Scottish Cathedrals and Abbeys

by Dugald Butler

Besides the Church of St. Regulus, there are still to be seen the ruins of the great Cathedral of St. Andrews, which consisted of a short aisleless presbytery, and choir of five bays with side aisles, with an eastern chapel in each aisle; north and south transepts, each of three bays with eastern aisles; nave of twelve bays with north and south aisles, and a large central tower over the crossing. The interior dimensions were—total length, 355 feet; width of nave, 63 feet; length of transepts, 167 feet 6 inches; width, 43 feet 2 inches. The older parts of the Cathedral exhibit traces of the transition from the Norman architecture, but the principal parts of the structure have been carried out in the First Pointed style.[42]

The Cathedral Church was also the Conventual Church of the Austin-canons, and the Bishop was ex officio prior of the monastery. Of the conventual buildings erected by Bishop Robert nothing remains.

The Cathedral was erected from east to west in about 115 years.[43] The work was commenced by Bishop Arnold in 1161, was continued by eleven successive bishops, and was consecrated by Bishop Lamberton in 1318. During its progress in 1276, the eastern end was greatly injured by a violent tempest, and in 1378 the Cathedral suffered from fire, which according to Wyntoun destroyed the south half of the nave from the west end, and eastward to and including the ninth pillar. The restoration was begun at once by Bishop Landel (1341-1385), and completed in the time of Bishop Wardlaw (1404-1440), who in 1430 improved the interior by the introduction of fine pavements in the choir, transept, and nave, and by filling the nave with stained glass and building a large window in the eastern gable. The south wall of the nave extends considerably westwards beyond the present west end, and contains the remains of a vaulting shaft, leading to the inference that the Cathedral was originally of greater length than it now is by at least 34 feet. The north wall of nave also projects westwards about 7 feet. There is a difficulty in connection with the west front, and it is regarded by competent authorities that this wall was not part of a western porch, but "indicates that there has been a change in the design, and that the original intention of having a wide porch extending along the whole of the west end has been departed from after the first story was built up to the level of the above string course, all above that point being of later design and execution."[44]

The early chapter-house was 26 feet square, and was vaulted with four central pillars. It opened to the cloisters, and the doorway is pronounced to be in the purest style of early pointed architecture.[45] Bishop Lamberton (1298-1328) erected a new chapter-house, and the old one was made a vestibule to the new. South of the early chapter-house was probably the fratery; on the upper floor of this building and the chapter-house was the dormitory—a wheel-stair leading to it from the south transept. On the west side of the cloister was the sub-prior's house, known also as Senzie House; south-east of the fratery is the prior's house or Hospitium Vetus, which was sometimes the residence of the bishop. West of the cathedral are the remains of the entrance gateway, called the "Pends," and in continuation of the "Pends" was the enclosing wall of the priory grounds, containing sixteen towers. The Guest-House was within the precinct of St. Leonard's College, and was built about the middle of the thirteenth century.[46] Within the precincts of the Priory-grounds were the various offices connected with the great ecclesiastical establishment.

The conventual and other buildings attached to the Cathedral have been recently excavated at the expense of the late Marquis of Bute, and considerable remains of the foundations disclosed to view. The ruins of the castle stand on a rocky promontory, overhanging the sea, N.N.W. of the Cathedral; and between the Cathedral-wall on the N.E. and the sea are the foundations of a chapel dedicated to the Virgin.

In 1559 the Cathedral was attacked by the mob and greatly destroyed. Time and weather helped to complete the work of destruction; the Protestant Archbishop Spottiswoode in 1635 strove to make provision for its restoration, but nothing appears to have been done to arrest the work of destruction. The Barons of Exchequer in 1826 took possession of the ruins, had the rubbish cleared away, and what remained of the great building strengthened. The pier-bases have been made visible, and the outline of the building marked on the turf. St. Andrews has been associated with most of the stirring events in Scottish Church history, and will always possess its two great voices of the Cathedral and the Sea.

