Table of
Contents

THE HISTORY OF THE BUILDING.

More than four hundred years passed by between the beginning of the building of this cathedral by Archbishop Lanfranc (1070-1089) and its completion, by the addition of the great central tower, at the end of the fifteenth century. But before tracing the history of the construction of the present well-known fabric, a few words will not be out of place concerning the church which preceded it on the same site. A British or Roman church, said to have been built by a certain mythical King Lucius, was given to St. Augustine by Ethelbert in a.d. 597. It was designed, broadly speaking, on the plan of the old Basilica of St. Peter at Rome, but as to the latest date of any alterations, which may or may not have been made by Augustine and his immediate successors, we have no accurate information. It is, however, definitely stated that Archbishop Odo, who held the see from a.d. 942-959, raised the walls and rebuilt the roof. In the course of these alterations the church was roofless for three years, and we are told that no rain fell within the precincts during this time. In a.d. 1011 Canterbury was pillaged by the Danes, who carried off Archbishop Alphege to Greenwich, butchered the monks, and did much damage to the church. The building was, however, restored by Canute, who made further atonement by hanging up his crown within its walls, and bringing back the body of Alphege, who had been martyred by the Danes. In the year 1067 the storms of the Norman Conquest overwhelmed St. Augustine’s church, which was completely destroyed by fire, together with many royal deeds of privilege and papal bulls, and other valuable documents.

A description of the church thus destroyed is given by Prof. Willis, who quotes all the ancient writers who mention it. The chief authority is Eadmer, who was a boy at the monastery school when the Saxon church was pulled down, and was afterwards a monk and “singer” in the cathedral. It is he who tells us that it was arranged in some parts in imitation of the church of St. Peter at Rome. Odo had translated the body of Wilfrid, Archbishop of York, from Ripon to Canterbury, and had “worthily placed it in a more lofty receptacle, to use his own words, that is to say, in the great Altar which was constructed of rough stones and mortar, close to the wall at the eastern part of the presbytery. Afterwards another altar was placed at a convenient distance before the aforesaid altar.... In this altar the blessed Elphege had solemnly deposited the head of St. Swithin ... and also many relics of other saints. To reach these altars, a certain crypt which the Romans call a Confessionary had to be ascended by means of several steps from the choir of the singers. This crypt was fabricated beneath in the likeness of the confessionary of St. Peter, the vault of which was raised so high that the part above could only be reached by many steps.” The resting-place of St. Dunstan was separated from the crypt itself by a strong wall, for that most holy father was interred before the aforesaid steps at a great depth in the ground, and at the head of the saint stood the matutinal altar. Thence the choir of the singers was extended westward into the body of the church.... In the next place, beyond the middle of the length of the body there were two towers which projected beyond the aisles of the church. The south tower had an altar in the midst of it, which was dedicated in honour of the blessed Pope Gregory.... Opposite to this tower and on the north, the other tower was built in honour of the blessed Martin, and had about it cloisters for the use of the monks.... The extremity of the church was adorned by the oratory of Mary.... At its eastern part, there was an altar consecrated to the worship of that Lady.... When the priest performed the Divine mysteries at this altar he had his face turned to the east.... Behind him, to the west, was the pontifical chair constructed with handsome workmanship, and of large stones and cement, and far removed from the Lord’s table, being contiguous to the wall of the church which embraced the entire area of the building.

Lanfranc, the first Norman archbishop, was granted the see in 1070. He quickly set about the task of building himself a cathedral. Making no attempt to restore the old fabric, he even destroyed what was left of the monastic building, and built up an entirely new church and monastery. Seven years sufficed to complete his cathedral, which stood on the same ground as the earlier fane. His work, however, was not long left undisturbed. It had not stood for twenty years before the east end of the church was pulled down during the Archiepiscopate of Anselm, and rebuilt in a much more splendid style by Ernulph, the prior of the monastery. Conrad, who succeeded Ernulph as prior, finished the choir, decorating it with great magnificence, and, in the course of his reconstruction, nearly doubling the area of the building. Thus completed anew, the cathedral was dedicated by Archbishop William in a.d. 1130. At this notable ceremony the kings of England and Scotland both assisted, as well as all the English bishops. Forty years later this church was the scene of Thomas À Becket’s murder (a.d. 1170), and it was in Conrad’s choir that the monks watched over his body during the night after his death.

