CHAPTER II
THE EXTERIOR
Wimborne Minster does not occupy a commanding position—it stands on level ground, its two towers are not lofty, the western only reaching the height of 95 feet and the central 84 feet—but it has the advantage of having an extensive churchyard both on the south side and also on the north, so that from either side a good general view of the building may be obtained. A street running from the east end of the church towards the north gives the spectator the advantage of a still more distant standpoint, from which the towers, transepts, choir, and porch group themselves into one harmonious whole, the long line of iron railings bounding the churchyard being the only drawback. The first impression is that there is something wrong with the central tower; the plain heavy battlement, with its four enormous corner pinnacles, seems to overweight the tower, and as each side of the parapet is longer than the side of the tower below, the feeling of top-heaviness is increased. The central tower has no buttresses, but the western has an octagonal buttress at each corner, and these decrease in cross section at each of four string courses; so that this tower seems to taper, and by contrast makes the central tower seem to bulge out at the top more than it really does.
But Wimborne Minster does not stand alone in giving at first sight a feeling that something is wanting to perfect beauty. In nearly every old building which has gradually grown up, been altered and enlarged by various generations, as need arose, each generation working in its own style, and often with little regard to what already existed, incongruities are sure to be discernible. But what is lost in unity of design increases the interest in the building, historically and architecturally regarded. And it is worthy of notice that at Wimborne, more than at many places, the enlargers of the church have contented themselves with adding to the building without removing the work of their predecessors more than was absolutely necessary. A very cursory glance at the exterior of the building as one walks round it is sufficient to show that the church as it stands offers to the student of architecture examples of every style that has prevailed in this country from the twelfth century onward, and he will especially rejoice at seeing so much fourteenth-century work. He will, as he passes along the narrow footway beneath the east end of the choir, regret that more space is not available here to get a good view of the most interesting Early English window. If a small tree were felled, and the wall of a garden or yard on the side of the footpath opposite to the church pulled down, so as to throw open the east end of the choir, it would be a great improvement. But this regret can be endured, as, though the window cannot be well seen, it is there, and by changing one's position a pretty accurate idea of its interesting features can be formed; but far keener is the regret that any lover of antiquity must feel when he notices, as he examines the church more closely, how busy the nineteenth-century restorer has been, how he has raised walls, altered the pitch of roofs, and inserted modern imitations of thirteenth and fourteenth century work, removing features which existed at the beginning of this century to make room for his own work; how he has banished much of the old woodwork in the interior, altered the position of still more, and generally been far less conservative of the work of former generations than the mediæval enlargers of the minster were. However, his work is now done—nave, towers, and choir were thoroughly restored about fifty years ago, and the transepts in 1891. No further work is contemplated at present. In fact, there seems nothing more that could well be done.
