Fig. 11. Patrington, Yorkshire: north side of chancel and vestry.

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Other Nottinghamshire chancels, the probable date of which is 1330–40, are Arnold (much rebuilt), Car Colston, and Woodborough. A certain number of chancels in Leicestershire, such as that of East Langton, approximate to the type, without actually reproducing it; but at Cotterstock, in Northamptonshire, where John Giffard, canon of York, founded a college of chantry priests in 1337, its familiar features reappear. It reached the diocese of Lichfield—or, at any rate, Derbyshire—rather later than the period of its general diffusion in the dioceses of York and Lincoln. The chancel of Sandiacre belongs to the decade between 1330 and 1340: Dronfield, which, in proportions and parapet and pinnacle-work, is closely akin to Sandiacre, is later than 1340; Norbury and the handsome chancel of Tideswell are later still, probably 1350–60. The chantry college of Chaddesden, founded in 1355, adds another church, with a smaller and less ambitious chancel, to the group. In the north-western part of Lichfield diocese, the fine vaulted chancel of the collegiate church of Nantwich (1327–33) is probably independent of the general type. There can be no mistake, however, about Halsall in south Lancashire. Here the date, although the later window tracery seems to contradict it, appears to be at latest 1340–50; and the likeness of the internal arrangements to those of the north Yorkshire churches is quite remarkable. In a few instances, the type persisted till much later. The chancel at Claypole, near Newark, was rebuilt about 1400: the fourteenth century nave has a noticeable affinity, in the sculpture of its capitals, to the nave of Patrington. Between 1380 and 1400, the chancel of Burneston, in north Yorkshire, shews distinct traces of the influence of Patrick Brompton and the other neighbouring buildings already mentioned. Burneston, Patrick Brompton, and Croft, were all connected with St Mary’s abbey at York. The convent, as rector of Burneston, may have been responsible for the chancel, when the whole church was rebuilt. But it must be repeated that the spread of architecture in parish churches is due to local piety rather than to the desire of religious houses to found churches in places from which they derived their income. The founder of the chancel of Heckington was not the impropriating abbey of Bardney, but a well-to-do king’s clerk, who was presented to the vicarage by Edward II during a voidance of the abbey. Further, the spread of this particular type of chancel cannot be referred to St Mary’s abbey or any other monastery, but to the growth of a school of lay masoncraft which learned its earliest lessons among the new buildings of St Mary’s abbey and York minster. As we should expect in a period which was so fruitful in good work, isolated types of almost equal beauty, the result of original local skill, constantly make their appearance. Such are the chancels of North Luffenham in Rutland, or of Hodgeston in Pembrokeshire—the latter, no doubt, one of the fruits of that movement in the diocese of St David’s, to which bishop Henry Gower (1328–47) gave a powerful impulse.

§ 42. The aisleless chancel survived as a favourite feature of the plan all through the middle ages. The aisled nave, with the deep aisleless chancel beyond, is beautiful in plan and elevation alike; and hardly any of the great Norfolk churches is so satisfactory in effect as the fourteenth century church at Tunstead, or the great fifteenth century church of Walpole St Peter, where the rebuilding of the chancel followed that of the nave. The wealthy lay folk of East Anglia naturally took charge of the repair of the nave as their own part of the church. The rectors, monastic or otherwise, were less active about the chancel. The result is that the uniform magnificence of Walpole St Peter is by no means found everywhere. The small vaulted thirteenth century chancel at Blakeney in north-east Norfolk, is quite out of proportion to the large fifteenth century nave and west tower. The magnificent church of Sall, near Aylsham, was entirely rebuilt in the fifteenth century; but the proportions of the chancel are very modest compared with the gigantic nave. Lavenham in Suffolk has one of the most ornate naves of the later part of the fifteenth century, and a tower of great height. The fourteenth century chancel, however, was kept, and, although chapels were added to it on the north and south, the eastern bay is insignificant in proportion and rough in masonry when contrasted with the nave. A similar disparity, not of style but of design, exists between the nave and tower of Stoke-by-Nayland and the less carefully rebuilt chancel. The rebuilding of a chancel may occasionally indicate that monastic impropriators neglected their duties, until they were compelled to repair. The hastily rebuilt chancel at Harringworth in Northamptonshire, where Elstow abbey was rector, is in striking contrast to the earlier nave, and may perhaps be explained in this way. Croyland abbey had to attend to its duties at Wellingborough in 1383, and the present aisled chancel is the result. At Walpole St Peter the church was evidently lengthened eastwards. The parishioners were probably allowed to pull down the old chancel when they built their new nave, and to encroach on its site: they naturally would contribute towards the new chancel, and this may account for the unusual splendour of the whole design.

Fig. 12. Walpole St Peter: from N.E.