Chapter VI: Part 6

The cathedral at Rouen was the burial-place of many men of eminence and distinction. Rollo and William Longue Epée have already been mentioned as interred here. The church also contained the lion-heart of the first English Richard, and the remains of his elder brother, Henry; together with those of William, son of Geoffrey Plantagenet; of the Regent Duke of Bedford; and of Charles V. of France. The tombs of these, and of various other individuals of high rank, are described at length by Pommeraye; but the outrages of the Calvinists and the democrats, added to the removals occasioned by the alterations made at various times in the building, have now destroyed nearly the whole of them, excepting those raised to the two Cardinals D'Amboise, both of them archbishops of Rouen, and that which commemorates Louis de Brezé, Grand Seneschal of Normandy. These monuments are placed on opposite sides of the Lady-Chapel; the former as conspicuous for its many sumptuous ornaments, as the latter for its chaste simplicity.

The archbishop of Rouen, prior to the revolution, took the title of _Primate of Neustria_; and his spiritual jurisdiction then extended over six suffragans, the bishops of Bayeux, Avranches, Evreux, Séez, Lisieux, and Coutances. Not many years previously, it had also embraced the Canadian churches, together with the whole of French North-America; but the appointment of a bishop at Quebec, deprived it of its trans-atlantic sway; and the concordat, in the time of Napoléon, reduced the number of the suffragan prelates to four, taking the mitres from Avranches and Lisieux. A still more important alteration has been occasioned by modern times, in the archiepiscopal revenues. It had been customary throughout France, before the recent changes, in speaking of the see of Rouen, to designate it by the epithet, _rich_; an appellation that would now be wofully misapplied. The archbishop then possessed, in addition to the usual sources of ecclesiastical income, a peculiar privilege, entitled the right of _Déport_; by virtue of which, he claimed the receipt of the first year's proceeds of every benefice which might become vacant in his diocese, whether by the resignation or death of the incumbent.[105]

A station so enviable as that of archbishop of Rouen, has been at almost all times in the hands of some individual belonging to one of the principal families of the kingdom. Among others, those of Luxembourg, Bourbon, D'Estouteville, D'Amboise, Joyeuse, Harlay, Colbert, and Tressan, have successively held it. To sum up the catalogue, in the words of Pommeraye, "the cathedral has furnished many saints for heaven, one pope for the apostolic chair, and thirteen cardinals to the church; nine of its prelates have belonged to the royal family of France; and many others, eminent for their birth, have been still more so for their own merit, and for the services they have rendered to the catholic church and the state."

NOTES:

[93] The destroying of dragons, or fiery serpents, or similar monsters, appears to have been the most common of all miracles, in the early ages of Christianity. After the exploits of St. Michael, St. Margaret, and St. George, ecclesiastical history abounds in similar legends. St. Romain, St. Marcel, St. Julian, St. Martial, St. Bertrand, St. Martha, and St. Clement, make but a small proportion of the saints who distinguished themselves by these acts of pious heroism. The dragons of Rouen and of Metz were of sufficient celebrity to acquire the distinct names of the _Gargouille_, and the _Graouilli_.--It has been commonly supposed, that these various miracles were allegorical, and intended to typify the confining of rivers within their channels, or the limiting of the incursions of the sea. Other authors have been inclined to account for their prevalence, as having reference to the sun, or to astronomical phænomena; but surely the most simple and satisfactory mode of explaining them, lies in considering the dragon as the emblem of evil, and the various victories gained over dragons, as so many conquests obtained by virtue over vice.--A considerable fund of curious information, on this subject, will be found in the _Magasin Encyclopédique_ for _January, 1812_, p. 1-24, in a paper by M. Eusèbe Salverte, entitled _Légendes du Moyen Age_.

[94] _Histoire des Archevêques de Rouen_, p. 40.

[95] _Histoire de la Cathédrale de Rouen_, p. 19.

[96] _Histoire de la Cathédrale de Rouen_, p. 625.

[97] Not, however, in the identical spot in which they were originally deposited: they were at first laid in the immediate vicinity of the high altar, but were, before the close of the eleventh century, removed to the situations they now occupy, in chapels on opposite sides of the upper end of the nave. The following account of their tombs, with the statues and inscriptions, is transcribed from _Gilbert's Description Historique de l'Eglise de Notre Dame de Rouen_, p. 57:--"Le tombeau de Rollon est placé dans un enfoncement cintré, pratiqué dans le mur de la chapelle; il consiste en un sarcophage de stuc, marbre de Portor, sur lequel se voit la statue couchée de ce prince, dont la tête est appuyée sur un coussin. Rollon est vêtu d'une longue tunique, par-dessus laquelle est un manteau couleur de pourpre, ou espèce de chlamyde attachée à l'épaule droite; il porte sur sa tête une couronne. Cette statue a été un peu mutilée. Au-dessus de l'arcade dans laquelle est le tombeau, on lit l'inscription suivante, gravée en lettres d'or sur un marbre noir:

HIC POSITUS EST
ROLLO
NORMANNIÆ A SE TERRITAE VASTATÆ
RESTITUTÆ
PRIMUS DUX CONDITOR PATER
A FRANCONE ARCHIEP. ROTOM.
BAPTIZATUS ANNO DCCCCXIII
OBIIT ANNO DCCCCXVII
OSSA IPSIUS IN VETERI SANCTUARIO
NUNC CAPITE NAVIS PRIMUM
CONDITA,
TRANSLATO ALTARI, COLLOCATA
SUNT A B. MAURILIO ARCHIEP. ROTOM.
AN. MLXIII.

Au-dessus de cette inscription est une urne en stuc, marbre de Portor. L'archivolte de l'arcade est en stuc blanc veiné de gris, ainsi que le lambris qui décore le pourtour de la chapelle. Tous ces ouvrages sont modernes, à l'exception de la statue du duc Rollon, qui paroit avoir été exécutée dans le treizième siècle.

