A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

The earliest monuments in England which have come down to us are, perhaps, not older than the Norman Conquest; and the most ancient is the simplest form. A stone coffin is covered with a single stone slab, which is also the only recipient of whatever device may be designed to commemorate the tenant of the narrow dwelling over which it closes. So early as the middle of the ninth century, (840,) Kenneth, king of Scotland, made an ordinance that such coffins should be adorned with the sign of the cross, in token of sanctity, on which no one was on any account to tread; and, perhaps, there were none but purely religious emblems employed for some generations after this time. The sign of the cross still continued for centuries the most usual ornament of tombs, but by-and-by it became associated with others which were most of them intended to designate the profession of him whose dust they honoured. Hence we have the crosier and mitre, with perhaps a chalice and paten, upon the tomb of an ecclesiastic, of an abbot, or a bishop; the knight has a sword, and his shield at first plain, but afterwards charged with his arms on his tomb. Sometimes an approach to religious allegory is discovered on monuments even of these very early ages, such as, for instance, the cross or crosier stuck into the mouth of a serpent or cockatrice, indicating the victory of the cross and of the Church over the devil. These, and the like devices, occurring before any attempt at the human figure was made, are in a low relief, or indented outline.

By-and-by the human figure was added, recumbent, and arrayed in the dress of the individual commemorated; and this figure soon rose from low relief to an effigy in full proportions. The knight and the ecclesiastic are now discovered so perfectly attired according to their order and degree, that the antiquary gathers his knowledge of costume from these venerable remains. Some affecting lessons of mortality are now forcibly inculcated by circumstances introduced into the sepulchre; for instance, the figure of the deceased appears nearly reduced to a skeleton, and laid in a shroud; a few instances occur in which the corpse thus represented is below a representation of the living person. Another interesting intimation of the character of the deceased appears in the crossed legs of those who had vowed a pilgrimage to the Holy Land; and the lion is frequently found, as well as the serpent, at the feet of the recumbent figure, perhaps in allusion to the words of the psalmist, “Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under thy feet.”

All this time the tomb has been gradually increasing in height and in general splendour, the sides are adorned with figures in several compartments, which run into niches or panels, according to the advance of architectural design, and at last they are surmounted with an arch, low at first and little decorated, but afterwards very elaborately wrought into a rich canopy. Religious allegories become more complex on the sides of the tomb, and we have instances of some which have since been borrowed by artists of name, and perhaps accounted new by many; for instance, it is not rare to see a representation of the soul of the dying conveyed to heaven by angels, while the corpse lies upon the litter, and this was a design chosen for the cenotaph of the Princess Charlotte. The relatives of the deceased are sometimes represented by many small statues in the niches; or armorial bearings are introduced, sparing at first, and often, as on the tomb of Lionell Lord Wells, in Methley church, supported on the breasts of angels. Angels also frequently support the head of the recumbent figure, and at the feet are sometimes one or more priests with an open book in their hands. The space in the wall behind the tomb and beneath the canopy allows of allegorical devices, sometimes in fresco, sometimes in mosaic. But what most demands attention are the recumbent figures themselves, generally with both hands raised in the attitude of prayer; or, if they be bishops, with the right hand as if giving a blessing. The effigies of the man and his wife appear always on the same tomb, lying side by side, and in the same pious attitude; a frequently recurring sight, which inspired the lines of Piers Plowman:—

“Knyghts in ther conisance clad for the nones,

Alle it semed seyntes ysacred opon erthe,

And lovely ladies ywrought leyen by her sides.”

And surely there is a beauty and propriety in that character of monuments for Christian men in Christian churches, which could suggest the words,

“Alle it semed seyntes ysacred opon erthe,”

far greater than we recognise in the vain-glorious boastings of success in secular pursuits, perhaps even in sinful undertakings, which cumber church walls. It is a holier thought to remember what was sacred in the Christian man; who, imperfect as he may have been, was yet, as he was a Christian, in some sense a saint, and to embody it in some pious attitude upon his tomb, than to forget everything that is Christian, and to celebrate only the secular or the vicious.

Gorgeous as some of these tombs are, they did not satisfy the splendour of that age, and the canopy swells into an actual chapel, sometimes in the body of the larger church, as that of William of Wykeham, in Winchester, and those of Cardinal Beaufort, and Bishops Waynflete and Fox, in the same cathedral. Sometimes the chapel is a building complete in itself, as that of the Beauchamps, at St. Mary’s church, Warwick, and that of Henry VII. at Westminster.