Table of
Contents

THE INTERIOR

Immediately after entering the Abbey Church by the north door, it will be well, in order to get a general idea of its size and beauty, to take one’s stand close to the west wall under the large lancet window. There is nothing to break the view from the west to the east walls of choir and ambulatory, a total distance of about 250 feet; for the wooden screen which separates the choir from the crossing is too light and open to break the vista. It will be noticed that with the exception of the western bays of the nave, and the three-light geometrical windows in the eastern wall of the choir, and the two windows of the ambulatory, everything is Norman or transitional in character. The aisles have stone quadripartite vaulting except in the added bays to the west, where the vaulting is merely plaster. The high roof, like many in Norman churches, is a wooden one, for Norman builders rarely dared to throw a stone vault over the nave or choir, for as yet the principle that allows such a piece of engineering to be carried out with safety, namely, the balancing of thrust and counter-thrust, by means of vaulting ribs and external flying buttresses, had not been fully realized in England. In some few cases it is true that late Norman vaults may be found, but more often where stone vaults exist in Norman churches they were added in after times. In Romsey Abbey one of the most noteworthy features is that very little alteration was made in the church when once it was built. True there was a westward extension in the thirteenth century, and some insertion of windows in the fourteenth century, but nothing of the original church seems to have been swept away, as was so often the case, to make room for extensions and alterations.

The Nave has seven bays, to the east of which is the transept, and beyond it the choir, which has three bays. Further to the east, as we shall find in due course, may be seen the low vaulted retro-choir or ambulatory of one bay.

It is well known that Norman choirs were generally short, and that when we find a considerable length of building eastward of the crossing, this eastward extension was made in the thirteenth or fourteenth century; the new building being often begun to the east of the Norman choir, and the choir left untouched until the eastern part was finished, when very frequently the old Norman choir and presbytery were demolished, and the new work joined on to the transept by masonry in the later style.

The inconvenience of a short architectural choir was very often avoided by bringing the ritual choir westward into the nave, an arrangement which exists up to the present day at the Abbey Church at Westminster. This seems to have been done at Romsey, the choir extending across the transept as far as the third pillar of the nave, counting from the east. But although the eastern bays of the nave and all of those of the choir are Norman, yet they are by no means of an ordinary type. There is much about this church that is unique, and certain arrangements are found only here and at St. Friedeswide’s, now Christ Church, Oxford, Dunstable Priory, and Jedburgh Abbey. There is no strict uniformity: one bay frequently differs from another in its details.

It may be well at the outset to point out that of the three horizontal divisions of the nave the main arcading occupies approximately three-sevenths of the total height of the wall, while the triforium and clerestory each occupy about two-sevenths.

The three western bays are early English in date and style, but they differ considerably from the typical early English of Salisbury; we do not find the detached shafts of Purbeck marble, nor the central cylindrical shaft; the bases, too, are rectangular, nor are there any enriched mouldings with dog-tooth ornament. In the triforium in some cases there are three, in other cases two subordinate arches, each with cusped heads, and the wall space above these smaller arches and the comprising one is pierced by a quatrefoil opening. The clerestory throughout the nave, whether in the Early English bays to the west or the Norman bays to the east, is of the same character, having three pointed arches in each bay with a window on the outside of the middle one. A passage protected by two iron rails runs right round the church at this level, and it is well worth ascending to this passage, as from it a good idea of the height of the church may be obtained. The clerestory of the transept and also that of the choir bear a general likeness to that of the nave, but are of earlier date, the arcading having semicircular and not pointed arches. The illustrations will show how shafts run on the face of the arcading right up from floor to roof. In the Norman part of the building the triforium is very peculiar; generally speaking, there are two subordinate round-headed arches, under the general round-headed comprising arch, but the tympanum or space above the former is left open, and from the point where the two smaller arches meet a shaft runs up to the centre of the main outer arch. I do not know of any similar arrangement in any other church, and, as it is a very peculiar one, hard to explain clearly in words, the reader should carefully study the illustrations in which the triforium appears. On the east side of the north arm of the transept a more elaborate arrangement of one of the arches may be seen. Here there are three, instead of two, subsidiary arches, which are interlaced, but here, also, the shaft above them appears, though necessarily much reduced in height. These shafts do not add to the beauty of the triforium, and they hardly seem necessary to give support to the outer arch (see illustrations, pp. 44, 45).