Eadmer also gives some description of the church raised by Lanfranc. The new archbishop, “filled with consternation” when he found that “the church of the Saviour which he undertakes to rule was reduced to almost nothing by fire and ruin,” proceeded to “set about to destroy it utterly, and erect a more noble one. And in the space of seven years he raised this new church from the very foundations and rendered it nearly perfect.... Archbishop Anselm, who succeeded Lanfranc, appointed Ernulf to be prior.... Having taken down the eastern part of the church which Lanfranc had built, he erected it so much more magnificently, that nothing like it could be seen in England, either for the brilliancy of its glass windows, the beauty of its marble pavement, or the many coloured pictures which led the wondering eyes to the very summit of the ceiling.” It was this part of the church, however, that was completed by Ernulf’s successor, Conrad, and afterwards known as Conrad’s choir. It appears that Anselm “allowed the monks to manage their own affairs, and gave them for priors Ernulf, and then Conrad, both monks of their own monastery. And thus it happened that, in addition to the general prosperity and good order of their property, which resulted from this freedom, they were enabled to enlarge their church by all that part which stretches from the great tower to the east; which work Anselm himself provided for,” having “granted to the said church the revenues of his town of Peckham, for seven years, the whole of which were expended upon the new work.” Prof. Willis, unable to account for the haste with which the east end of Lanfranc’s church was pulled down, assumes that the monks “did not think their church large enough for the importance of their monastery,” and moreover wanted shrine-room for the display of relics. The main body of Lanfranc’s church was left standing, and is described as follows by Gervase. “The tower, raised upon great pillars, is placed in the midst of the church, like the centre in the middle of a circle. It had on its apex a gilt cherub. On the west of the tower is the nave of the church, supported on either side upon eight pillars. Two lofty towers with gilded pinnacles terminate this nave or aula. A gilded corona hangs in the midst of the church. A screen with a loft (pulpitum) separated in a manner the aforesaid tower from the nave, and had in the middle and on the side towards the nave, the altar of the holy cross. Above the pulpitum and placed across the church, was the beam, which sustained a great cross, two cherubim, and the images of St. Mary and St. John the Apostle.... The great tower had a cross from each side, to wit, a south cross and a north cross, each of which had in the midst a strong pillar; this pillar sustained a vault which proceeded from the walls on three of its sides,” etc. Prof. Willis considers that as far as these parts of the building are concerned, the present fabric stands exactly on the site of Lanfranc’s. “In the existing building,” he says, “it happens that the nave and transepts have been transformed into the Perpendicular style of the fourteenth century, and the central tower carried up to about double its original altitude in the same style. Nevertheless indications may be detected that these changed parts stand upon the old foundations of Lanfranc.”

The building, however, was not destined to remain long intact. In a.d. 1174 the whole of Conrad’s choir was destroyed by a fire, which was described fully by Gervase, a monk who witnessed it. He gives an extraordinary account of the rage and grief of the people at the sight of the burning cathedral. The work of rebuilding was immediately set on foot. In September, 1174, one William of Sens, undertook the task, and wrought thereat until 1178, when he was disabled by an unfortunate fall from a scaffolding, and had to give up his charge and return to France. Another William, an Englishman this time, took up the direction of the work, and under his supervision the choir and eastern portion of the church were finished in a.d. 1184. Further alterations were made under Prior Chillenden at the end of the fourteenth century. Lanfranc’s nave was pulled down, and a new nave and transepts were constructed, leaving but little of the original building set up by the first Norman archbishop. Finally, about a.d. 1495, the cathedral was completed by the addition of the great central tower.

plan of canterbury cathedral, about a.d. 1165. from a norman drawing inserted in the great psalter of eadwin, in the library of trinity college, cambridge. first published in vetusta monumenta (society of antiquaries, 1755). for full description and a plan of the waterworks see archÆologia cantiana, vol. vii., 1868.