Dans la chapelle de Saint-Anne, située de l'autre côté de la nef, se voit le tombeau de Guillaume _Longue-Epée_, fils de Rollon, et second duc de Normandie, mort victime de la plus infâme trahison, dans l'entrevue qu'il eut à Pecquigny, le 18 Décembre, 944, avec Arnoul, comte de Flandres. Le corps du duc Guillaume fut apporté à Rouen et inhumé dans la cathédrale. [Voyez Servin, _Hist. de Rouen_, tom. I. p. 118 et 119.]

Sur le sarcophage en stuc, marbre de Portor, est placée la statue du duc, vêtu d'une longue tunique, et tenant à la main un sceptre qui a été mutilé. Au-dessus de l'arcade enfoncée, dans laquelle est la sépulture du prince, on lit l'inscription suivante, gravée en lettres d'or sur un marbre noir:

HIC POSITUS EST
GUILLELMUS DICTUS LONGA SPATA
ROLLONIS FILIUS
DUX NORMANNIÆ
PRODITORIE OCCISUS DCCCCXXXXIV
OSSA IPSIUS IN VETERI SANCTUARIO,
UBI NUNC EST CAPUT NAVIS PRIMUM
CONDITA, TRANSLATO ALTARI, HIC
COLLOCATA SUNT A B. MAURILIO
ARCHIEPISC. ROTOM.
ANNO MLXIII."

[98] "Rotomagensi namque urbe in honore genetricis Dei ampliavit mirabile monasterium, longitudinis, latitudinisque, atque altitudinis honorificæ exspatiatum incremento."--_Duchesne, Scriptores Normanni_, p. 153.

[99] _Pommeraye, Histoire de l'Eglise Cathédrale de Rouen_, p. 36.

[100] The following are the dimensions of the principal parts of the cathedral, in French measure, copied from Mr. Turner's _Tour in Normandy_, I. p. 147:--

FEET.
Length of the interior 408
Width of ditto 88
Length of nave 210
Width of ditto 27
Ditto of aisles 15
Length of choir 110
Width of ditto 35-1/2
Ditto of transept 25-1/2
Length of ditto 164
Ditto of Lady-Chapel 88
Width of ditto 28
Height of spire 380
Ditto of towers at the west end 230
Ditto of nave 84
Ditto of aisles and chapels 42
Ditto of interior of central tower 152
Depth of chapels 10

[101] _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, I. p. 139.--The mention of this sculpture affords an opportunity of pointing out what appears a singular error on the part of the late M. Millin, in his _Voyage dans les Départemens du Midi de la France_. He has figured, in the atlas to that work, _plate twelve_, a bas-relief of the eleventh century, representing the assassination of Count Dalmace, by the hands of his son-in-law, Robert I. Duke of Burgundy; and, in the lower compartment, containing a banquet, he explains one of the figures (I. p. 190) to be the Earl falling from the table; whereas, a comparison with the sculpture at Rouen will scarcely leave a doubt, that it was designed for a dancing-girl, introduced for the amusement of the company.

[102] _Pommeraye, Histoire de l'Eglise Cathédrale de Rouen_, p. 33.

[103] _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, I. p. 144.

[104] _Bibliographical, Antiquarian, and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany_, I. p. 50.

[105] _Pommeraye, Histoire des Archevêques de Rouen_, p. 22.

PLATE LIII.

CRYPT IN THE CHURCH OF ST. GERVAIS, AT ROUEN.

It has been inferred, and with much apparent probability, from the silence of Julius Cæsar, that the proud capital of Normandy had either no existence in the time of that general, or was at most only a place of small importance. There have not, however, been wanting, among the historians of Rouen, some, who, jealous, as usual, for the honor of their city, ascribe to it an antiquity beyond the deluge, and trust to the latter half of its classical name, for bearing them out in the assertion, that its foundations were laid by Magus, the son and successor of Samothes, first king of Gaul. Others, more moderate, have contented themselves with the belief, that, although Cæsar does not make mention of Rothomagus, there is still no reason to question its existence before the Christian æra, or to doubt that it was then the chief town of the Velocasses, as Lillebonne was of the neighboring tribe of the Caletes, the inhabitants of the present _Pays de Caux_. It is at least known with certainty, that, in the division of Gaul, which took place not very long afterwards, into seventeen provinces, Rouen became the metropolis of the _Lugdunensis Secunda_; and that, from that time forwards, it continued gradually to rise in consequence, till the establishment of Neustria into an independent sovereignty stamped it with the title of the capital of a nation.

At the present time, Rouen can shew scarcely any remains of Roman antiquity: "the wide waste of all-devouring years," has effaced those vestiges which that powerful people seldom failed to have impressed, wherever their dominion had once been firmly established. The small church of St. Gervais, derives therefore a peculiar interest, as exhibiting proofs, sufficiently decided, though far from important, of a connection with Italy. These proofs rest principally upon the Roman bricks and other _débris_, some of them rudely sculptured, which have been employed in the construction of the piers of the crypt, and upon the sculpture of the capitals of some columns on the exterior of the apsis.