The arch at the east end of the triforium on the south side, which opens out to the transept, is worthy of special notice. Under the outer round-headed arch is a solid tympanum, beneath which are two very narrow round-headed arches, separated by a huge cylindrical shaft which has as its base a large plain rectangular block of stone.

The two eastern bays of the nave on both sides are peculiar. Between them runs up a solid cylindrical pier, which has its capital at the level of the spring of the main arches of the triforium. The arches of the main arcade spring from corbels on the sides of these great pillars, so that it seems as if the triforium gallery were hanging beneath the arches which spring below the clerestory. A somewhat similar arrangement may be seen at the cathedral church of Christ Church at Oxford; some authorities have from this similarity asserted that the buildings must have been contemporaneous, but this does not seem to have been the case. Mr. Prior considers the Romsey work forty years earlier than that at Oxford, dating it about 1120 against the Oxford work, to which he assigns the date of about 1160. It may be noticed that the Romsey builder did not continue this arrangement throughout the nave and choir, whereas this was done at Oxford.

Generally speaking, the Norman piers at Romsey are compound ones, formed of many minor shafts. The plain cylindrical form seen at Gloucester and Waltham is not met with at Romsey except in the pillar described above. The Norman aisles have stone vaults, except in the three western bays, and it is noteworthy that the arches leading into the transept are of horseshoe type. These are very elaborately moulded, the outer sides being ornamented with chevron decoration. The capitals in the choir aisles are elaborately and grotesquely carved, though it is not easy to interpret the subjects of this carving; on one capital in the north aisle is represented a fight between two kings, stayed by two winged figures; in the south aisle a crowned figure stands, holding a pyramid, possibly intended as a symbol of the church, while near by a seated figure and an angel between them hold a V-shaped scroll on which may be read the words, “Robert me fecit.” Another somewhat similar chevron bears the words, “Robert tute consule x. d. s.”, but who Robert was it is impossible to say. Henry I had a son Robert, Earl of Gloucester, who is spoken of as “Consul”; he it was who fought for his half-sister Maud against Stephen. He would have been alive at the time the church was built, but whether he had any part in the erection of it we cannot say, though he seems to have been interested in building, for the castles at Bristol and Cardiff and the tower of Tewkesbury Abbey Church are attributed to him.

The tower of Romsey was at one time a lantern, open to the roof, but when the bells were placed in the wooden cage on the roof, a ringing floor was inserted below. The arcading running round the interior of the tower is very beautiful. The ringers’ chamber is a spacious room, a good idea of the plain architectural character of which is given in the accompanying illustration. In the west wall of the north end of the transept a perpendicular window has been cut through a group of Norman windows, showing how little regard mediaeval builders had for the preservation of earlier work. Opposite to this is one of the two apsidal chantries, which in its time has served various purposes. Originally it was a chapel or chantry where mass was said for the repose of the soul of some private benefactor of the Abbey; then it became the eastern apse of the parish church of St. Lawrence; still later it was used as a school, and now serves the purpose of a choir vestry. There are within it two piscinae and two aumbries at different levels, indicating, no doubt, an alteration of level in the altar itself during the period that this chantry was in use. An elaborate monument now stands under the eastern wall.

In Mr. Spence’s “Essay on the Abbey Church of Romsey” (1851), this tomb is described as standing in the south ambulatory. It commemorates one Robert Brackley, who died Aug. 14, 1628.

The tomb, which is of imitation porphyry, takes the form of a sarcophagus, beneath an arch the soffit of which is adorned with red and white roses. Corinthian pillars of black marble support the structure.

In the North Choir Aisle, on opposite sides, may be seen two interesting mediaeval relics. On the north side is part of a fourteenth-century reredos, probably that which stood behind the high altar. It was found at the back of the present altar, concealed behind the regulation panels on which the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments were painted. It had evidently been itself partially repainted in a rougher style than the original. The painting represents the Resurrection. The portrait of an abbess is to be seen in the left-hand corner; above is a row of ten figures—saints, bishops, and holy women. On the opposite wall, carefully preserved behind a sheet of glass, is a piece of fifteenth-century needlework; originally it was a cope, and was in more recent times used as an altar cloth, its shape having of course been altered to adapt it to its new use.