During the four centuries which passed during the construction and reconstruction of the fabric, considerable changes had manifested themselves in the science and art of architecture. Hence it is that Canterbury Cathedral is a history, written in solid stone, of architectural progress, illustrating in itself almost all the various kinds of the style commonly called Pointed. Of these the earliest form of Gothic and Perpendicular chiefly predominate. The shape and arrangement of the building was doubtless largely influenced by the extraordinary number of precious relics which it contained, and which had to be properly displayed and fittingly enshrined. Augustine’s church had possessed the bodies of St. Blaize and St. Wilfrid, brought respectively from Rome and from Ripon; of St. Dunstan, St. Alphege, and St. Ouen, as well as the heads of St. Swithin and St. Furseus, and the arm of St. Bartholomew. These were all carefully removed and placed, each in separate altars and chapels, in Lanfranc’s new cathedral. Here their number was added to by the acquisition of new relics and sacred treasures as time went on, and finally Canterbury enshrined its chiefest glory, the hallowed body of St. Thomas À Becket, who was martyred within its walls.

Since, owing to an almost incredible act of royal vindictiveness in a.d. 1538, Becket’s glorious shrine belongs only to the history of the past, some account of its splendours will not be out of place in this part of our account of the cathedral. It stood on the site of the ancient chapel of the Trinity, which was burnt down along with Conrad’s choir in the destructive fire of a.d. 1174. It was in this chapel that Thomas À Becket had first solemnized mass after becoming archbishop. For this reason, as we may fairly suppose, this position was chosen to enshrine the martyr’s bones, after the rebuilding of the injured portion of the fabric. Though the shrine itself has been ruthlessly destroyed, a mosaic pavement, similar to that which may be seen round the tomb of Edward the Confessor in Westminster Abbey, marks the exact spot on which it stood. The mosaic is of the kind with which the floors of the Roman basilicas were generally adorned, and contains signs of the zodiacs and emblems of virtues and vices. This pavement was directly in front of the west side of the shrine. On each side of the site is a deep mark in the pavement running towards the east. This indentation was certainly worn in the soft, pinkish marble by the knees of generations of pilgrims, who prostrated themselves here while the treasures were displayed to their gaze. In the roof above there is fixed a crescent carved out of some foreign wood, which has proved deeply puzzling to antiquaries. A suggestion, which hardly seems very plausible, connects this mysterious crescent with the fact that Becket was closely related, as patron, with the Hospital of St. John at Acre. It was believed that his prayers had once repulsed the Saracens from the walls of the fortress, and he received the title of St. Thomas Acreusis. Near this crescent a number of iron staples were to be seen at one time, and it is likely that a trophy of some sort depended from them. The Watching Tower was set high upon the Tower of St. Anselm, on the south side of the shrine. It contained a fireplace, so that the watchman might keep himself warm during the winter nights, and from a gallery between the pillars he commanded a view of the sacred spot and its treasures. A troop of fierce ban-dogs shared the task of guarding the shrine from theft. How necessary such precautions were is shown by the fact that such a spot had to be guarded not only from common robbers in search of rich booty, but also from holy men, who were quite unscrupulous in their desire to possess themselves and their own churches of sacred relics. Within the first six years after Becket’s death we read of two striking instances of the lengths to which distinguished churchmen were carried by what Dean Stanley calls “the first frenzy of desire for the relics of St. Thomas.” Benedict, a monk of Christ Church, and “probably the most distinguished of his body,” was created Abbot of Peterburgh in a.d. 1176. Disappointed to find that his cathedral was very poor in the matter of relics he returned to Canterbury, “took away with him the flagstones immediately surrounding the sacred spot, with which he formed two altars in the conventual church of his new appointment, besides two vases of blood and parts of Becket’s clothing.” Still more striking and characteristic of the prevalent passion for relics is the story of Roger, who was keeper of the “Altars of the Martyrdom,” or “Custos Martyrii.” The brothers of St. Augustine’s Abbey were so eager to obtain a share in the glory which their great rival, the neighbouring cathedral, had won from the circumstances of Becket’s martyrdom within its walls, that they actually offered Roger no less a reward than the position of abbot in their own institution, on condition that he should purloin for them some part of the remains of the martyr’s skull. And not only did Roger, though he had been specially selected from amongst the monks of Christ Church to watch over this very treasure, agree to their conditions, and after duly carrying out this piece of sacrilegious burglary become Abbot of St. Augustine’s; but the chroniclers of the abbey were not ashamed to boast of this transaction as an instance of cleverness and well-applied zeal.