The church of St. Gervais is situated at a short distance without the walls of Rouen, upon a slight eminence, adjoining the Roman road to Lillebonne, and near a rising ground, commonly called the _Mont aux Malades_, as having been, in the eleventh century, the site of a monastery, destined for the reception of lepers. According to Farin,[106] the church was originally an abbey, and is expressly recognized as such in a charter of Duke Richard II. dated A.D. 1020; in which, among other donations to his favorite monastery at Fécamp, he enumerates, "item _Abbatiam_ Sancti Gervasii, quæ est juxta civitatem Rothomagum, et quicquid ad ipsam pertinet." The authors of the _Gallia Christiana_[107] add that, "at the time when this abbey was conferred upon Fécamp, it was taken from the monks of St. Peter at Chartres." Two centuries subsequently, St. Gervais appears to have sunk into the rank of a simple priory, under the immediate control of the monks of Fécamp, who assumed the title of its priors. In process of time, the still humbler name and dignity of a parochial church were alone left; but the period at which this last change took place, is not recorded. The abbot of Fécamp continued, however, till the period of the revolution, to exercise spiritual jurisdiction over what was termed the barony of St. Gervais; including not only this single parish; but some others dependent upon it. He nominated to the livings, directed the religious establishments, had entire control over the prisons, and was entitled to all privileges arising from the fair of St. Gervais, which was annually held at Rouen, in the Fauxbourg Cauchoise, on the twentieth of June. It is even on record, that in the year 1400, the abbot ventured upon the bold experiment of forbidding William de Vienne, then archbishop of Rouen, either to carry his cross, or to give his benediction within the precincts of his jurisdiction; but so daring an assumption of power was not to be tolerated, and the matter was accordingly referred to the parliament of Paris, who decided in this instance against the abbot.

Adjoining to the church of St. Gervais, stood originally one of the palaces of the Norman Dukes and it was to this[108] that William the Conqueror caused himself to be conveyed, when attacked with his mortal illness, after having wantonly reduced the town of Mantes to ashes. Here, too, that mighty monarch breathed his last, and left a sad warning to future conquerors; deserted by his friends and physicians, the moment he was no more; while his menials plundered his property, and his body lay naked and deserted in the hall.

The ducal palace, and the monastic buildings, are now wholly destroyed. Fortunately, however, the church still remains, and preserves some portions of the original structure, more interesting from their features than their extent. The exterior of the apsis is very curious: it is obtusely angular, and faced at the corners with large rude columns, of whose capitals, some are Doric and Corinthian, others as wild as the fancies of the Norman lords of the country. None reach so high as the cornice of the roof; it having been the design of the original architect, that a portion of work should intervene between the summits of the capitals and this member. A capital to the north is remarkable for the eagles carved upon it, as if with some allusion to Roman power.

But the most singular part of this church is the crypt under the apsis, represented in the plate; a room about thirty feet long, by fourteen wide, and sixteen high, of extreme simplicity, and remote antiquity. Round it runs a plain stone bench; and it is divided into two unequal parts by a circular arch, devoid of columns or of any ornament whatever. Here, according to Ordericus Vitalis,[109] was interred the body of St. Mello, the first archbishop of Rouen, and one of the apostles of Neustria; and here his tomb, and that of his successor, Avitien, are shewn to this day, in plain niches, on opposite sides of the wall. St. Mello's remains, however, were not suffered to rest in peace; for, about five hundred and seventy years after his death, which happened in the year 314, they were removed to the castle of Pontoise, lest the canonized corpse should be violated by the heathen Normans. The existence of these tombs, and the antiquity of the crypt, recorded as it is by history, and confirmed by the style of its architecture, have given currency to the tradition, which points it out as the only temple where the primitive Christians of Neustria dared to assemble for the performance of divine service. Many stone coffins have also been discovered in the vicinity of the church. These sarcophagi serve to confirm the general tradition; they are of the simplest form, and apparently as ancient as the crypt; and they were so placed in the ground, that the heads of the corpses were turned to the east, a position denoting that the dead received Christian burial.

NOTES:

[106] _Histoire de la Ville de Rouen_, v. p. 1.

[107] XI. p. 124. A.

[108] The whole of the remainder of this article is transcribed from _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, I. p. 125.

[109] _Duchesne, Scriptores Normanni_, p. 558.

PLATE LIV.

CHURCH OF ST. PAUL, AT ROUEN.

Next to the church of St. Gervais, that of St. Paul is the most interesting relic of ancient architecture among the ecclesiastical buildings at Rouen. Indeed, it may be considered as the only other of an early date; the round tower attached to the abbatial church of St. Ouen[110] being altogether inconsiderable, and indebted for its principal interest to its connection with an abbey endowed with such extensive possessions, and gifted with so much reported sanctity.

The foundation of the church of St. Paul is of very remote antiquity: it is said to have been laid by St. Romain, in memory of his great victory over heathenism, when, triumphant, he erected the banner of the cross upon the ashes of the temple of Venus. Impure was the goddess, and most impure were her rites; so that, to use the words of Taillepied, in speaking of this same temple, "là dedans la jeunesse, à bride avallée, souloit se souiller et polluer par ordre luxure et paillardise abominable, ne ayant égard qu'auprès de ce lieu y avoit un repaire de malins esprits qui faisoyent sortir une fumée tant puante et infecte que la mortalité s'en ensuyvoit par après."

This very remark concerning the infectious vapor, seems decisive as to the feet of the church of St. Paul occupying the site of the pagan fane. It stands without the walls of the town, upon elevated ground, at a very short distance to the right of the barrier below Mont St. Catherine, on the road to Paris, in the immediate vicinity of some mineral springs, strongly impregnated with iron. Prior to the revolution, the church was under the jurisdiction of the monastery of Montivilliers. The abbess had the right of nomination to the vacant benefice; and, till the middle of the seventeenth century, she was in the habit of regarding St. Paul's as a priory, and fixing there a colony of her nuns. But they were all recalled in 1650, and were never afterwards succeeded by a fresh establishment.