The east end of the north choir aisle, internally apsidal though not externally, is now fitted up with an altar as a chapel for week-day or early morning services. Passing to the south we enter the ambulatory. It is vaulted in stone, and the plain horseshoe arches at the end without any ribs (see illustration), are worthy of notice. In this space several interesting relics of the old abbey, and some conjectural models of the church in its former condition, may be seen. Here, too, is a fifteenth-century walnut wood chest: and here are two stone cressets, possibly used by the builders, which when done with were built by them into the walls, where they remained until discovered during the nineteenth-century restoration of the church.

Among the relics is a very curious one which was found in 1839. A grave was being dug in the south aisle near the abbess’s door, and about five feet below the floor the workmen came upon a singular leaden coffin. It was 18 in. wide at the head and tapered gradually to 13 in. at the foot; it was only 5 ft. long and 15 in. deep. The lead was very thick, and the seams were folded over and welded, no solder being used. The lead was much decayed. The curious thing about it is that when it was opened not a bone was found within it; the lead coffin had contained an oaken shell which crumbled into dust on exposure to the air, but within the coffin lying on a block of oak, so shaped as to receive the head of the corpse, was a tress of auburn hair forming a plait about eighteen inches long. It was in perfect condition and looked as if the skull had only recently been removed from it. Why the hair and the block on which it lay should alone have been preserved is sufficiently mysterious; but there are other problems difficult of solution connected with this relic; it was found beneath a mass of concrete and rubbish; moreover the coffin lay partly beneath one of the piers of the main arcading of the nave, and was not placed in the usual direction, east and west, but the head was turned towards the north-west. This leads one to suppose that this coffin was originally buried in one of the earlier churches, and may have been somewhat disturbed from its original position at the time when the Norman church was built. Anyhow, it is strange that we should be able to look on that tress of golden hair probably belonging to some young damsel of high degree, one akin, it may be, to the royal house of Wessex, who was being educated at this Saxon nunnery so many centuries ago.

This relic was at one time left exposed, but as it was thought that the hair was shrinking and losing its colour, it was covered with glass and kept in a locked wooden case.

Here, too, may be seen several coins, including a “long cross” silver penny, not earlier than the second half of the thirteenth century, which was dug up in the churchyard; a ball probably discharged from a Parliamentary culverin which was found embedded in the north face of the tower; a clumsy pair of forceps which were used for extracting the teeth of nuns suffering from toothache; a mason’s punch found under the floor of the destroyed Lady Chapel, and a Roman spearhead found at Greatbridge, a short distance to the north of the town.

But among many precious relics, one recently recovered for the church is of the greatest interest, namely, the Romsey Psalter.

This is a small octavo manuscript containing thirty pages of vellum measuring 6.9 by 4.7 inches, each page containing as a rule twenty-two lines. The approximate date is probably about the middle of the fifteenth century. This is arrived at partly from the character of the writing, and partly from the fact that the Kalendar in it contains no mention of the Feast of the Visitation of the Virgin on 2nd July, a feast which was ordered to be used by the convocation of the province of Canterbury in 1480. Hence it would seem that this Psalter with its Kalendar must have been written before this date. The capital letters are painted either red or blue, and besides these there are eight illuminated initial letters, seven of which occupy a space equivalent to eight manuscript lines, and the other a space equal to nine lines. Connected with these illuminated letters are floral borders on the left-hand side of the page, and in most cases at the top or bottom also. The first and last pages of the book are soiled, probably from the book for some long period of its existence having been left lying about without covers. The present binding is of much more recent date.

There are reasons for supposing that the book was the private property of some abbess or nun, or, at any rate, of some one connected with the nunnery, and not a public service book.

It is also thought that the book was written by a Franciscan friar for the use of some one in a Benedictine house. For in the invocation of saints in the Litany which the book contains, the names of the monastic saints are arranged in the following order: Benedict, Francis, Anthony, Dominic (Bernard being omitted), instead of the usual order: Anthony, Benedict, Bernard, Dominic, Francis.

The fact that the death days added to the Kalendar in the sixteenth century are chiefly those of the abbesses of St. Mary’s nunnery, Winchester, seems to indicate that the book somehow before that date had passed from Romsey to the nunnery at Winchester. Of its further history nothing is known save that at one time it belonged to a certain T. H. Lloyd, whose name is written in it, until at last it was advertised for sale by Quaritch in his catalogue of old books in 1900. The Dean of Winchester happened to see this list, and called the attention of the Vicar of Romsey to the fact that a book of such interest might, provided the money to purchase it could be found, once more pass back into the possession of the church, where it had been used in its early days. There was little difficulty in collecting the money, and the book may now be seen preserved in a glass case in the ambulatory at Romsey.