The translation of Becket’s remains from the tomb to his shrine took place a.d. 1220, fifty years after his martyrdom. The young Henry III., who had just laid the foundation of the new abbey at Westminster, assisted at the ceremony. The primate then ruling at Canterbury was the great Stephen Langton, who had won renown both as a scholar and a statesman. He had carried out the division of the Bible into chapters, as it is now arranged, and had won a decisive victory for English liberty by forcing King John to sign the Great Charter. He was now advanced in years, and had recently assisted at the coronation of King Henry at Westminster.

The translation was carried out with imposing ceremony. The scene must have been one of surpassing splendour; never had such an assemblage been gathered together in England. Robert of Gloucester relates that not only Canterbury but the surrounding countryside was full to overflowing:

The archbishop had given notice two years before, proclaiming the day of the solemnity throughout Europe as well as England: the episcopal manors had been bidden to furnish provisions for the huge concourse, not only in the cathedral city, but along all the roads by which it was approached. Hay and provisions were given to all who asked it between London and Canterbury; at the gates of the city and in the four licensed cellars tuns of wine were set up, that all who thirsted might drink freely, and wine ran in the street channels on the day of the festival. During the night before the ceremony the primate, together with the Bishop of Salisbury and all the members of the brotherhood, who were headed by Walter the Prior, solemnly, with psalms and hymns, entered the crypt in which the martyr’s body lay, and removed the stones which covered the tomb. Four priests, specially conspicuous for their piety, were selected to take out the relics, which were then placed in a strong coffer studded with iron nails and fastened with iron hasps.

Next day a procession was formed, headed by the young king, Henry III. After him came Pandulf, the Italian Bishop of Norwich and Papal Nuncio, and Langton the archbishop, with whom was the Archbishop of Rheims, Primate of France. The great Hubert de Burgh, Lord High Justiciary, together with four other barons, completed the company, which was selected to bear the chest to its resting-place. When this had been duly deposited, a solemn mass was celebrated by the French archbishop. The anniversary of this great festival was commemorated as the Feast of the Translation of the Blessed St. Thomas, until it was suppressed by a royal injunction of Henry VIII. in 1536.

