St. Philibert founded Jumièges in 654, about the same time as St. Wandrille was begun, and it also suffered terribly at the hands of the Northmen, who tortured and massacred without mercy, and left the once prosperous abbey a shattered ruin.
The rebuilding was encouraged by William Longsword, the son of Rollo; but the builder of the Norman church which stands to-day was Abbot Robert of Jumièges, who was afterwards appointed Archbishop of Canterbury by Edward the Confessor, who had been educated at Jumièges under his care. The buildings, completed and consecrated in 1067, remained in use until 1793, the date of the Suppression, so that, with an interval of about a century in its early history, Jumièges existed as a monastery for 1,139 years, and in that period was ruled by eighty-two abbots.
It is interesting to know that, although the Benedictines of Jumièges contributed a very large sum towards the ransom of Richard I. after his capture on the way home from the Holy Land, the monastery was twice plundered by English armies, and the first occasion was in Edward III.’s reign, when the generosity of the monks seems to have been quite forgotten!
A portion of the buildings belonging to William Longsword’s church is to be seen in the Chapel of St. Pierre already mentioned.
An interesting legend of the founder of the abbey explains the presence of a wolf at the feet of the saint on a carved stone boss. St. Philibert had given to a convent four leagues from Jumièges the laundry work of his abbey, and the Abbess and her nuns washed the linen which was sent to them. One day a wolf ate the ass that carried the washing, but the holy Abbess induced the wicked wolf to carry the baskets, which he did, we read, until the end of his life.
The greatness and power of the abbey declined very much after the Reformation, and at the time of the Revolution the religious who were dispersed were not numerous.
The short distance from Yainville has to be retraced, and then, going to the right through a belt of forest, one reaches the banks of the Seine once more, and passes through the little town of Duclair, with its sunny quay and its ferry-boat. There are beautiful views over the river, and as the car runs along the level road one may overtake a steamer that is sliding along with a little pile of water pushed up in front of its bow, and note the contrast of its stained red funnel with the soft green landscape beyond. On the left curious little chambers are cut out of the cliff of chalk, and several form complete cottages. So even and horizontal are the layers of chalk, with bands of flint at different heights, that the cliff has often an exceedingly artificial appearance.
Soon afterwards the road cuts across the neck of another peninsula formed by one of the deep windings of the Seine, and on reaching the foot of the rising ground a turning to the right leads to the hamlet of St. Martin Boscherville, whose noble Church of St. Georges rears its great bulk on the hillside. The hurried tourist might be inclined to pass this by, thinking that of ecclesiastic architecture he has seen enough in this neighbourhood; but throughout the whole of France he will not find another Norman church so perfect as that of St. Georges de Boscherville. The abbey was founded and built in the eleventh century by the Grand Chamberlain of William the Conqueror, Raoul de Tancarville, a fact proclaimed in an inscription above the chief portal; and the great church, built at the time when England was newly subjected to the Norman, stands to-day, with the exception of the western turrets, exactly as the original builders left it.
The transepts are remarkable for their galleries, similar to those in Winchester Cathedral; and the chapter-house, which is later than the church, being Transitional in style, should also be seen. The sixteenth-century tomb of Le Roulx, the last Abbot, is in front of the altar.
On resuming the journey, the hill just mentioned is negotiated with some considerable winding, which enables one to get especially fine views over the wooded country to the west, with the big church in the middle distance, and the gleaming river showing its snaky windings on either side.