It is worth notice that in this book the Psalms are so divided that the first 109 would be recited at Mattins in the course of a week, the others being used at Vespers during the same time.

There are certain hymns appointed for use on Sundays, canticles from the Old and New Testament, the Te Deum, Benedicite, and Quicunque Vult. Also a Litany, and sundry additional prayers.

The east end of the South Choir Aisle corresponding to that of the north choir aisle is now fitted up with an altar for week-day services. But this chapel has in it one of the oldest if not the very oldest piece of carved work connected with the abbey. Taking the place of a reredos, is a carving of the Crucifixion of unmistakable pre-Conquest character, its probable date is about 1030. The figures are Byzantine in character, and besides the Virgin and St. John who are so often represented in carvings and paintings of the Crucifixion, there are two of the Roman soldiers, one holding the spear with which afterwards the side of Jesus was pierced, and the other offering the sponge of vinegar on the hyssop rod.

What the original position of this carving was we do not know, it is described in 1742 as being on the south wall near the communion table; then it appears to have been built face inwards, into the wall, and was placed in its present position by the late vicar, the Rev. E. L. Berthon.

The apsidal chantry attached to the east wall of the southern arm of the crossing is now used as the clergy vestry, and contains in a frame the deed of sale of the abbey church to the parishioners of Romsey after the dissolution of the nunnery. It is dated 20th February, 1544.

The Screen. The screen that divides the choir from the crossing looks at first sight distinctly modern, yet it contains some ancient carving dating from 1372. It has occupied various positions in the church. At one time it was used to separate from the Abbey Church the chancel of the parish church, formed as already described from the north arm of the crossing. It was afterwards placed across the nave, near the west end, under the organ which blocked up the great triple lancet window. In a guide book in the abbey, published in 1828, we read that “there is a curious oaken screen of neat Gothic workmanship, which now separates the west end from the part which is fitted up for worship. It formerly stood in the northern transept, and separated it from the body of the church, but when the alteration in the pewing was made, it was removed to the place it now occupies, immediately under the organ: it was then painted. The top of the screen is crowned with running foliage, underneath which, in twenty-three Gothic trefoils, are as many carved faces. They are evidently portraits very tolerably executed, and on this account curious and interesting. One of them is crowned, and all of them have their heads covered with flowing hair, or wigs, or caps; the last on the right hand is a head thrusting out its tongue, perhaps a sportive essay of the carver.” When the restoration was begun about the middle of the nineteenth century, this screen was removed, treated as useless lumber, and stowed away in the triforium, which at that time, as already described, was separated from the church by a wall. Here in 1880 the vicar, the Rev. E. L. Berthon, found, to use his own words, “the ancient oak-carvings of heads in trefoils with a curious cresting above.” He resolved to utilize it in the construction of the chancel screen. The lower part is modern, designed to match the old work. The seats in the choir were designed by Mr. Berthon, and the heads intended to represent various kings, saints, and abbesses, were carved in the town. The pulpit was erected in 1891, the figures being carved by Harry Hems of Exeter, who has done so much wood and stone carving in restored reredoses and screens in various churches.

The Organ stands under the westernmost arch of the choir on the north side.