A picture of the shrine itself is preserved among the Cottonian MSS., and a representation of it also exists in one of the stained windows of the cathedral. At the end of it the altar of the Saint had its place; the lower part of its walls were of stone, and against them the lame and diseased pilgrims used to rub their bodies, hoping to be cured of their afflictions. The shrine itself was supported on marble arches, and remained concealed under a wooden covering, doubtless intended to enhance the effect produced by the sudden revelation of the glories beneath it; for when the pilgrims were duly assembled on their knees round the shrine, the cover was suddenly raised at a given signal, and though such a device may appear slightly theatrical in these days, it is easy to imagine how the devotees of the middle ages must have been thrilled at the sight of this hallowed tomb, and all the bravery of gold and precious stones which the piety of that day had heaped upon it. The beauties of the shrine were pointed out by the prior, who named the giver of the several jewels. Many of these were of enormous value, especially a huge carbuncle, as large as an egg, which had been offered to the memory of St. Thomas by Louis VII. of France, who visited the shrine in a.d. 1179, after having thrice seen the Saint in a vision. A curious legend, thoroughly in keeping with the mystic halo of miraculous power which surrounds the martyred archbishop’s fame, relates that the French king could not make up his mind to part with this invaluable gem, which was called the “Regale of France;” but when he visited the tomb, the stone, so runs the story, leapt forth from the ring in which it was set, and fixed itself of its own will firmly in the wall of the shrine, thus baffling the unwilling monarch’s half-heartedness. Louis also presented a gold cup, and gave the monks a hundred measures, medii, of wine, to be delivered annually at Poissy, also ordaining that they should be exempt from “toll, tax, and tallage” when journeying in his realm. He himself was made a member of the brotherhood, after duly spending a night in prayer at the tomb. It is said that, “because he was very fearful of the water,” the French king received a promise from the Saint that neither he nor any other that crossed over from Dover to Whitsand, should suffer any manner of loss or shipwreck. We are told that Louis’s piety was afterwards rewarded by the miraculous recovery, through St. Thomas’s intercession, of his son from a dangerous illness. Louis was the first of a series of royal pilgrims to the shrine. Richard the Lion Heart, set free from durance in Austria, walked thither from Sandwich to return thanks to God and St. Thomas. After him all the English kings and all the Continental potentates who visited the shores of Britain, paid due homage, and doubtless made due offering, at the shrine of the sainted archbishop. The crown of Scotland was presented in a.d. 1299 by Edward Longshanks, and Henry V. gave thanks here after his victory over the French at Agincourt. Emperors, both of the east and west, humbled themselves before the relics of the famous English martyr. Henry VIII. and the Emperor Charles V. came together at Whitsuntide, a.d. 1520, in more than royal splendour, and with a great retinue of English and Spanish noblemen, and worshipped at the shrine which had then reached the zenith of its glory.

But though the stately stories of these royal progresses to the tomb of the martyred archbishop strike the imagination vividly, yet the picture presented by Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” is in reality much more impressive. For we find there all ranks of society alike making the pilgrimage—the knight, the yeoman, the prioress, the monk, the friar, the merchant, the scholar from Oxford, the lawyer, the squire, the tradesman, the cook, the shipman, the physician, the clothier from Bath, the priest, the miller, the reeve, the manciple, the seller of indulgences, and, lastly, the poet himself—all these various sorts and conditions of men and women we find journeying down to Canterbury in a sort of motley caravan. Foreign pilgrims also came to the sacred shrine in great numbers. A curious record, preserved in a Latin translation, of the journey of a Bohemian noble, Leo von Rotzmital, who visited England in 1446, gives a quaint description of Canterbury and its approaches. “Sailing up the Channel,” the narrator writes, “as we drew near to England we saw lofty mountains full of chalk. These mountains seem from a distance to be clad with snows. On them lies a citadel, built by devils, ‘a CacodÆmonibus extructa,’ so stoutly fortified that its peer could not be found in any province of Christendom. Passing by these mountains and citadel we put in at the city of Sandwich (Sandvicum).... But at nothing did I marvel more greatly than at the sailors climbing up the masts and foretelling the distance, and approach of the winds, and which sails should be set and which furled. Among them I saw one sailor so nimble that scarce could any man be compared with him.” Journeying on to Canterbury, our pilgrim proceeds: “There we saw the tomb and head of the martyr. The tomb is of pure gold, and embellished with jewels, and so enriched with splendid offerings that I know not its peer. Among other precious things upon it is beholden the carbuncle jewel, which is wont to shine by night, half a hen’s egg in size. For that tomb has been lavishly enriched by many kings, princes, wealthy traders, and other righteous men.”

