eoman and Medieeval brick, are found in varying degrees of abundance. Some of these obviously point to Norman work, and afford the strongest piece of evidence for the early church, for of any wall that can beyond doubt be assigned to this period on the strength of its architectural details, there is none. Nor is this remarkable; for the disappearance of all W i B m & rtvti *"•, Kg. 2.—TEYNHAM CHUBCJHC. Reconstruction of the west end, as it probably appeared at the end of the 12th century. of the early walls would have been achieved by the end of the thirteenth century, when the enlargement was complete, and the old material absorbed and re-used in the later work. I t is doubtful even whether the wall above the nave arcade is original. This arcade was rebuilt certainly in the fifteenth century, and from the thinness of the wall above (2 feet only, as compared with 2 feet 9 inches, the normal width of an early wall) it seems that it was rebuilt in its entirety. The west wall of the nave has been obscured by the TEYNHAM CHURCH General view from the South-West. F. C. Etliston Erwood H S n H H TEYNHAM CHURCH Tomb in the Churchyard near the West End of the Building. F. C. Elliston Erwood TEYNHAM CHURCH: ARCHITECTURAL NOTES. 149 erection of the tower externally and by plastering internally. Nothing, therefore, can be argued from this source. Por the later twelfth-century development there is more substantial evidence, sufficient indeed to establish and justify the plan as given in Pig. 1. In the northern vestry can be seen, in its south-east corner, a cement rendered projection, which suggests a modern chimney flue, but an examination of the corresponding position, the north-east corner of the southern or choir vestry, reveals a sixnilar projection, well hidden from view below by a dark and dirty cupboard devoted to the church cleaner's materials, and equally masked above by piles of miscellaneous rubbish. This feature is, fortunately, not covered with cement, and at once indicates its character, and that of the corresponding feature on the north, as a late twelfth-century buttress, with a somewhat greater projection than the earliest type, but still not of the full depth of later times. Its coins are of Eeigate stone, and it seems to have been without off-seis, but with a plain sloping head. Quite evidently these were designed in some measure to resist the thrust of the arches inserted in the walls when the aisles were built. These aisle walls, both north and south, shew straight joints against the west walls of the transepts, and in each case retain at both ends sufficient indication of their original coins in situ to make their extent certain. The fact that these external walls shew signs of having been heightened in a succeeding century tends to confirm the accuracy of the small sketch (Pig. 2), where the building at this time is shewn as covered by one plain gable roof. Again, no doors nor windows of this period remain, and their positions are either obscured or occupied by later insertions. The arcades of the nave were, in all likelihood, in three bays (rather than two, as now), each supported by two full piers with responds east and west. One other feature remains in the traces of an internal plinth throughout the greater part of the south wall and the eastern portion of the north wall. This plinth is quite rough—without any moulding, or chamfer, and may be an original offset of the wall, now much obscured 150 TEYNHAM CHURCH: ARCHITECTURAL NOTES. -by plaster. The character of the church was entirely altered in the thirteenth century by the addition of a considerably larger chancel and two deep transepts, the latter in their combined length from north to south being almost equal to the length of the new church from east to west. These enlargements surrounded the old chancel, which was ultimately taken down, the space being thrown into the nave and forming the crossing, which frequently, in larger churches of this type, was crowned with a tower. No such tower was ever erected here, the abutments being of far too weak a character to support the additional weight. Instead, a tower was built at the west end of the nave. The chancel is practically complete save for the insertion of a five-light window in a later style, and for the fact that the chancel arch has been rebuilt. Also the two corner buttresses at the west end are modern additions. Externally the walling has been in great part restored; but on the north, near to its junction with the transept, there is a patch of walling of early character, very suggestive of herringbone work. Most of the other windows are original and form two finely-proportioned, though simple, series of lancets, with broad internal splays quite in keeping with the spacious character of the interior. Below the eastern window, on the south side, the string-course is original; elsewhere it is modern restoration, as is a great deal of the internal stonework. A contemporary piscina, with a trefoiled head and stopped chamfered reveals, is situated beneath the same window. Its position, much too low down for convenience, shews that the chancel floor has been raised Considerably above its proper level. In the east wall of the chancel, to south of the communion table, is an aumbry, or cupboard, perhaps of the fourteenth century. Both arms of the transept were originally similar, lit by ten windows, four in each east wall and three in the west wall, while the gable walls, north and south, contained each two lancets, with a circular or very slightly vesica-shaped quatrefoiled light above them. These early arrangements have been much disturbed. In both transepts the eastern F. C. Elliston Erwood TEYNHAM CHURCH View from the Crossing into the South Transept. t . C Elliston Erwood TEYNHAM CHURCH South Arcade and Aisle of the Nave, looking South-West. lWfuvmCUch,K«nt. J (