Respecting the various changes of the edifice, Farin contents himself with the brief remark, "that it was repeatedly destroyed during the wars, and rebuilt by the liberality of the Norman Dukes."[111] The eastern part of what is now standing is evidently of Norman time; and, architecturally considered, it is a most curious specimen, being probably the only church in existence which terminates to the east in three semi-circular compartments. Of these, the central division is considerably the most lofty, as well as the most prominent; and the arrangement of the corbel-table, which is carried equally round them all, proves that it must always have been so. The sculpture of this corbel-table is viewed by the Norman antiquaries with peculiar interest: some of the heads, with widely distended jaws, beset with teeth of enormous size, represent wolves; others, with human features and whiskered upper lips, are supposed to be intended for the Saxon foe, who, at the time of the Norman invasion, were induced, we are told, by the smooth faces of their opponents, to entertain the erroneous belief, that the approaching host was but an army of priests. Mr. Cotman, who has observed in similar situations, in many other parts of Normandy, faces equally shadowed with whiskers, has been led to the suspicion, that they were intended in derision of the Saxons.

Internally, the triple circular ending of the church is no longer observable. Both of the lateral divisions are parted off at the extremity, and formed into distinct apartments: the southern is applied to the purpose of a sacristy, while the northern serves merely as a lumber-room. The nave, which is thrice the width of the chancel, and is clearly of a date comparatively modern, is separated from the more eastern portion of the building by a semi-circular arch. The sculpture upon the capitals appears of Roman design: that on one of them, exhibits a row of graceful figures in a pure classical taste, intent upon some action, but so much mutilated, that it would be now no easy task to conjecture the object of the artist. The aisles of the chancel are divided from the central compartment by double arches, a larger and a smaller being united together, all of them semi-circular, and all of the Norman style of architecture. Attached to the eastern end of the church, within the lumber-room just mentioned, stands a piece of Roman sculpture, supposed by M. Le Prevost to have served originally for an altar. Mr. Turner has given a figure of it in his Tour; and he conjectures, that it was of the workmanship of the fourth century; a supposition founded upon the resemblance borne by its ornaments, to those upon the pedestal of the obelisk raised by Theodosius, in the Hippodrome at Constantinople, as represented in the elaborate publication of the late M. Seroux d'Agincourt.[112]

NOTES:

[110] Figured in _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, I. p. 127.

[111] _Histoire de la Ville de Rouen_, v. p. 8.

[112] _Histoire de la décadence de l'Art_, pl. 10, _Sculpture_, fig. 4-7.

ARCHITECTURAL

ANTIQUITIES

OF

NORMANDY,

BY
JOHN SELL COTMAN;

ACCOMPANIED BY
HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE NOTICES
BY
DAWSON TURNER, ESQ. F.R. AND A.S.

VOLUME THE SECOND.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR JOHN AND ARTHUR ARCH, CORNHILL;
AND J. S. COTMAN, YARMOUTH.

MDCCCXXII.

PLATES IN THE SECOND VOLUME.

PLATE.

55. Church of St. Nicholas, at Caen, West End to face page 59
56. -- -- -- -- East End 60
57. Church at Cheux, near Caen, from the North-East 62
58. Church at Bieville, from the North-West 63
59. -- -- Elevations and Details 64
60. Church at Fontaine-le-Henri, near Caen, North Side of Chancel 65
61. -- -- -- -- -- Elevations 66
62. Château at Fontaine-le-Henri, near Caen 67
63. -- -- -- -- -- Elevation of
central Compartment 68
64. House in the Place de la Pucelle, at Rouen 69
65. House in the Rue St. Jean, at Caen 70
66. Tower of the Church at Tréport, near Caen 71
67. Church of Anisy, near Caen 73
68. Church of Perriers, near Caen 74
69. Castle of Lillebonne 75
70. Castle of Briquebec 77
71. Church of St. Stephen's, at Fécamp 79
72. Screen in the Church of St. Lawrence, at Eu 81
73. \ Church of St. Peter, at Lisieux, West Front 83
74. /
75. -- -- -- -- South Transept 86
76. Abbey Church of St. Ouen, at Rouen 87
77. Fountain of the Stone Cross, at Rouen 90
78. Palace of Justice, at Rouen 91
79. Church of Louviers, South Porch 93
80. Château Gaillard, North-East View 95
81. -- -- South-West View 96
82. Abbey Church of Montivilliers, West End 97
83. Church of St. Sanson sur Rille 99
84. Church of Foullebec, West Door-way 100
85. Castle at Tancarville 101
86. Entrance to the Castle at Tancarville 103
87. Church of the Holy Cross, at St. Lo, West Door-way 104
88. -- -- -- -- -- Sculpture 106
89. Castle of Falaise, North-West View 107
90. -- -- North View 109
91. Interior of the Church of Creully 110
92. \ Cathedral Church of Notre Dame, at Coutances, West Front 111
93. /
94. -- -- -- -- -- -- Elevation of
the Nave 115
95. Mount St. Michael, on the Approach from Pontorson 116
96. -- -- Interior of the Knights' Hall 120
97. Abbey Church of Cerisy, Interior of the Choir 121
98. Church at Oyestraham, West Front 122
99. Cathedral Church of Notre Dame, at Séez, West Front 123
100. -- -- -- -- -- Elevation of the
Nave 125

The Figure referred to in the Note, p. 117, is inserted at the
beginning of the Preface.--As a Vignette, at the end of the
Preface, is introduced a View of the Church of Querqueville, near
Cherbourg, a building of unquestionable antiquity, and here
figured, as the only instance in Normandy, or possibly in
existence, of a church whose transepts, as well as the chancel,
terminate in a semi-circular form. In these parts, the walls are
formed of herring-bone masonry, which is not the case with the
tower or nave, which are more modern. The tower is, however,
probably of the Norman æra; and the peculiar masonry which
distinguishes the chancel, is still observable for a few feet
above its junction with the nave. Its ornaments may be compared
with those of St. Peter's church, at Barton-upon-Humber, and
Earl's-Barton church, Northamptonshire, both of them figured in
the _fifth_ volume of _Britton's Architectural Antiquities_, and
both evidently Norman. The church of Querqueville has no
buttresses. Its length, from east to west, is forty-eight feet and
six inches; from north to south, forty-three feet and four inches;
the width of the nave is nine feet and nine inches.