The church is built partly of a warm brown sandstone, partly of stone of a pale yellow or drab colour, the two kinds being in many places mixed so as to give the walls a chequered appearance. This may be noticed both outside and inside the building. In some of the walls the stones are used irregularly, in others they are carefully squared. The red stone is to be met with in the neighbourhood: some of that used for raising the transept walls in 1891 was obtained from a bridge in the town that was being rebuilt; and from marks on some of those stones it appeared that before being in the bridge they had been used in some ecclesiastical building, so that they have now returned to their original use. There is little ornament to be seen outside, save on the upper stage of the tower; in fact, the whole building excepting the arches of the nave and the tower may be described as severely plain in character. The college was never wealthy, hence probably it could not employ a number of carvers; then again it was not a monastic establishment, so that there were no monks to occupy their time in the embellishment of the building, carving, as monks often did, their quaint fancies on bosses and capitals. We miss the crockets and finials, the ball-flower, and other ornaments that we meet with in so many fourteenth-century buildings; but the very simplicity of the work gives the church a dignity that is often wanting in more highly ornamented structures. The small number of the buttresses in the body of the church is noteworthy; save at the angles there are only five—namely, two on each nave aisle, and one on the north choir aisle. At each of the eastern corners of the choir aisles the buttresses are set diagonally, as also are those on the northern corners of the north porch. There is a buttress on each of the side walls of the north porch, and two set at right angles to each other at each of the two corners of the north transept, and also at the south-west corner of the south transept; beneath the east window of the choir there is a small one. The buttresses at the corner of the choir project but slightly. The central tower has none, but the west tower has an octagonal buttress at each corner. The central tower attracts notice first. From the outside at the angles a small portion of the plain wall of the triforium stage may be seen, against which the roofs of the choir and transepts abut; the nave roof, however, hides all of this stage at the western face: above this face is a band of red-brown sandstone, and above this the clerestory stage. In each face are two round-headed windows with a pointed blank arch between them. There are six slender shafts to support the outer order of moulding over the two windows and the blank arch, and two of a similar character to support the inner ring of moulding over each window. At each corner of the tower up to the top of this stage runs a slender banded shaft. This stage is finished by a string course, above which the tower walls recede slightly, the walls of the upper or belfry storey being a little thinner than those below. This stage, perfectly plain within, is the most richly-ornamented part of the tower outside: it is the latest Norman work to be found in the minster, and probably may be dated late in the twelfth century. An arcading of intersecting round-headed arches runs all round this storey. Seven pointed arches are thus formed in each face; between these arches stand slender pillars with well carved capitals which show a great variety of design. Five of the seven arches on each face were originally open, save possibly for louvre-boards placed to keep out the rain; now all but the central one on each face are walled up, and the centre one is glazed. This filling up was not all done at the same time, as the varying character of the stone shows. The work was no doubt begun in order to strengthen the walls when the spire was added, and was continued from time to time as the necessity for further strengthening arose. Above the stage was a bold corbel table, and this is the upper limit of the Norman work. There can be little doubt that the Norman builder, here as elsewhere, finished his tower with a low pyramidal roof with overhanging eaves to shoot off the rain. This covering may have been of lead, but possibly of stone tiles or wooden shingles. About a century later this Norman roof was removed to make place for a loftier roof or spire. Of its character and material and height we know nothing—there is no description of it; and though the minster is represented on an old seal with one spire-crowned tower, yet the representation of the rest of the church is so conventional that it cannot be regarded as an authentic record of the actual appearance of the steeple. It is curious that, as it stood for about three hundred years and fell only in the later years of Elizabeth's reign, no drawing remains to show us what this spire was like. But it passed away, doing some damage to the building in its fall, and that is the only record it has left behind; but we can well picture to ourselves how much importance must have been added to the minster by this spire, which must have been a conspicuous object for many miles round. The present heavy, ugly battlemented parapet spoils the general effect of the tower; and though we are adverse to the sweeping away of any features of an old building, even when the features are inharmonious and even ugly—because this is, as it were, tearing a page of stone from the book of the history of the building—yet we must confess we could have regarded the loss of the seventeenth-century parapet and pinnacles with much less regret than other features which the restorer has tampered with.
The North Porch, which was evidently always intended to be, as it is to this day, the chief entrance into the church, consists of two bays marked externally by buttresses on each side: the inner order of moulding to the arch giving access to this porch springs from two shafts of Purbeck marble; the outer orders are carried up from the base without any capitals or imposts. The height of the crown of the inner arch above the capitals from which it springs is somewhat less than half the width at the bottom, and the radius of the curvature of the arches is greater than the width. Over the arch is a square-headed two-light window, lighting the room over the entrance. The roof differs from all the other roofs of the church since it is covered with stone tiles, while the others are covered with lead. There are buttresses set diagonally at the two northern angles of the porch.
