Fig. 218.—Plan, and East End of Church, Bradford, Wilts.
Fig. 219.—Church, Bradford, Wilts.
At Bradford, in Wilts, a very complete church has but recently been discovered; having previously been so surrounded by buildings that its character was unnoticed. I give drawings of it, made by my friend Mr. Irvine, a zealous antiquary, who has also sent to the Academy a cast of some uncouth sculpture found there.[9] The church consists of a nave and chancel, and has every characteristic of Anglo-Saxon work strongly developed.[10]
At Jarrow-on-the Tyne the chancel of the Saxon church remains. It has few characteristic features. The windows are of a very pristine form, in this case with no external splay, the jambs of upright stones with horizontal stones for imposts, and arches cut out of single stones. They had been walled up at a very early date to a certain thickness from the exterior with very small perforations,—some circular and some more elongated,—in the filling up wall. This, I fancy, was as a means of defence. There is one doorway, which is a plain arched opening running square through the wall, the door having been hung as usual against its inner face, and the jambs formed of large stones facing the reveal. There are some signs of an apse having existed, but of this I cannot speak with any certainty. A tower was erected between the nave and the chancel—as I am informed by a local antiquary—in the reign of the Conqueror. The nave has long since perished, but in the walls of a modern erection on its site were found, used as building material, about twenty baluster columns, some 2 ft. 3 in. high and a foot in diameter ([Fig. 220]). This was in all probability the very church erected by Benedict Biscop, and in which the Venerable Bede worshipped.
Fig. 220.—Baluster Columns, Jarrow-on-the-Tyne.
At Monk Wearmouth are the remains of the other church of Benedict Biscop.