PLATES LV. AND LVI.

CHURCH OF ST. NICHOLAS, AT CAEN.

The Abbé De la Rue, in his _Historical Essays upon Caen_, contents himself with remarking, with regard to the church of St. Nicholas, that it is the only specimen of real Norman architecture now left entire in the town; for that the abbatial church of the Holy Trinity, a building of the same period and style, has been so disguised by the alterations made with the view of adapting it to its present purpose, that, considered as a whole, it is no longer to be recognized as a type of the religious edifices of the Normans. Such being the case, it is the more to be lamented that the church here figured, should not only have been degraded from its original application, but should have been appropriated to an object eminently liable to expose it to injury. It is now used as a stable for cavalry; but, fortunately, it has still been suffered to remain entire; and hopes are entertained, that it may yet be one day again employed as a place of worship.

The exterior of the building has not altogether escaped uninjured or unaltered. In the western front, (see _plate fifty-five_,) both the lateral towers have lost their original terminations, and have been reduced to a level with the roof of the nave. One of them still remains in a state of dilapidation: to the other has been added a square tower, of rather elegant proportions, surmounted by a small crocketed pinnacle, the workmanship probably of the fourteenth century. The rest of this part of the church is as it was first built, except that the great arches of entrance are entirely blocked up. The whole is of extreme simplicity, and vies in that respect with the same portion of the adjoining church of the abbey of St. Stephen; the different members of the two being nearly the same, though disposed in a dissimilar manner.

The central tower of the church of St. Nicholas is square and small, and so low as to admit only a single tier of semi-circular-headed windows, four on each side. It terminates in a ridged roof, and apparently, never was higher; though, as far as may be judged from analogy, a greater elevation was probably designed by the architect. Along the sides of the church, immediately beneath the roof, runs a bold projecting cornice, of antique pattern, formed of numerous horizontal mouldings; and, under this, the corbel-table presents only a row of plain knobs, instead of the monsters commonly found in Norman buildings. The clerestory, throughout both the nave and choir, is filled with narrow arches, alternately pierced for windows, and left blank. All these arches, as well as the windows of the transepts and of the projecting aisles below, are without the accompaniment of pillars or ornaments of any description, excepting a broad flat moulding of the simplest kind, which wholly encircles them. The disposition of the windows in the lower part of the nave, differs from that of those above, in their being separated from each other by shallow buttresses, which hold the place of the blank arches. A plain string-course also is continued the whole length of the church beneath the windows, as in the west front. On the south side is a door, the only one now in use in the church, which is entered by a very noble Norman arch, composed of a great number of cylindrical mouldings, arranged in three broad bands, but without pillars or capitals, and with no other variation than that of size, and of the addition of the billet-moulding to the outer row. The transome-stone of this arch is unquestionably coeval with the arch itself, the sculpture of the masonry being interwoven with it. Attached to the eastern side of both the transepts, is a circular chapel, as in the churches of St. Georges, of St. Taurin at Evreux, of Fécamp, of Cerisy, and in several other ancient religious buildings in Normandy. Nor is England altogether without specimens of the same kind: a similar chapel, now in a ruinous state, and called by Blomefield, "the sexterie or ancient vestry," is joined to the north transept of Norwich cathedral; and near the eastern extremity of the same church, are four others. But the principal characteristic of those at St. Nicholas', is the extremely high pitch of the stone roof, a peculiarity equally observable in the roof of the choir; and hence the following remarks on the part of Mr. Turner[113]:--"Here we have the exact counterpart of the Irish stone-roofed chapels, the most celebrated of which, that of Cormac in Cashel cathedral, appears, from all the drawings and descriptions I have seen of it, to be altogether a Norman building. Ledwich asserts that 'this chapel is truly Saxon, and was erected prior to the introduction of the Norman and Gothic styles.'[114] If we agree with him, we only obtain a proof, that there is no essential difference between Norman and Saxon architecture; and this proposition I believe, will soon be universally admitted. We now know what is really Norman; and a little attention to the buildings in the north of Germany, may terminate the long-debated questions relative to Saxon architecture, and the stone-roofed chapels in the sister isle."

In the east end of the church of St. Nicholas, (see _plate fifty-six_,) may be remarked a sensible approximation in point of style, to the same part in the church of the Trinity. The circular apsis is divided into compartments by slender cylindrical pillars; and each intercolumniation is filled by a couple of windows of comparatively large size, placed one above the other, while a row of narrow blank arches occupies the lower part. The head of each of these smaller arches is hewn out of a single stone. The height of the roof, in this part of the church, is so much greater than in the choir, as almost to justify the suspicion that it was no part of the original plan, but was an addition of a subsequent, though certainly not of a remote, æra. Were the line of it continued to the central tower, it would wholly block up and conceal the windows there. The discrepancy observable in the style of its architecture, may also possibly be regarded as enforcing the same opinion. But, indeed, as has already been more than once observed in this work, no inferences drawn from style must be admitted without the utmost hesitation. A very sensible discussion upon this point, as illustrated by the church of St. Nicholas itself, and the two adjoining churches of the Trinity and of St. Stephen, has lately appeared in one of the most popular English periodical publications, from the pen of a writer possessed of the deepest knowledge of the subject, and gifted with the most comprehensive and clearest views[115]. It were an injustice to the readers of this work, not to extract it upon the present occasion. It will supersede the necessity of any labored description of the interior of the building.--

