Norman Piers in Crypt
Roger seems at once to have commenced the reproduction at York of this great work, by substituting for the short simple chancel of the Minster a complex eastern building which, making due allowance for its want of equal dimensions with Canterbury choir, was yet evidently planned on the same system, with the aisles square ended instead of apsidal, and the flanking towers made to perform the part of eastern transepts. Of this choir, portions only of the crypt still survive. The base of the beautiful western entrance doorway to the north aisle can still be seen by adventurous explorers. The ordinary visitor can still admire the substantial and elaborately incised columns, which once supported the floor of the choir above, and see the arches, with the bold zigzag mouldings, which once rested on them, but which were removed in the days of Edward I. to support a stone platform behind the high altar, on which was erected the shrine of William Fitzherbert, then canonised as “St. William of York,” to provide for the northern province a counter-attraction to St. Thomas of Canterbury. If the arches were replaced on the piers the pavement of the choir would be 15½ feet above the pavement of the crypt, within 6 inches of that of Canterbury, and if the present nave floor were reduced 4 feet to its original level, the respective levels of the nave, crypt, and choir at York and Canterbury would be the same. No doubt the arrangement of the different flights of steps from the nave to the choir and to the crypt, broken in the centre aisle with a broad landing which still remains at Canterbury, was followed at York. But all this has passed away, and the feature of the “glorious choir” of Roger can now only be realised from the conjectures of the archæologist or the dreams of the antiquary.
But there were munificent laymen as well as ecclesiastics in those days, for Lord William de Percy gave the church of Topcliffe, with all things pertaining, to the church of St. Peter at York, as a perpetual alms for the repairing and building thereof, a gift which still remains in the possession of the Dean and Chapter; and he and his successors continued to assist the development of the Cathedral with munificent contributions of wood until the completion of the nave, when his statue was placed, to commemorate his liberality, above the west door, on the right hand of Archbishop Melton, the Metropolitan at that time. On his left stands another figure commemorating equally liberal benefactors: Mauger le Vavasour, who gave a grant of free way for the stone required for the foundation of the Minster by Archbishop Thomas; his son, Robert le Vavasour, also gave 10 acres and half a rood of his quarry in Thievesdale in free, pure and perpetual alms; and their descendants, in like manner, presented almost all the material required for the present buildings, even as late as the great fire in 1829, when Sir Edward Vavasour, although a Roman Catholic, at once placed his quarries at the service of the Dean and Chapter for the restoration of the choir.
Fancy would fain idealise the choir of Roger, which has passed away, for the superstructure to such substantial and dignified masonry as still remains must have been solemn and imposing. Professor Willis suggests a choir the floor of which was raised 15 feet above the floor of the nave, and transepts with eastern towers approached by flights of steps such as still exist at Canterbury, but the learned professor had few reliable data for his conjectures, and it must remain a conjecture usque ad finem. Geoffrey Plantagenet, who succeeded Roger, had not the opportunity, even if he had the will and capacity, to extend the buildings of the Minster. The youngest child of fair Rosamond, the lawful wife, historians now tell us, of Henry II., he was at least a loving son. On his breast his father died, to him the King gave his royal ring, and on his head with his last dying breath he invoked the blessing of heaven. But if his dutiful conduct caused the warm-hearted members of the Chapter to elect their Treasurer Archbishop, it did not conciliate either of his half-brothers, Richard and John. Sixteen years of incessant discord ensued, and then he gave place to one more capable of his position, Walter de Gray. But the Chapter did not at first think so. He was not one of themselves; they knew little of the Bishop of Worcester, and what they knew they disliked. He was, in their eyes, an illiterate person. Simon de Langton was more to their mind. But Walter de Gray was King John's friend, and John was not a man to be thwarted. He meant him to be Archbishop, and his representatives persuaded Pope Innocent III. to overrule the election of the Chapter. At least, he was a man of pure life, they said. “Per sanctum Petrum,” replied the Pope, “virginitas magna est virtus, et nos eum damus vobis.”
And certainly posterity has had no reason to regret his decision. The glorious early English transepts and tower are believed to have been his conception, vast beyond anything which had been erected in those days, and, as the late Mr. Street has often told me, after all his experiences on the Continent, unsurpassed in Christendom. Walter de Gray, at least, completed the south transept, “in boldness of arrangement and design, and in richness of decoration without a peer.” And there his body rests in the grave which received all that was mortal of him on the vigil of Pentecost, 1255, still surmounted with the effigy of the great man in full canonicals carved in Purbeck marble, under a comely canopy resting on ten light and graceful pillars, hidden, alas! by a crude and modern screen of iron, the well-intentioned addition of Archbishop Markham some eighty years ago.
South Transept and Founder's Tomb
And Providence had associated with Walter de Gray one worthy of such a fellowship, John le Romain, the treasurer of the church, an Italian ecclesiastic who, tradition says, smitten with the charms of some dark-eyed beauty of the South gladly associated himself with the clergy of the Church where celibacy, at that day at least, was not de rigueur. He it was who completed the great work his superior had commenced, raised, at his own expense, the great tower, built the north transept, designed “the Five Sisters,” and filled it with the exquisite grisaille geometrical glass, which has been the admiration of successive generations for six hundred years. How much Walter de Grey laid out in the erection of the transepts I cannot say: I only know that the South Transept cost £23,000 to restore fifteen years ago. In addition to his work on the material fabric of the Minster, Archbishop Walter de Grey achieved that which had a substantial influence on its progress to its completion. Archbishop Roger had initiated the great work, but had died in his bed, and his influence had died with him. Thomas à Becket, his successor as Archdeacon of Canterbury, had also advanced to the dignity of the archiepiscopate, but he had fallen a victim to his zeal for the Church spiritual, and his martyrdom and canonisation had entailed a shrine in the Cathedral which was eliciting from innumerable pilgrims munificent offerings for the fabric of the church. If York were to compete with Canterbury it was necessary that here, too, a shrine of some popular saint should attract the presence of the devout, and appeal to their munificence and liberality. This also Walter de Grey, supported as he was by the king, was able to accomplish, and in compliance with a petition from the Archbishop and Dean and Chapter, Pope Honorius, on March 18th, 1226, issued a letter, “tied with thread of silk and a Bull,” to the effect that the name of William (Fitzherbert) of holy memory, formerly Archbishop of York, nominated by them for this honour, the predecessor of Archbishop Roger, was “inscribed in the catalogue of the Saints of the Church Militant.”
Little, however, seems to have been done during the archiepiscopates of Sewell de Bovell, Geoffry de Ludham and Walter Gifford.