Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Norwich / A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See

by C. H. B. Quennell

In 1446, on February 27th, Walter Lyhart, or le Hart, was consecrated, and it is to him that Norwich Cathedral owes the superb lierne vault that now spans the nave. Other important works were carried out by him; the spire which had been blown down in 1362 (and had probably been re-constructed by Bishop Percy—though there is no record of such work), was struck by lightning in 1463, and the burning mass fell through the presbytery roof, which up till this period was still in wood, completely destroying it, and making necessary the vault added by Lyhart's successor.

During this episcopate the rood screen was erected, and a sumptuous monument placed over the grave of the founder.

The stone spire must have been added about this time, replacing the former wooden construction.

Bishop Lyhart left to his successor, Bishop Goldwell, in his will 2200 marks for repairing the dilapidations caused by the fire of 1463. During this bishop's episcopate we find that the cathedral was brought nearly to that state in which we have it now,—the tower was still further adorned with Perpendicular battlements, the presbytery was vaulted in with stone, and the flying-buttresses added around the eastern apse to take the consequent thrust of the new vault.

Internally, also, the lower stages of the presbytery were Perpendicularised by the addition of the four centred arches that still remain, and in the second bay of which, eastward from the tower, on the south side, was erected Bishop Goldwell's altar tomb.

His successor, Lane, occupied the see but a short while, 1499-1500, and in turn was succeeded by Bishop Nykke—he is more generally called Nix (snow), sarcastically, as his character appears to have been of the blackest. During his episcopate, the cathedral was again visited by fire in 1509. The sacristy, with all the books and ornaments, was consumed, and the wooden roofs of both transepts totally destroyed.

Bishop Nykke constructed the stone vaulting that, covering both arms of the church, completed the stone vaulting throughout the cathedral. His chantry, which is on the south side of the nave, and occupies two bays of the aisle, was arranged by him before his death, and its richness is inversely proportionate to the degradation of his character.

The tracery in the Norman arch leading from the south aisle of the presbytery into the transept, is of late Perpendicular style, and was added by Robert of Calton, who was destined to be the last prior but one of Norwich: William Castleton was the last prior and the first dean. Bishop Nykke died in 1535-6, and was succeeded by William Rupgg or Repes, who was the last bishop elected by the chapter of the monks of the Benedictine monastery of Norwich. Monasticism was doomed; Wolsey had fallen, and his property had been confiscated in 1529. The smaller monasteries were dissolved in 1536, and in 1538 the greater shared the same fate, among them Norwich.

Most interesting is the parallel which can be drawn between the history of the Church and of that architecture which she especially fostered. Gothic or Christian art was developed from the remains of a Roman civilisation, and so long as it had the healthy organic growth which was consequent on the evolution of a series of constructive problems fairly faced and in turn conquered, and again, stimulated by the growth of the Church, to which it was handmaiden, developed style after style in regular sequence, until the builders, finding they had conquered construction, took to imposing ornament. From that time, instead of ornamenting construction, they constructed ornament; and as the Reformation came to the Church in the sixteenth century so to architecture came degradation. And then the Renaissance of pagan types, from which the Gothic had derived its being by a rational development, was by the revivalists of those days hotch-potched into a more or less homogeneous mass, which even the genius of Wren could leave but coldly pedantic.

The history of the architecture of the cathedral might safely stop with the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1538, since when it is a mere recapitulation of the doings and undoings of various sets of more or less deeply incriminated fanatics and restorers.