EARLY BRITISH CHURCHES.

In dealing with the introduction of church architecture into our own land, the task would be much simplified if one could state with certainty when the first church was built on British soil. Some historians assert that the Church of England as it is constituted to-day dates no further back than the moment when S. Augustine and his followers landed on the shores of Kent in the year 596, yet one is probably justified in assuming that a church existed in these islands for centuries previous to the arrival of the Roman missionaries. Unfortunately we have no records to guide us as to the date of this earlier settlement, and the name of the first Christian missionary to heathen Britain has still to be discovered. "We see," says the quaint old historian, Thomas Fuller, "the light of the word shined here, but see not who kindled it." The first Christian building of which we have any record was probably that erected at Glastonbury before the year 300, but that this was the first Christian settlement cannot be alleged with certainty.

There are many traditions concerning the introduction of Christianity into Britain, some of which may probably have some bearing on the truth, but the whole subject is involved in considerable obscurity. One of these numerous traditions is to the effect that the British King Caradoc, after being taken prisoner to Rome, was allowed to return, on condition that several members of his family remained as hostages; and whilst serving in this capacity, his mother, son, and daughter are stated to have become converts to Christianity, the doctrines of which faith they spread in their native land on their return thereto. Another tradition is to the effect that S. Paul himself visited Britain and laid the foundation of the Christian faith.

A Rood Screen with a Restoration of the Rood.
Kenn, Devon.
Photograph by Chapman.
Click to [ENLARGE]

We are also told by eminent church historians that the father and grandfather of S. Patrick were Christians, in which case S. Patrick himself would from a very early age have been brought up in the tenets of their faith. He is said to have been seized by pirates in the Clyde and taken to the north of Ireland, and eventually to Gaul. He was subsequently restored to his friends, whom he wished to convert to the Christian faith, and for this purpose his father sent him to be taught in the schools of Tours, Auxerre and Lerins. Eventually he was consecrated Bishop of the Irish and organized an efficient ecclesiastical system in Ireland.

Before the coming of the Anglo-Saxons the church seems to have established a firm hold on the people, who held tenaciously to their possessions, both secular and religious, which were only wrested from them after a severe struggle. Their enthusiastic love of Christianity led them to make a heroic defence of the churches, rather than see them fall into the hands of the heathen Anglo-Saxons. The historian Bede tells us that all their buildings were destroyed, the priests' blood was spilt upon the altars, prelates and people were slain with the sword, and all the cities and churches were burnt to the ground. When all was lost and there was no longer a church or home to defend, the Britons retired to the country of their fellow-Christians, the secluded and almost impenetrable hills and forests of the west. The Anglo-Saxon love of gold was quickly recognised by the people of West Wales who saved their property and bought the right of worshipping after the manner of their fathers by the payment of an annual tribute to their conquerors.

So ruthlessly indeed did the Anglo-Saxons rase to the ground the early churches, that, until a few years ago, but few traces of these early buildings were thought to exist. Church of
S. Piran, Perranporth. An accidental discovery, however, in the year 1835, brought to light an undoubted relic of an early British church in the west, this being the remains of a little church which had been until the date above mentioned completely buried in the sand on the sea coast near Perranporth in Cornwall. They are thought by ecclesiologists to be the remains of the original church erected to the memory of S. Piran, a Cornish missionary and a friend of S. Patrick, who was buried within its walls before the year 500 A.D. On removing the sand, the accumulated deposit of centuries, the church was found to have consisted of a nave and chancel containing a stone altar.

The Church of S. Martin, Canterbury.
Click to [ENLARGE]

