“He [Halderston] built the eastern gable from the foundations, along with its arch [arcuali voltâ].” As Lord Bute remarks—“This must mean only the east window, the greater part of the east wall being of transition work” (see Figs. 443-444.) “He adorned pleasingly the hinder vestry [revestiarium] with the reliques and other restorations and cases [clausaris] at considerable expense.”
Lord Bute thinks that “the revestiarium is evidently the east end of the church behind the high altar, sometimes wrongly called the Lady Chapel,” and refers for the use of this term to the contemporary accounts of the death of the Red Comyn, in which he is sometimes stated to have been dragged by the friars into the vestry, and sometimes behind the altar, thus showing the space behind the altar to have been the vestry.
“He laid with a pleasing pavement the whole space not only of the choir, but also of the transept [transversarum capellarum] of the church, along with both sides [lateribus sive panis] of the cloister, and also the outer chapter house [inferius capitulum]. He rebuilt, as it were, from the foundations the fair and remarkable palace within the court of the prior’s lodging, along with the handsome [decentoribus] oratory and chamber which are there situated; and likewise domestic manor-houses in their [or his ‘suis’] ‘locaperhendinalia’ [places where he might occasionally have to stay, perendie = the day after to-morrow], such as Ballon, Segy, and Kynmoth.”
The following note on the above passage is subjoined by Lord Bute:—
“Bower states (pp. 368-369) that Prior John of Haddington, who sat 1263-1304, ‘made the great chamber which is situated in the east part of the monastery, beside the burying-ground;’ that Prior John of Forfar (1313-1321) ‘built the new chamber adjoining the cloister, which the priors have usually had, and which Prior William of Lothian (1340-1354) afterwards enclosed on every side with a very strong wall;’ also, that William of Lothian roofed ‘the eastern chamber’ at great expense.” Lord Bute goes on to say—“My impression is, that the ‘new chamber’ is that afterwards called the senzie chamber; several priors and bishops are mentioned as having died ‘in the prior’s chamber,’ but that Halderston rebuilt the eastern chamber, erecting a fine house there, and also rebuilding some rather decayed old oratory on a finer scale [decentiori]. He was the first who obtained for the priors the use of the pastoral insignia—viz., the mitre, staff, and ring. ‘He strikingly increased for their glory the pomp of divine service, at the celebration of the mass of our lady in her chapel. [Probably it was the custom for the priors to sing or say it on certain days, or every day].... In his days the Lord William Bower, vicar of St. Andrews, completed the altar of [Christ] crucified in the nave of the church, adorned with its permanent [solido] throne and sumptuous figures; and likewise William of Ballochy, his sub-prior, with the desire of the said prior, completed in a very beautiful and comely manner the space of the dormitory at the sides and the other pavements.’”
With regard to the work of William Bower, Lord Bute says:—
“I only know of one other instance of a permanent stone gallery of one arch crossing the nave; this is at Frankfort, and I got there an architectural work on it. At Frankfort, the imperial throne stood upon it as the Commissioner’s throne used to stand in St. Giles’, Edinburgh, before it was all pulled down a few years ago; the throne of the King of France on the rood loft at Rheims, &c. &c. But this throne was not permanent. I believe that at St. Andrews there was this single span arch, bearing a platform, upon which was a great canopy (as in St. Giles’), and under the canopy the royal throne, looking eastwards, and the altar of the crucifix back to back with it (as with the imperial throne and domestic altar in the gallery at Aachen). In the rood loft at Rheims the king’s domestic altar was not back to back with the throne, but at the south end of the gallery at his right hand. Above the roof of the baldaquin or canopy (at St. Andrews), over the throne and altar, I imagine the great rood, with a multitude of ‘sumptuous figures,’ to have towered up towards the roof.”
From the above quotations from Bower, and Lord Bute’s remarks thereon, attention is drawn to a number of interesting points connected with the cathedral and priory, and the names and dates of the priors to whom certain parts of the structure are due. We gather from them—
1. That the Lady Chapel was situated on the north side of the choir.
2. That the nave was, to a large extent, rebuilt and roofed by Prior James Bisset, about the beginning of the fifteenth century, but remained an “empty synagogue” till completed and furnished with glazed windows, altars, and decorations by his successor, Prior Halderston.