FIG. 173. UPPER CLOISTER, ST HONORAT, DETAILS.
The chapel was probably part of the original design, and was restored in the fourteenth century. We read that in 1342, the Abbot Geoffrey had the “choir” constructed in Toulon. This no doubt refers to a wooden gallery or stalls, which were then fitted up, but have now entirely disappeared.
The western portion of the castle was divided in the centre by a wall running east and west. The northern division seems to have contained the kitchen, and the other half the original refectory. The stone sink still exists in the kitchen window to the north. The windows looking to the west are small and high, the sill being stepped up. The upper floors in this wing would contain the dormitories, being provided with fireplaces and garderobes in the walls. But this part of the building was much altered in the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries, and Mérimée mentions that when he visited the Island in 1834, the place was divided up into small rooms with plaster partitions, and, he adds, “some of the chambers are still painted in the style of the eighteenth century, several of the panels over the doors representing shepherds and shepherdesses in the style of Van Loo, decorations one would scarcely look for amongst the monks.”
At a period subsequent to the original erection of the castle, the angle contained between the southern projection and the main building was enclosed with a wall and added to the structure. The walls of this addition are much thinner than the old ones, being only about 4 feet, while those of the original castle are from 8 to 10 feet thick. That this portion is an addition is evident from the style of the masonry of the old southern wall, which is visible in the interior of the extension, and corresponds with the rough ashlar of the exterior walls generally (see [Fig. 174], right side).
The principal floor of this addition, entering off the lower cloister, was used as the refectory ([Fig. 174]). It is 47 feet long by 16 feet wide, and is roofed with a round tunnel vault strengthened with transverse ribs. This structure must belong to a comparatively late period—probably the fifteenth century—but it is noteworthy that the old Provençal style of tunnel vaulting, strengthened with transverse ribs, having a simple ovalo for the string course or impost, and “cut off” corbels, is still maintained.
FIG. 174. REFECTORY, CASTLE OF ST HONORAT.
The custom of reading to the monks during meals by one of their number was evidently observed here, from the semi-circular recess or pulpit, raised a few steps above the floor, which is formed in the wall at the north-east angle.
The basement of this addition may have been used as cellars and stores, and was reached by a wheel stair in the thickness of the wall. The upper floor (now destroyed) was the library, which contained a large number of valuable MSS., now dispersed and lost.