The building measured 29 feet in length, 161⁄3 feet in width and 19 feet from the floor to the roof, and probably shares with S. Mary's Church in Dover Castle, and S. Martin's, Canterbury, the honour of being one of the earliest links we possess with the ancient British Church. S. Mary's, Dover, appears to have been built of Roman bricks and cement, a combination which antiquaries consider is found only in those buildings which were erected during the Roman occupation.S. Martin's, Canterbury. S. Martin's Church, Canterbury has many claims to be considered one of our most interesting churches, no less on account of its associations than for its structural interest. The date of its building has been a source of endless controversy, as it contains many features attributable to either Roman or Saxon architecture. It is thought that it may possibly have been used for worship by the Christian soldiers of the Roman army. Be this as it may, it is established beyond doubt that it was the oratory of Queen Bertha, the first English Christian queen, who here worshipped, with her chaplain Liudhard, long before the advent of S. Augustine, who himself in later times preached here; and within the walls of this cradle of English Christianity, Ethelbert, King of Kent, the husband of Queen Bertha was baptized. The Venerable Bede, writing within a hundred years of the death of S. Augustine states that there was in 597 A.D. in Canterbury, a church "dedicated to the honour of S. Martin and built while the Romans still occupied Britain." On the departure of the Romans it is probable that the church was still used by a small band of Christian worshippers until the heathen Jutes overran the Isle of Thanet in 449.

Little is known of the progress of Christianity on this island from that date until the landing of S. Augustine in 597, and the first fruits of his mission, as we have seen, was the conversion and baptism of King Ethelbert. As one would naturally expect, the aspect of the structure to-day, though suggestive of antiquity, is lacking in uniformity of treatment. The brick courses in the nave are at irregular intervals, varying from nine to twenty inches apart, the spaces being filled with Kentish rag-stone and occasional blocks of chalk. The chancel extends eighteen or twenty feet east of the arch and is composed of Roman bricks, evenly laid and averaging four bricks to a foot. The chancel was lengthened at the beginning of the thirteenth century and again at a more recent date, so that its architecture to-day is of three distinct periods. Outside may be seen five flat pilaster buttresses and one semi-circular one, a square-headed Roman doorway, a Saxon doorway and two Early English porches; and there is also a nearly circular panel on the south side of the nave, and a Norman squint at the west end. There are many other features of interest which bear evidences of a great antiquity, and the only question which is seriously disputed is whether the earliest portion of the present nave was built about the end of the Roman occupation of Britain or during the mission of S. Augustine.

An Ancient Window built with Roman Brickwork.
Swanscombe, Kent.
Photograph Mr. G. H. Smith.
Click to [ENLARGE]

The Rev. Charles F. Routledge, M.A., F.S.A., Hon. Canon of Canterbury Cathedral, writes: "Whatever may finally be determined to be the date of the church's foundation, it can never lose its unique association with S. Augustine, King Ethelbert and Queen Bertha, nor its undisputed claim to be the oldest existing church in England. From it flowed the tiny spring of English Christianity, which has since widened out into a mighty river, and penetrated the remotest parts of the civilized and uncivilized world."

Among other churches which show signs of having been built during the Roman occupation are those ofOther Early Churches. Reculver, Richborough and Lyminge, while the foundations of an undoubted early church have been discovered in the old Roman city of Silchester, in Hampshire. See [frontispiece.] The old church at Reculver stood originally within the Roman castrum, the fortress which guarded the northern mouth of the Wantsume, now a small stream, but once an arm of the sea dividing the Isle of Thanet from the mainland. The greater part of this church was pulled down in 1809, but the western towers, known as "the sisters" were repaired by Trinity House, as they constitute a useful landmark for mariners, being visible at a great distance.

Reculver church was built about A.D. 670, and from the existing walls and foundations it is clear that its plan was basilican. The church is now a ruin, but some stone pillars which supported the arches are preserved in the Cathedral Close at Canterbury.

As Reculver guarded the northern mouth of the watercourse, so Richborough protected the south, and here traces of a chapel in the form of a cross are plainly discernible amongst ruins known to be of Roman workmanship. The old church at Lyminge in the same county is thus described by Canon Jenkyns, in his "History of Lyminge":—"The Roman foundations discoverable at the south-east angle of the chancel, together with the remarkable half-arch that intervenes, marked the site of the aquilonalis porticus—the title of basilica already given to it in the seventh century establishes its claim to great antiquity."

We thus see that although remains of the actual buildings in which the British Christians worshipped are few in number, yet enough are left us to prove conclusively that there was a very active and zealous Christian community established in these islands during at least the period immediately preceding that in which Rome withdrew her legions from Britain in order to defend Italy against the Goths, and abandoned our island to the mercy of her foes.

CHAPTER II