at the foot; the work is rude and clumsy Norman, with wide-jointed masonry, and the capitals left plain, to be painted or carved afterwards.
Soon after the Norman Conquest a great change took place in the art of building in England. On consulting the history of our cathedral churches, we find that in almost every instance the church was rebuilt from its foundations by the first Norman bishop, either on the same site or on a new one; sometimes, as at Norwich and Peterborough, the cathedral was removed to a new town altogether, and built on a spot where there was no church before; in other cases, as at Winchester, the new church was built near the old one, which was not pulled down until after the relics had been translated with great pomp from the old church to the new. In other instances, as at York and Canterbury, the new church was erected on the site of the old one, which was pulled down piecemeal as the new work progressed. These new churches were in all cases on a much larger and more magnificent scale than the old; they were also constructed in a much better manner, the Normans being far better masons than the Saxons[B].
| Doorway, Dartford, Gundulph, A.D. 1080. | Westminster Abbey, A.D. 1066. |
Rubble Masonry, from Gundulph’s Tower, called St. Leonard’s, at Malling, Kent, A.D. 1070.
The earliest Norman Keep in existence.
Notwithstanding this superiority of workmanship to that which had preceded it, the early Norman masonry is extremely rude and bad; the joints between the stones are often from one inch to two or three inches wide, and filled with mortar not always of very good quality. In consequence of this imperfect construction, many of the towers fell down within a few years after their erection. It is probable, however, that the workmen employed on these structures were for the most part Saxons, as the Normans must have been too much employed otherwise during the reign of the Conqueror to execute much masons’ work with their own hands. Nor were the Norman monks established in sufficient numbers to be able to superintend all the