Between the porch and the transept are three two-light Decorated windows. The tracery of all these is alike, but differs from that of the two windows to the west of the porch. The most picturesque feature of the north transept is the turret containing the staircase by which access is obtained to the tower. This, before the church was enlarged in the fourteenth century, formed the north-west angle of the Norman transept: projecting towards the north, its base is rectangular. This rectangular portion rises nearly to the level of the tops of the aisle windows, above this level the turret is circular, and rising above the transept roof is capped by a low conical roof of stone tiles. Two string courses run round it, one at the bottom of the circular part, and one a little higher up. This turret was once known as the "Ivy Tower," from the ivy that grew on it, but this was all removed at the time when the transept was altered in 1891. At that time the side walls were raised about two feet, and the roof was raised to the original pitch of the Norman transept, and at the same time the tracery of the north window, which was of a very plain and clumsy character, seventeenth-century work, was removed and the existing tracery inserted. Much picturesqueness has been sacrificed to make these changes. The portion of this transept to the north of the turret was added about the middle of the fourteenth century to form the chantry founded by Bembre, who was dean from 1350-1361. This part contains, besides the large window, two smaller two-light windows, which look out respectively to the east and west. The tracery in these is almost entirely modern. Beyond the transept is the wall of the north choir aisle. This stands farther to the north than the wall of the nave aisle; in fact, it is in a line with the original north end of the Norman transept. In this wall, close to the transept, is a small round-headed doorway. And, farther to the east, is another larger pointed doorway between the second and third windows of the choir aisle, counting from the transept eastward. This doorway is enclosed by a triangular moulding very plain in character, but none of it is original. The three windows are each of two lights. The tracery of these three is alike, but differs from that of the windows in the nave aisle. The east window of the north aisle is of five lights. The enclosing arch is not very pointed—much less so than in the narrower windows of the aisles—and each light runs up through the head of the window. These and the corresponding south choir aisle windows are late Decorated work.
Unfortunately the churchyard does not extend to the east of the church. A narrow footway, bounded to the east by cottages and garden walls, renders it impossible to photograph the east window of the choir. This is a most interesting one; and has been figured in most books on architecture. It consists externally of three lancets enclosed in a peculiar way by weather moulding; this rises separately over the head of each lancet, and between the windows runs in a horizontal line and is continued to the square corner buttresses. Within this moulding, and over the heads of each lancet, there is an opening pierced: the central one is a quatrefoil, while the other two have six points. These openings are a very early example of plate tracery, which was fully developed in the Early Decorated style. This window belongs to the Early English period, and may be dated about 1220. There will be occasion to refer to this window again when speaking of the interior of the church. The south choir aisle has a five-light east window closely corresponding to the window of the north aisle, and on the south two three-light windows. In these, as in the east aisle windows, the lights are carried up through the heads. There is no doorway giving access to this aisle from the outside.
The angle between the choir aisle and south transept is filled up with the vestry and the library above it. The south wall of this projects beyond the wall of the south transept. This vestry is of Decorated date, possibly rather later than the other Decorated work in the minster. The upper storey forms the library. Its walls are finished at the top by a plain parapet which conceals the flat roof. At the south-western angle is an octagonal turret staircase, capped by a pyramidal roof rising from within a battlemented parapet, and terminating in a carved finial. This is of Perpendicular character. From the sharpness of the stone at the coigns it would seem that very extensive restoration, if not absolute rebuilding, of the walls was carried on in this part of the church. The south transept is rather shorter than that on the north side; but, unlike it, all the walls up to the level of the window are of Norman date. The string courses on the western side are worthy of close attention. One which runs under the south window is continued round the Perpendicular buttresses at the south-west angle, and then again joins the original course on the western face and runs to within a few feet of the nave aisle, where it abruptly terminates. Above this for several feet the walls have the same character as below; then the character changes, and this change probably marks the junction of the Norman with the Decorated work, which was added when the Norman