PLAN OF MARKET CROSS
The Market Cross at Chichester (Figs. [11], [161-163]) was built shortly before 1500 by Bishop Edward Storey, who endowed it with an estate at Amberley, Sussex, producing a yearly rental of £25, that the means for keeping the cross in constant repair might be assured. It is octagonal on plan, its eight arches all open to the ground. This is much the most elaborately ornamented of the crosses of its class. The flying buttresses (unlike those of Malmesbury cross) are crocketed at intervals all the way along their ogee course; and the side walls above the arches are richly panelled. Splendid though Chichester cross is still, it has been shamefully disfigured by incongruous innovations intruding upon the original design. It was probably at the "restoration," under Charles II., that the bust of Charles I. was set up in an oval recess, inserted in the place of one of the niches of the parapet. The clock above was fixed in 1724. Again the cross suffered excessive repair, and further alterations in 1746.
In the case of the market crosses of Chichester and Malmesbury the ring of pinnacles and the flying buttresses, converging upon the central shaft, itself culminating in a sculptured lantern, resemble in general effect the crown steeples of King's College, Aberdeen, and of the collegiate church of St Giles at Edinburgh. But there is a difference. In the Scottish instances the lantern is structurally upheld by the combined thrust of the flying buttresses, without vertical support. In the English market crosses, on the contrary, the shaft, rising from the floor and passing right up through the roof, sustains the lantern from directly underneath.
Salisbury Poultry Cross (Figs. [159], [160]) must originally have been constructed in the same way, but, some time before May 1789 (see illustration in Archæologia, Vol. IX., p. 373) the whole of the original superstructure above the roof had perished. The pinnacles, flying buttresses, and lantern, which now crown the roof, are only a modern restoration, albeit a very excellent one. The plan of the Poultry Cross is hexagonal. In addition to this cross there are known to have existed at one time in Salisbury the Cheese Cross, Bernard's Cross, and that before the west door of the cathedral. One of the number was erected by Lawrence de St Martino, as a penance enjoined before September 1388, by Bishop Radulph Ergham because Lawrence, who was infected with Lollardism, had been guilty of flagrant irreverence toward the Blessed Sacrament. To complete his penance he was required to come and kneel in the open air, barefoot and bareheaded, before the said cross every Saturday for the rest of his life. A record of his offence and of its punishment was to be inscribed upon the cross itself, and, assuming this penance cross to be the actually existing market cross, it has been conjectured that the six panelled sides of its central pillar bore the required text. But the identity is very doubtful, more especially as 1388 seems too early a date, by some hundred years, for the Poultry Cross.
The old Market Cross at Glastonbury (Fig. [164]) has unfortunately disappeared. The shelter was octagonal and gabled. But the singular feature of the design was that the gables, instead of surmounting the arched openings, were placed over the spandrels and the piers between the arches. Conformably, then, with the canted plan of the structure, the face of each gable was returned at an angle from its central vertical line, a simple but quite unusual device, which produced a remarkably quaint and original effect. The picturesqueness was enhanced by the presence hard by of a water conduit, which grouped charmingly with the more imposing structure of the market cross. Both, however, becoming dilapidated through neglect, were demolished in 1808.
At Norwich (Fig. [153]) the first market cross was erected in the time of Edward III. (1327-37). It is known to have been repaired in the reign of Henry IV. (1399-1413). The structure must have been of considerable size, since it contained a chapel and four shops. Becoming decayed, it was pulled down in 1501, and rebuilt, the new cross being finished in 1503. Like its predecessor, it contained an oratory or chapel. It was octagonal, raised on steps, and appears to have been originally an instance, on a large scale, of a spire-shaped cross with an entrance on the west side between two vices leading to the upper storeys. In the seventeenth century, apparently, the cross was surrounded by sixteen pillars, i.e., eight large and eight intermediate pillars of slenderer size, to support a flat leaded roof for the shelter of the market people—an addition which totally altered the aspect of the original spire-shaped cross. Meanwhile, in the first year of Edward VI., the crucifixes which had adorned the cross were taken down by order of the King's visitors. The standard weights and measures of the city used to be kept in the market cross. The oratory in it was let in 1574 to the company of workers in leather. In 1646 the cross was repaired by means of a graduated tax, levied on all the citizens in proportion to their means. In 1646, also, the floor of the cross was paved. In 1664 it was appointed for the Court of Guard, and in 1672 was "beautified and adorned" according to the fashion of the day. Just sixty years afterwards the cross was again alleged to be in decay, its materials were sold and the whole cross swept away, the demolition beginning in August 1732.
164. GLASTONBURY, SOMERSETSHIRE
MARKET CROSS