"When a distinct gradation of style is observable, it is natural to conclude, that these architectural varieties, emanating from one prototype, each clearly to be discriminated, yet dying into another by imperceptible shades, were successively developed at certain intervals of time. This reasoning, though it advances upon legitimate premises, may be fallacious, as is proved at Caen, where three coeval churches, probably erected by the same architect, are distinguished by such remarkable modifications of the Norman Romanesque style, that were we not acquainted with the facts, we might well suppose that they marked the progress of architecture during three half centuries.--St. Nicholas, the first of these edifices, was built by the monks of St. Stephen's Abbey some time between the years 1066 and 1083. The original lines are characterized by simplicity and regularity. All the capitals of the columns, embedded in the side walls, are of one order; and the capitals of the pier-columns, which nearly resemble the others, are equally uniform. The east end terminates by an apsis, of which the elevation resembles the exterior of the cathedral of Pisa. Three circular arches, supported by Corinthianizing pilasters, form the western portal. The original cross-vaulting of the side-aisles still remains: it is without groins, and of Roman construction, and the whole interior shews that the architect was endeavoring to recollect the models of the great city.--If we pass from hence to the adjacent abbey church of St. Stephen, erected at the same period, we shall observe that the conception of the architect is more Norman than in the church which we have quitted. The nave is divided into bays by piers, alternating with circular pillars of smaller diameter. The pier consists of a pilaster fronted by a cylindrical column, continuing to about four-fifths of the height of the roof. Two cylindrical columns then rise from it; so that from this point upwards, the pier becomes a clustered column: angular brackets sculptured into knots, grotesque heads, and foliage, are affixed to the bases of the derivative pillars. A bold double-billeted moulding is continued below the clerestory, whose windows adapt themselves to the binary arrangement of the bays of the nave; that is to say, a taller arch is flanked by a smaller one, on its right side, or on its left side, as the situation requires; these are supported by short massy pillars; and an embattled moulding runs round the windows. These features are Norman; but in other portions of the church, the architect Romanises again, as in St. Nicholas. The piers of the aisle-arches are of considerable width: the pillars at each angle are connected by an architrave, distinctly enounced, running along the front of the pier, and interposed between the capitals and the springing of the well-turned semi-circular arch. The triforium is composed of a tier of semi-circular arches, nearly of equal span with those below. The perspective of the building is grand and palatial. In the evening, when it is illuminated only by a few faintly-burning tapers, the effect of the gleams of light, reflected from the returns of the arches and pillars, is particularly fine. Beyond the central arch which supports the tower, all is lost in gloom, except that at the extremity of the choir, the star-light just breaks through the topmost windows above the altar.--In the church of St. Stephen, the leading ideas of the architect were still influenced by the Roman basilica; a third and more fanciful modification is to be observed in the coeval church of the Holy Trinity. Here the piers are narrower; the columns supporting the aisle-arches are consequently brought closer together, and the architrave is less prominent than at St. Stephen's: there the embattled moulding is confined to the clerestory; in the present church, it runs round the principal arches; and, instead of the lofty triforium which there surmounts the side-aisles, the walls which we now describe are threaded by a gallery supported by misproportioned pillars, whose capitals exhibit every possible variety of grotesque invention. The bold archivolts beneath the central tower are chased with the Norman lozenge: they are circular; but the eastern arch, which runs higher than the others, is obtusely pointed, though it is evidently of the same date with its companions."

The parish of St. Nicholas is placed without the walls of Caen, in that portion of the suburbs known by the name of _Le Bourg-l'Abbé_, as having been, before the revolution, under the jurisdiction of the abbot of St. Stephen. In the same quarter was also included the parish of St. Ouen, as was a portion of those of St. Stephen and St. Martin. The two last-mentioned churches were ceded, in the earliest period of the history of Caen, by the Chapter of the Cathedral of Bayeux, to Queen Matilda, in exchange for some other preferment, and were by her bestowed upon the nuns of her new convent of the Trinity. But the increasing power of the rival monastery, built by her husband, naturally caused its occupants to turn a wistful eye towards churches so immediately in their vicinity. Disputes succeeded; and the monks of St. Stephen erected the church of St. Nicholas, that their suburb might no longer be without a religious building which depended wholly upon themselves. Peace was at length restored by means of a charter from the Duke, dated in the year 1083, whereby St. Nicholas was recognized as parochial, an equivalent was given to the abbess by the extension of her power in her own quarter of St. Giles, and the respective parishes of St. Stephen and St. Martin were allowed to retain all they possessed in the Bourg-l'Abbé, except five families expressly designated in the charter. These five were transferred to St. Nicholas; and, to secure to the saint a certain increase of votaries hereafter, a proviso was added, enacting that every house which might be built in future, in that suburb, should belong to his parish. Hence, the two other saints retained nothing more than the ground covered by the tenements then standing, sixty-seven in number; and the necessary consequence was, that from that period till the year 1790, when the whole was remodelled, the limits of the several parishes were confused and irregular in the extreme. Not only did adjoining dwellings belong to different parishes, but the line frequently ran between the various apartments of the same house, or even separated the apartment themselves.

The church of St. Nicholas, as indebted for its existence to the monks of the abbey of St. Stephen, continued for some time to receive its pastors from among the brethren of that convent. At a subsequent period, the monks, after they had transferred to substitutes the performance of their religious duties, still endeavored to preserve their supremacy; but they were finally obliged to relinquish it; and the ministers of St. Nicholas enjoyed the same rights as the other clergy of Caen, though the ecclesiastical privileges of the abbot remained inviolate.

To the church of St. Nicholas was attached a guild, in the early lists of whose members were included names of the greatest distinction in the town and neighborhood. St. Nicholas was in remote times an object of especial devotion; and the company incorporated under his patronage, naturally partook of his celebrity. The Abbé De la Rue also states, that it was from within this church, that what were termed the _Apostolic decrees_, were delivered in the twelfth century. They derived their name from being pronounced by commissioners delegated by the Pope, to decide in matters touching the canon law; and the numerous appeals to the court of Rome, at that period, rendered the necessity for such decisions of frequent occurrence.

NOTES:

[113] _Tour in Normandy_, II. p. 176.

[114] _Antiquities of Ireland_, p. 151.

[115] _Quarterly Review for June_, 1821, p. 120.