2. Diocese of Glasgow

Towards the end of the fourth century, St. Ninian, a Christian missionary trained at Rome in the doctrine and discipline of the Western Church, is said to have established a religious cell on the banks of the Molendinar. How long he remained there is uncertain, but his labours are chiefly centred around the Candida Casa at Whithorn and among the southern Picts, whose district, according to Bede, he evangelised. With St. Ninian's departure, the district around the Molendinar relapsed into barbarism, and the only remaining monument of his work was a cemetery which he was reputed to have consecrated. The next historical reference to Glasgow is in connection with St. Kentigern, or, as he was popularly known, St. Mungo, about the middle of the sixth century. He was of royal descent, and was born in 518 or 527. His biographer, Joceline, states that he was adopted and educated by St. Servanus or St. Serf, who lived at Culross, and by him was named "Munghu," i.e. dearest friend. But this must be a mistake, for Servanus lived two centuries after Kentigern's time;[47] if it is correct, there must have been an earlier and a later St. Serf. On attaining his twenty-fifth year, according to Joceline, he proceeded to Carnock, where lived a holy man named Fergus. After he reached the abode of Fergus, the good man said his "nunc dimittis" and died; and Kentigern, placing his body on a wain drawn by two bulls, took his departure, praying to be guided to the place which might be appointed for burial. The place where the wain stopped was Cathures, afterwards called Glasgow, where St. Ninian had consecrated a cemetery, and here Fergus was buried. Such is Joceline's account of Kentigern's first connection with Glasgow. The king and people of the district pressed him to remain as their bishop, and he consented, establishing his see at Cathures and founding a lay society of the servants of God, and fixing his own abode on the banks of the Molendinar. After some years of austerity and beneficence there, he was driven from his work by the persecutions of an apostate prince and settled in the vale of Clwyd, North Wales, where he founded a monastery. After a time he returned to Glasgow, at the solicitation of the King of Cumbria, and appointed St. Asaph as his successor in Wales. In a martyrology ascribed to the year 875 Kentigern appears as "bishop of Glasgow and confessor."[48] While resident at Glasgow, St. Kentigern was visited by St. Columba, his distinguished contemporary and the apostle of the Picts, who presented him with a crozier, which, Fordun says, was afterwards preserved in St. Wilfrid's Church at Ripon. Bishop Forbes describes the meeting of the two great men "as one of those incidents which we wish to be true, and which we have no certainty for believing not to be so."[49] St. Kentigern died in 603 or 614, and was buried in Glasgow, which is still known as the city of St. Mungo—Mungo being his name of honour or affection. Everything connected with St. Mungo's early church, of wood and wattles or of stone, on the banks of the Molendinar, is shrouded in the mists of antiquity until the first quarter of the twelfth century, when David, Prince and Earl of Cumbria, the youngest son of Queen Margaret, took measures to reconstruct the see and recover its property. Of Glasgow during the Culdee period nothing can be definitely known. The result of Prince David's inquest is contained in the Register of the Bishopric,[50] and it sets forth that Prince David, from love to God and by the exhortation of the Bishop, having caused inquiry to be made concerning the lands belonging to the church in Cumbria, had ascertained that they belonged to the church of Glasgow, and restored them. These lands extended from the Clyde on the north to the Solway and English March on the south, from the western boundary of Lothian on the east to the river Urr on the west, including Teviotdale, and comprehended what afterwards formed the site of the city of Glasgow.[51] The building of the cathedral would appear to have been begun before David succeeded to the throne in 1124, and he appointed his tutor John (called Achaius) to the bishopric. In 1136 the church, which was probably chiefly of wood, was dedicated, and King David endowed it further with lands, tithes, and churches. The church of Achaius was destroyed by fire, but through the exertions of Bishop Joceline a society was founded to collect funds for its restoration, and the work was sufficiently advanced for its consecration on 6th July 1197.[52] Although built at different dates, the building has a very homogeneous appearance, and might be mistaken for a building of one period. Under competent guidance,[53] we now propose to give a short sketch of the cathedral itself.

The first attempt to erect a cathedral was made by Bishop Achaius, whose episcopate extended from 1115 to 1147, and Mr. Honeyman regards the portion of the lower church at the south-west angle as the most ancient part of the structure. He holds that the church built by Achaius was restored by Bishop Joceline (1175-1199) at the end of the twelfth century, and that the above portion formed a chapel, and was part of that restoration. The strongest argument is its nearness to the tomb of the patron saint. If we assume that the old choir terminated in a semicircular apse, projecting eastward beyond the aisles, we shall find that the tomb would be enclosed in such a position as to admit of the high altar being placed immediately over it. Assuming that the choir was not apsidal but square, we get the same result. The probability is that the end of the church erected or altered by Joceline was square, and that it projected two bays beyond the aisles, as at St. Andrews and other churches of the same period.[54] The crypt, or, strictly speaking, "lower church," was evidently suggested by the sloping eastward character of the site, which would have placed St. Mungo's tomb at a depth below the level on which a large church could possibly be built; while Achaius, from his long residence in Italy, would be led to imitate some notable Italian examples.[55] Some similarities between Glasgow and Jedburgh (which was in the diocese of Glasgow) have suggested that there was in the olden times such a servant of the church as a diocesean architect.[56] "One thing is abundantly clear," says Mr. Honeyman, "to any one who intelligently studies the building, namely, that the whole design was carefully thought out and settled before a stone was laid. It is a skilful and homogeneous design, which could only be produced by a man of exceptional ability and great experience. Nothing has been left to chance, or to the sweet will of the co-operating craftsman, but the one master-mind has dictated every moulding and every combination, and has left the impress of his genius upon it all. The mark of the master may be discerned by the practised eye in every feature of the magnificent edifice; the marks of the craftsmen may be seen on the work they were told to do, and did so well."[57] To Bishop Joceline is due the credit of having formed a society to collect funds for the restoration of Bishop John's church, which was burnt by fire,[58] and he appears to have rebuilt the choir, and also to have designed, if he did not also partly build, the nave.[59] This part of his work was sufficiently advanced for consecration on 6th July 1197.[60] The work was probably continued by his successors, but the next great benefactor of the cathedral was Bishop William de Bondington (1233-1258), who perfected Joceline's work, and built both choir and lower church or "crypt," as they now are.[61] According to Mr. Honeyman, the foundations of the nave were laid and part of the walls was carried up before the building of the choir was begun.[62] Most of the nave appears, from its architecture, to have been erected at the end of the thirteenth, or the beginning of the fourteenth century, and is pronounced to form "one of the finest examples of the late First Pointed or Early Decorated style in Scotland."[63] "The spacing (of the piers) is that of the twelfth century (considerably less than that of the choir), while the height and the treatment, in other respects, is that of the latter portion of the thirteenth."[64]