The mediaeval Monuments remaining at Romsey are not numerous, being for the most part the graves and coffins of former abbesses, many of them incapable of identification. The Old English chronicle states that Eadward the Elder, his son Ælfred, his daughter Eadburh, St. ÆthelflÆd, Eadmund, brother of King Æthelred, were all buried here, but their graves are unknown, and not a stone remains to commemorate them. There is one very beautiful effigy of Purbeck marble now placed under an ogee canopy at the south-east corner of the transept, but whom it represents we cannot say. The slab is about 7 ft. long. A small piece at the left-hand upper corner is broken off: were this replaced the stone would be 2 ft. 3 in. wide at the head, tapering downwards to about 1 ft. 3 in. at the foot. The recumbent figure is itself about 6 ft. in length. The lady is dressed in a tight-sleeved loose robe, which falls in folds to the feet, but is girt about the waist with band and buckle; the right hand holds a fold of the robe; the left hand, lying on the bosom, is in the position seen in so many of the figures on the west front of the Cathedral Church at Wells, grasping the cord that holds up the mantle to the shoulders; the head rests on a cushion; beneath the head-dress the wimple may be seen passing beneath the chin. The pointed shoes rest on an animal, possibly intended for a dog. This effigy bears a strong resemblance to that of Eleanor, wife of Edward I, at Westminster, and is certainly late thirteenth century work. There is no staff or other symbol to show that the lady was an abbess. By some it has been supposed that it was erected to the memory of Isabella de Kilpec by her daughter, Alicia Walrand, who was abbess from 1268 to 1298. At any rate, the date fits in well with the character of the monument. Its original position in the church is unknown. It was found somewhere towards the west end of the nave, by some workmen who were engaged in digging a grave, and as it chanced to fit the ogee canopy in the transept, it was laid under it, but it must not be supposed that it originally had any connection with it. Near by is a seventeenth century monument of John St. Barbe, and Grissel his wife, whose family owned the estate of Broadlands, near Romsey, which was afterwards bought by the great-grandfather of the well-known statesman, Lord Palmerston. Several coffin lids of various dates have been found, among them, that of the Abbess, Joan Icthe, who died in 1349, of the terrible scourge that visited England in the fourteenth century, known as the Black Death. Almost all the persons buried in the abbey were women, but one curious exception may be noted. In 1845 a coffin was discovered in the nave, under an enormous slab of stone, measuring 11 ft. 5 in. by 3 ft. 9 in. Mr. Ferrey, the architect, under whose supervision the restoration of the abbey was then being carried out, thus describes the discovery:

“Great care was exercised in raising the stone. Upon its being moved, there was discovered immediately under it a stone coffin, 5 ft. 10 in. long, by 2 ft. wide in the broadest part, and 1 ft. deep; containing the skeleton of a priest in good preservation, the figure measuring only 5 ft. 4 in. in length; the head elevated and resting in a shallow cavity worked out of the stone, so as to form a cushion. He had been buried in the vestments peculiar to his office, viz., the alb and tunic. Across the left arm was the maniple, and in his hand the chalice covered with the paten. Considering these remains to be about five hundred years old, it is remarkable that they should be in such preservation. The chalice and paten are of pewter, [4] the latter much corroded: a great portion of the linen alb remains; the maniple is of brown velvet fringed at the extremity, and lined with silk; portions of the stockings remain, and also all the parts of the boots, though from the decay of the sewing, they have fallen in pieces. About 2 ft. from the end of the coffin is a square hole through the bottom, with channels worked in the stone leading to it. This was probably a provision to carry off the fluids, which would be caused by the decomposition of the body. On the sides of the coffin could be traced the marks of the corpse when it was first deposited, from which it would appear that the deceased had been stout as well as short of stature. It is to be regretted that the inscription being stripped from the verge of the slab, we have no means of knowing whose remains these are. The Purbeck marble slab has never been disturbed, being found strongly secured by mortar to the top of the stone coffin. It is curious that the covering should be so gigantic, and the coffin under it so small: judging by the size of the slab and the beauty of the large floriated cross, it might have been supposed to cover some dignified ecclesiastic. This is clearly not the case.... In the absence of any known date, judging from the impress on the marble, and the shape of the stone coffin, I should assign both to the early part of the fourteenth century.”

There are sundry mural tablets of modern date, and near the west end an altar tomb, with the recumbent effigy by Westmacott of Sir William Petty, the founder of the Lansdowne family, who was born at Romsey in 1623, and was buried within the abbey, and on the north side a tomb on which a child lies on its side as if asleep, with its limbs carelessly stretched out.

There is no painted glass of mediaeval date to be seen in the church; such as we find is modern. The three lancets at the west are the work of Messrs. Clayton and Bell, and were inserted as a memorial to Lord Palmerston, who died in 1865. The glass in the windows in the east wall of the ambulatory commemorating C. B. Footner, who died in 1889, was painted by the same firm. The two east windows, painted by Messrs. Powell, were inserted as a memorial to Lord Mount-Temple, who died in 1888. To the same firm are due the windows in the transept, which commemorate the Hon. Ralph Dutton, Lady Mount-Temple, Mr. Tylee, Professor Ramsey, and the Rev. E. L. Berthon, and the one in the north chancel aisle erected to the memory of the wife of the Right Hon. Evelyn Ashley. The window at the east end of the north aisle is by Kempe, and commemorates Mr. G. B. Footner.

The Font is in the north aisle of the nave, dates from about the middle of the last century, and stands on the same spot as the ancient font of the church of St. Laurence. The conventual church, of course, would not need a font. But in post-Reformation times one stood on a raised platform at the west end of the church.

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