chapel, which occupied the lower part of what is now the south end of the transept, was incorporated in the transept. Vertically above the termination of the string course just mentioned, but at a considerably higher level, another string course abruptly begins and runs along the wall, until it passes within the roof of the nave aisle. The south end of this shows the length to which the original Norman transept extended before the walls of the chapel to the south were carried up in the fourteenth century to form the addition to the transept. In the southern wall of this new transept was placed a large five-light decorated window. In this, as in several of the other Decorated windows already described, the lights run up to the enclosing arch above. The tracery of this window, as it now exists, dates back only to the time when the church was restored in the middle of the nineteenth century. Up to 1891 the side walls were about two feet lower than at present, and the gable more obtuse. At the summit of the old gable stood a block of masonry carrying a sundial; this, when the transept was altered, was removed, the new gable being finished with a cross. A pillar was built in the churchyard to the south of the western tower in 1894, and on it the block from the transept bearing the sundial was placed. This sundial has two dates on it—1696 and 1752, marking, no doubt, the year of its original erection and of some subsequent repair. It is noteworthy that the figures used in these two dates differ in character,—the eighteenth-century carver who incised the later date not thinking it incumbent on him to make his figures match those of his predecessor. The three aisle windows between the south transept and the south porch are two-light Decorated windows with tracery, some of it original, corresponding to that of those on the opposite side in the north aisle.
The South Porch is small, and the side walls do not project far from the aisle. Above the arch is a carving of a lamb much weathered, and on the gable stands a fragment of a cross. The gates beneath the outer arch are kept locked save on Sundays, as are frequently the gates in the railings surrounding the churchyard to the south of the minster, which is divided from the churchyard on the north side by the church itself and by railings at the east and west ends of it. To the west of the porch are two more two-light windows, corresponding in character with the windows opposite in the north aisle. The clerestory windows of the nave are of Perpendicular date, fifteenth-century work, and have not any beauty. Each has three foliated lights under a round-headed moulding. Above each of these three there are two lights, all enclosed within a rectangular label. The nave roof is higher than the choir roof. Its aisles have lean-to roofs, whereas the choir aisles are wider and have gable roofs: hence the clerestory windows of the choir, modern lancets, are not visible from the outside.
The Western Tower is of four stages, with octagonal buttresses at each corner, decreasing in cross section at each course. Of these the north-eastern one contains the stairs leading to the top of the tower, the others are solid. These are crowned with sharp pyramidal turrets. In the lowest stage on the western face is a doorway which for some time was stopped up to strengthen the tower, but which was opened again at the general restoration. Above this is the west window of six lights, Perpendicular in character but of nineteenth-century date. The third stage—the ringing room within is lighted by four small windows: that in the west wall is a quatrefoil, those on the north and south have single lights foliated at the head; the original one in the east wall was covered when the nave roof was raised, and a plain opening was made in the wall farther to the south. Above this is the belfry, with two pairs of two-light windows on each face: these are divided by transoms, and the arches at the tops are four centred. These windows are, of course, not glazed, but are furnished with louvre-boards. The tower is finished with a battlemented parapet. Just outside the easternmost window on the north face, and below the transom, stands a figure now dressed in a coat of painted lead, representing a soldier in the uniform of the early part of the nineteenth century. He holds a hammer in each hand, with which he strikes the quarters on two bells beside him. He is known by the name of the "Jackman" or "Quarter Jack." There are no windows at the west ends of the nave aisles; but, as on the south side so on the north, there are between the tower and the porch two two-light Decorated windows in the wall of the aisle.
The level of the churchyards, as in the case with most old burying-grounds, is considerably above the level of the floor of the church. Hence steps have to be descended on entering the porches, and again in passing from the porches into the church. On the south side some levelling of the ground has been done, and the upright head-stones have been laid flat, but the altar tombs have been allowed to remain as they were. There are few trees in the churchyard to impede the view of the building; those there are, are as yet small, and serve only to pleasantly break the bareness of the ground without hiding the architectural features of the building.