Such was Canterbury Cathedral in the middle ages, the resort of emperors, kings, and all classes of humble folk, English and foreign. It was in the spring chiefly, as Chaucer tells us, that

The miracles performed by the bones of the blessed martyr are stated by contemporary writers to have been extraordinarily numerous. We have it on the authority of Gervase that two volumes full of these marvels were preserved at Canterbury, and in those days a volume meant a tome of formidable dimensions; but scarcely any record of these most interesting occurrences has been preserved. At the time of Henry VIII.’s quarrel with the dead archbishop—of which more anon—the name of St. Thomas and all account of his deeds was erased from every book that the strictest investigation could lay hands on. So thoroughly was this spiteful edict carried out that the records of the greatest of English saints are astonishingly meagre. A letter, however, has been preserved, written about a.d. 1390 by Richard II. to congratulate the then archbishop, William Courtenay, on a fresh miracle performed by St. Thomas: “Litera domini Regis graciosa missa domino archiepiscopo, regraciando sibi de novo miraculo Sancti Thome Martiris sibi denunciato.” The letter refers, in its quaint Norman-French, to the good influence that will be exercised by such a manifestation, as a practical argument against the “various enemies of our faith and belief”—noz foie et creaunce ount plousours enemys. These were the Lollards, and the pious king says that he hopes and believes that they will be brought back to the right path by the effect of this miracle, which seems to have been worked to heal a distinguished foreigner—en une persone estraunge.

Another document (dated a.d. 1455) preserves the story of the miraculous cure of a young Scotsman, from Aberdeen, Allexander Stephani filius in Scocia, de Aberdyn oppido natus. Alexander was lame, pedibus contractus, from his birth, we are told that after twenty-four years of pain and discomfort—vigintiquatuor annis penaliter laborabat—he made a pilgrimage to Canterbury, and there “the sainted Thomas, the divine clemency aiding him, on the second day of the month of May did straightway restore his legs and feet, bases et plantas, to the same Alexander.”

Other miracles performed by the saint are pictured in the painted windows of Trinity Chapel, of which we shall treat fully later on. The fame of the martyr spread through the whole of Christendom. Stanley tells us that “there is probably no country in Europe which does not exhibit traces of Becket. A tooth of his is preserved in the church of San Thomaso Cantuariense at Verona, part of an arm in a convent at Florence, and another part in the church of St. Waldetrude at Mons; in Fuller’s time both arms were displayed in the English convent at Lisbon; while Bourbourg preserves his chalice, Douay his hair shirt, and St. Omer his mitre. The cathedral of Sens contains his vestments and an ancient altar at which he said mass. His story is pictured in the painted windows at Chartres, and Sens, and St. Omer, and his figure is to be seen in the church of Monreale at Palermo.”

In England almost every county contained a church or convent dedicated to St. Thomas. Most notable of these was the abbey of Aberbrothock, raised, within seven years after the martyrdom, to the memory of the saint by William the Lion, king of Scotland. William had been defeated by the English forces on the very day on which Henry II. had done penance at the tomb, and made his peace with the saint, and attributing his misfortunes to the miraculous influence of St. Thomas, endeavoured to propitiate him by the dedication of this magnificent abbey. A mutilated image of the saint has been preserved among the ruins of the monastery. This is perhaps the most notable of the gifts to St. Thomas. The volume of the offerings which were poured into the Canterbury coffers by grateful invalids who had been cured of their ailments, and by others who, like the Scotch king, were anxious to propitiate the power of the saint, must have been enormous. We know that at the beginning of the sixteenth century the yearly offerings, though their sums had already greatly diminished, were worth about £4,000, according to the present value of money.