PLATE LVII.

CHURCH OF CHEUX.

The earliest mention which occurs of Cheux, a small country town, about nine miles to the west of Caen, is to be found in the charter, granted about the year 1077, by the Conqueror, for the foundation of his abbey of St. Stephen. The king, in this instrument, after a pious proem, reciting that he has been led to the holy task by the expectation of obtaining remission for his sins and a hundred-fold reward in heaven, places, as the very first of the gifts destined for the endowment of the rising monastery, the town of Cheux. He also expressly designates Cheux, and the four places immediately following, as _villas juris mei_, thereby meaning, as M. de Gerville justly remarks, to draw a distinction between those donations which came immediately from himself, and those which originated with any of his subjects, and stood in need of nothing more than a ratification on his part. Another remark may, perhaps, not impertinently be made upon this part of the charter, as curiously illustrative of the manners of the times as to the nature of feudal tenures, and the mode of recruiting the army. In the very next paragraph, a distinction is drawn between the rights of two different classes of men, the _coloni_ and _conditionarii_, the latter being explained by the words of the charter itself, to mean _free men_ ("_liberos homines_.") The Duke assigns to the abbey, the towns themselves, together with their inhabitants, mills, waters, meadows, pastures, and woods; and also with all the revenues and customs derivable from them, as they have been enjoyed by himself, or any of his predecessors. He likewise expressly stipulates, that such of the people of Cheux and Rotz, as do not hold _frank-tenements_, ("_qui francam terram non tenent_,") should be exclusively devoted to the service of the church and the monks, so as not to be subject to any call arising from military expeditions, or other cause, unless the Prince himself should personally, or by letter, direct the abbot to send them. Even in the latter case, he binds himself to summon each by name, and never to call them out, except the province should be invaded by a foreign foe; nor on any account to require their services beyond the limits of the duchy.

At the same time that the Conqueror's children confirmed all the donations made by their father to the abbey of St. Stephen, Robert, his successor upon the ducal throne, added the privilege of an annual fair at Cheux, and a weekly market: the latter was held upon a Sunday, during the twelfth century, but was afterwards, by an order from King John, changed to a Tuesday. Upon the accession of Henry II. to the dukedom, another charter of great length was granted in favor of the royal abbey; and in this, Cheux is again mentioned. The King not only follows the example of his predecessors, in renouncing all right to it, but he gives his royal assent, in the following terms, to two purchases which had been made in it:--"Concedo emptionem, quam fecit Willelmus Abbas, Joanni, filii Conani, Canonico Bajocensi, scilicet, totam terram suam de Ceusio, quæ est de feudo S. Stephani; 23 libr. annual; et emptionem quam fecit Willelmus Abbas, a Radulpho, fratre Vitalis, scilicet, sex acras terræ, quam tenebat in feodu de prædicto sancto in Ceusio, pro quibus faciebat serraturas portarum Ceusii, pro C. solid. census."

From that time to the revolution, Cheux continued to be one of the principal domains of the abbot of St. Stephen. According to the territorial division of ancient France, it formed a part of what was termed the _Election_ of Caen, and was included in the archdeaconry of Bayeux, and the deanery of Fontenay. The revolution, introducing a new arrangement, together with a new set of terms, has placed it in the _arrondissement_ of Caen, and in the _canton_ of Tilly.

The church is a fine specimen of Norman architecture; remarkable as to its plan, in having the choir of considerably greater width than the nave. The portion east of the tower is composed of three distinct parts, unequal in size, the central being the narrowest, as is strikingly the case in the church at Great Yarmouth; but all of the same height, and each of the lateral ones exactly equalling in its width the length of the transept to which it is attached; and thus, also, the choir and transepts, taken collectively, form nearly a square, except that, to the end of the middle compartment, is attached a circular apsis, of an unusually small size; and, seen from the inside of the church, this disproportion becomes even more conspicuous: the great thickness of the wall necessarily subtracting much from the space. It even strikes the eye as being less than it really is, from being subdivided into a number of small arches; which, with the vaulted roof, lighted by the extremely narrow windows below, and the larger ones above, give this end of the church a very peculiar appearance.

PLATE LVIII. AND LIX.

CHURCH OF BIEVILLE.

It is only when considered as a curious relic of ancient ecclesiastical architecture, that the church of Bieville can lay claim to any attention whatever. History, even in its lowest department, topography, is altogether silent with regard both, to the building and the parish, except so far as to record that the church was among the dependencies of the royal abbey of St. Stephen, at Caen; though even in this character, it does not appear till the middle of the fourteenth century, when it is mentioned in one of the registers of the diocese of Bayeux. Its situation is about four miles north of Caen.

Taken as a whole, the church of Bieville has probably no parallel in Normandy or in England. The upper story of the tower alone is of a subsequent æra, and _that_, the earliest style of pointed architecture: all the rest of the structure is purely Norman, and of extreme simplicity. The church of St. Peter, at Northampton, said to have been erected by Simon de St. Liz, during the reign of William the Conqueror, is encircled at the height of the clerestory by a row of small arches, similar in their proportions and decorations to those at Bieville; but they are there continued in an uninterrupted line round the building, while at Bieville they occupy only a comparatively small portion of it. In the nave of this latter church, they are disposed regularly in triplets, the central one only pierced for a window, and each three separated by a flat Norman buttress.