Bishop Wishart during the war of Independence supported the Scottish party; he obtained permission from Edward I. to cut timber in Luss forest for erecting the spire of the cathedral, and it was one of the causes of accusation against him, which led to his imprisonment in England, that he had used the said timber not for building the spire but for making engines of war wherewith to attack Edward's army. In 1400 the wooden spire of the cathedral was destroyed by lightning, but a new tower of masonry was erected over the crossing by Bishop Lauder (1408-1425), who carried the work as high as the main parapet. "This bishop appears also to have begun the completion of the chapter-house, a detached structure lying to the north-east of the choir. The walls of this building were partly erected about the time of the construction of the choir, but were afterwards raised to two storeys in height, and vaulted by Bishop Cameron."[65] This latter prelate (1426-1446) was known as "the Magnificent," from the splendour of his retinue and court. He erected the stone spire above the tower of Bishop Lauder, and also completed the chapter-house wing containing the sacristy on the upper floor, and the chapter-house on the ground floor. His arms are still to be seen on the portions of the structure erected by him. The beautiful rood-screen was also probably constructed by him.[66] Bishop Cameron also increased the number of prebendaries from seven to thirty-two, and ordained that they should all have manses and reside near the cathedral. In his day the episcopal court was said to rival that of the King, and he built the great tower of the castle or episcopal palace, which was probably erected by Bishop Bondington and stood with the garden in the open space between the cathedral and the present Castle Street, now called Infirmary Square. The Bishop's palace was a Scottish baronial structure, and had an elaborate turreted gateway or port at the south-east angle of the wall nearly opposite the gate that now leads to the cathedral yard.[67] Bishop William Turnbull, who succeeded Bishop Cameron, held office from 1448 to 1454. He did not add much to the cathedral, but his memory ought to be gratefully remembered, for in response to his representation and that of the King, Pope Nicholas V. issued his bull, on 7th January 1450-1451, by which he erected the University, ordaining that it should flourish in all time to come, as well in theology and canon and civil law as in the arts and every lawful faculty, and that the doctors, masters, readers, and students might there enjoy all the liberties, honours, exemptions, and immunities granted by the Apostolic see to the doctors, masters, and students in the University of Bologna. He gave the power to confer degrees and make licentiates—an important recognition in those days, for it brought the influence of the Church on the side of schools of learning, and gave universal European validity to the degrees so conferred.[68] The Bishop of Glasgow was the patron and head of the University of Glasgow, which was thus founded forty years after that of St. Andrews, and forty years before that of Aberdeen. The next prelate, Bishop Andrew Muirhead (1455-1473) took an important part in the State affairs of the period, and as far as his work in the cathedral is concerned, built the hall of the choral vicars. It is situated between the two buttresses at the west end of the north aisle of the choir, and is a low building now roofed with flags. It was called the "aula vicariorum chori," and was built as an accommodation for the vicars choral, whose duties were to serve and sing in the choir. They were formed into a college by Bishop Muirhead, were originally twelve in number, but were afterwards increased to eighteen, and were aided by boy choristers. Archbishop Eyre thinks that this building on the north side of the cathedral was the early song-school of the church, which passed into the hands of the college of vicars choral, and was a hall for their business meetings and musical practice, the second storey being probably their reading-room, or the sleeping-place of the sacristan, who was required to sleep in the church.[69]