The story of the fall of the shrine and the overthrow of the power of the martyr is so remarkable and was so implicitly believed at the time, that it cannot be passed over in spite of the doubts which modern criticism casts on its authenticity. It is said that in April, a.d. 1538, a writ of summons was issued in the name of King Henry VIII. against Thomas Becket, sometime Archbishop of Canterbury, accusing him of treason, contumacy, and rebellion. This document was read before the martyr’s tomb, and thirty days were allowed for his answer to the summons. As the defendant did not appear, the suit was formally tried at Westminster. The Attorney General held a brief for Henry II., and the deceased defendant was represented by an advocate named by Henry VIII. Needless to relate, judgment was given in favour of Henry II., and the condemned Archbishop was ordered to have his bones burnt and all his gorgeous offerings escheated to the Crown. The first part of the sentence was remitted and Becket’s body was buried, but he was deprived of the title of Saint, his images were destroyed throughout the kingdom, and his name was erased from all books. The shrine was destroyed, and the gold and jewels thereof were taken away in twenty-six carts. Henry VIII. himself wore the Regale of France in a ring on his thumb. Improbable as the story of Becket’s trial may seem, such a procedure was strictly in accordance with the forms of the Roman Catholic Church, of which Henry still at that time professed himself a member: moreover it is not without authentic parallels in history: exactly the same measures of reprisal had been taken against Wycliffe at Lutterworth; and Queen Mary shortly afterwards acted in a similar manner towards Bucer and Fagius at Cambridge.

The last recorded pilgrim to the shrine of St. Thomas was Madame de Montreuil, a great French dame who had been waiting on Mary of Guise, in Scotland. She visited Canterbury in August, a.d. 1538, and we are told that she was taken to see the wonders of the place and marvelled at all the riches thereof, and said “that if she had not seen it, all the men in the world could never ’a made her believe it.” Though she would not kiss the head of St. Thomas, the Prior “did send her a present of coneys, capons, chickens, with divers fruits—plenty—insomuch that she said, ‘What shall we do with so many capons? Let the Lord Prior come, and eat, and help us to eat them tomorrow at dinner’ and so thanked him heartily for the said present.”

Such was the history of Becket’s shrine. We have dwelt on it at some length because it is no exaggeration to say that in the Middle Ages Canterbury Cathedral owed its European fame and enormous riches to the fact that it contained the shrine within its walls, and because the story of the influence of the Saint and the miracles that he worked, and the millions of pilgrims who flocked from the whole civilized world to do homage to him, throws a brighter and more vivid light on the lives and thoughts and beliefs of mediÆval men than many volumes stuffed with historical research. No visitor to Canterbury can appreciate what he sees, unless he realizes to some extent the glamour which overhung the resting place of St. Thomas in the days of Geoffrey Chaucer. We have no certain knowledge as to whether the other shrines and relics which enriched the cathedral were destroyed along with those of St. Thomas. Dunstan and Elphege at least can hardly have escaped, and it is probable that most of the monuments and relics perished at the time of the Reformation. We know that in a.d. 1541, Cranmer deplored the slight effect which had been wrought by the royal orders for the destruction of the bones and images of supposed saints. And that he forthwith received letters from the king, enjoining him to cause “due search to be made in his cathedral churches, and if any shrine, covering of shrine, table, monument of miracles, or other pilgrimage, do there continue, to cause it to be taken away, so as there remain no memory of it.” This order probably brought about the destruction of the tombs and monuments of the early archbishops, most of whom had been officially canonised, or been at least enrolled in the popular calendar, and were accordingly doomed to have their resting-places desecrated. We know that about this time the tomb of Winchelsey was destroyed, because he was adored by the people as a reputed saint.

Any monuments that may have escaped royal vandalism at the Reformation period, fell before the even more effective fanaticism of the Puritans, who seem to have exercised their iconoclastic energies with especial zeal and vigour at Canterbury. Just before their time Archbishop Laud spent a good deal of trouble and money on the adornment of the high altar. A letter to him from the Dean, dated July 8th, a.d. 1634, is quoted by Prynne, “We have obeyed your Grace’s direction in pulling down the exorbitant seates within our Quire whereby the church is very much beautified.... Lastly wee most humbly beseech your Grace to take notice that many and most necessary have beene the occasions of extraordinary expences this yeare for ornaments, etc.” And another Puritan scribe tells us that “At the east end of the cathedral they have placed an Altar as they call it dressed after the Romish fashion, for which altar they have lately provided a most idolatrous costly glory cloth or back cloth.”