The western front, represented in _plate fifty-eight_, is divided by plain string-courses into three stories of irregular height: the basement contains only the door, which is entered by a richly-ornamented arch, (see _plate fifty-nine, fig. B_.) surmounted by a broad drip-stone, decorated with quatrefoils, and terminating at each end in a human head of classical character. The lowest moulding of this arch is considerably more flattened than the upper, a peculiarity that is likewise observable in the interior arch to the great door-way at Castle-Acre Priory, in Norfolk.[116] In the second story are six arches, supported by eight pillars, with capitals and bases of ordinary character: even these, contiguous as they stand, are divided into two equal sets, by the intervention of a flat space in the centre, so narrow, as to wear the appearance of a pilaster. Here, too, as in the nave, the central arch of each compartment is alone pierced for a window.--The upper story has only a single window, precisely resembling those below, but flanked on each side by a circular one, similar to that in the front of the neighboring chapel of the _Délivrande_:[117] or, if a comparison be sought among Norman edifices in England, to those in the tower of Norwich cathedral;[118] in the same part of the church of St. James, at Bury St. Edmunds;[119] and in the east end of the church of the Hospital of St. Cross.[120] In point of general character, the western front of the church of Bieville may not unaptly be compared with that of the chapel of the _Délivrande_, or of the hospital of St. Leonard, at Stamford, as figured by Carter.[121] The tower of the church at Bieville is well calculated to serve as a specimen of the towers of the village churches, comprized in a circuit of twenty miles round Caen. Among others, those of Soumont, Ifs, Soulangy, Potigny, and the Lower Allemagne, to the south, and of Lyons, Oyestraham, and several more, to the north, greatly resemble it.

_Plate fifty-nine_, as being altogether architectural, will best be understood by a set of regular references to the different subjects it embraces.

A. _Door-way on the north side of the nave_, remarkable for its lintel or transom-stone in the figure of a pediment, from which the arch rises, encircled with a single, wide, plain, flat moulding. There is a similar instance in the church of Martinvast, near Cherbourg; but the pediment there assumes a form more decidedly conical.[122] Transom-stones occur frequently in Normandy, and are variously sculptured; from the rude cross, either alone or encompassed with the cable-moulding, to the elaborate representations of the crucified Saviour, or other subjects from holy writ. Profane subjects, which are of so frequent occurrence on transom-stones in England, are very seldom found in the duchy: the writer of the present article never recollects to have met with any; and Mr. Cotman's more extensive researches have brought him acquainted only with a single instance, a centaur, in the act of discharging his arrow at a stag, in the church of Urville, near Valognes.

B. _Great western entrance_, (already described.)

C. _First compartment of the nave from the west_, showing the structure and disposition of the arches, and the very flat buttresses with a double projection, the first only equalling that of the corbels. The square-headed door is modern. Several of the sculptures on the corbels are close imitations of those upon the church of the Holy Trinity, at Caen.

D. and E. _Portions of other compartments of the nave_, to obtain a complete idea of which, it is only necessary to produce the dotted lines below, to the same length as that at C; the parts and their disposition being precisely the same, with the exception of the door.

F. _Elevation of the choir_, which is divided into two equal portions by a flat buttress, flanked on each side by a slender cylindrical column. Of these parts, one is quite plain, except only the corbel-table and ornamented frieze below. The other has two arches, recently blocked up, similar to those of the nave, but with a richer exterior moulding. The door below these has the same peculiarity, in the drip-stone rising from sculptured heads, as in the western entrance. The frieze beneath the corbels very much resembles that in the same situation in the church of the Holy Trinity, (see _plate thirty-one_,) and is likewise continued over the buttresses, as well as along the receding part between.

NOTES:

[116] Figured in _Britton's Architectural Antiquities_, III. pl. 2.

[117] Figured in _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, II. p. 295.

[118] _Britton's Norwich Cathedral_, p. 33, pl. 6.

[119] _Britton's Architectural Antiquities_, III. p. 80.

[120] _Antiquarian and Topographical Cabinet_, V.

[121] _Ancient Architecture_, pl. 24.--In the description of this building, page 33, Mr. Carter speaks of it as being of _Saxon_ origin; and, in the chronological table attached to his work, he classes it in the third of the four æras into which he divides his specimens of _Saxon_ architecture.

[122] A still more remarkable example occurs in Essington church, Gloucestershire, figured by Carter, in his _Ancient Architecture_, pl. XV. fig. X. The transom-stone is there formed of part of an octagon, rising from an horizontal torus moulding, which finishes in a spiral direction round two heads. A lion and a griffin fill the space within.

PLATE LX. AND LXI.

CHURCH OF FONTAINE-LE-HENRI, NEAR CAEN.

The parish of Fontaine-le-Henri lies about eight miles north of Caen, immediately adjoining Than, whose church has already been figured in this work. The register of the livings appertaining to the diocese of Bayeux, made about the year 1350, and commonly known by the name of the _livre pelut_, (_liber pelutus_, or the _parchment book_,) contains only the following brief notice of it:--"Ecclesia de Fontibus Henrici LX Libras.--Dnus dicte ville.--Archidiaconatus de Cadomo.--Decanatus de Dovra." In the _Gallia Christiana_, and other similar works, no mention whatever is made of this parish.

According to the modern division of France, Fontaine-le-Henri is included in the canton of Creüilly: the name of the village, to whose deanery it formerly appertained, cannot fail to strike the ear of an Englishman, as being the same with that of the celebrated harbor in his own island, the common landing-place from Calais. But the English Dover, from having been originally a Roman station, is generally supposed to have derived its appellation from the Romans; and Darell, in his History of the castle, published by Grose,[123] gives it as his opinion that, among the ancient Britons, it was called _Rupecester_, but, on the Roman invasion, got the new name of _Dofris_, _Dobris_, or _Doris_, "in consequence of the filling or damming up of the harbor;" "Doafer," as he observes a few pages before, "signifying, in the language of those times, a harbor shut up, or of difficult access." A still higher authority, the learned Bishop Huet,[124] classes the word, Douvres, among those whose origin is to be sought in the ancient language of Gaul, and proposes two derivations: one from _Dufyrrha_, a rising ground; the other from _Dvvr_, the term for water. Thus, without giving any opinion of his own, he leaves the matter to his reader, with a "utrum horum mavis elige."