These embellishments were not destined to remain long undisturbed. In a.d. 1642, the Puritan troopers hewed the altar-rails to pieces and then “threw the Altar over and over down the three Altar steps, and left it lying with the heels upwards.” This was only the beginning: we read that during the time of the Great Rebellion, “the newly erected font was pulled down, the inscriptions, figures, and coats of arms, engraven upon brass, were torn off from the ancient monuments, and whatsoever there was of beauty or decency in the holy place, was despoiled.”

A manuscript, compiled in 1662, and preserved in the Chapter library, gives a more minute account of this work of destruction. “The windows were generally battered and broken down; the whole roof, with that of the steeples, the chapter-house and cloister, externally impaired and ruined both in timber-work and lead; water-tanks, pipes, and much other lead cut off; the choir stripped and robbed of her fair and goodly hangings; the organ and organ-loft, communion-table, and the best and chiefest of the furniture, with the rail before it, and the screen of tabernacle work richly overlaid with gold behind it; goodly monuments shamefully abused, defaced, and rifled of brasses, iron grates, and bars.”

The ringleader in this work of destruction was a fanatic named Richard Culmer, commonly known as Blue Dick. A paper preserved in the Chapter library, in the writing of Somner, the great antiquarian scholar, describes the state in which the fabric of the cathedral was left, at the time of the Restoration of King Charles II., in 1660. “So little,” says this document, “had the fury of the late reformers left remaining of it besides the bare walles and roofe, and these, partly through neglect, and partly by the daily assaults and batteries of the disaffected, so shattered, ruinated, and defaced, as it was not more unserviceable in the way of a cathedral than justly scandalous to all who delight to serve God in the beauty of Holines.” Most of the windows had been broken, “the church’s guardians, her faire and strong gates, turned off the hooks and burned.” The buildings and houses of the clergy had been pulled down or greatly damaged; and lastly, “the goodly oaks in our common gardens, of good value in themselves, and in their time very beneficial to our church by their shelter, quite eradicated and set to sale.” This last touch is interesting, as showing that the reforming zeal of the Puritans was not always altogether disinterested.

After the Restoration some attempt was made to render the cathedral once more a fitting place of worship, and the sum of £10,000 was devoted to repairs and other public and pious uses. A screen was put up in the same position as the former one, and the altar was placed in front. But, in a.d. 1729, this screen no longer suited the taste of the period, and a sum of £500, bequeathed by one of the prebendaries, was devoted to the erection of a screen in the Corinthian style, designed by a certain Mr. Burrough, afterwards Master of Caius College, Cambridge. A little before this time the old stalls, which had survived the Puritan period were replaced: a writer describes them, in the early half of the seventeenth century, as standing in two rows, an upper and lower, on each side, with the archbishop’s wood throne above them on the south side. This chair he mentions as “sometime richly guilt, and otherwise well set forth, but now nothing specious through age and late neglect. It is a close seat, made after the old fashion of such stalls, called thence faldistoria; only in this they differ, that they were moveable, this is fixt.”

Thus wrote Somner in a.d. 1640: the dilapidated throne of which he speaks was replaced, in a.d. 1704, by a splendid throne with a tall Corinthian canopy, and decorated with carving by Grinling Gibbons, the gift of Archbishop Tenison, who also set up new stalls. At the same time Queen Mary the Second presented new and magnificent furniture for the altar, throne, stalls of the chief clergy, and pulpit. Since then many alterations have been made. The old altar and screen have been removed, and a new reredos set up, copied from the screen work of the Lady Chapel in the crypt; and Archbishop Tenison’s throne has given place to a lofty stone canopy. In 1834 owing to its tottering condition the north-west tower of the nave had to be pulled down. It was rebuilt on an entirely different plan by Mr. George Austin, who, with his son, also conducted a good deal of repairing and other work in the cathedral and the buildings connected with it. A good deal of the external stonework had to be renewed, but the work was carried out judiciously, and only where it was absolutely necessary. On the west side of the south transept a turret has been pulled down and set up again stone by stone. The crypt has been cleared out and restored, and its windows have been reopened. The least satisfactory evidences of the modern hand are the stained glass windows, which have been put up in the nave and transepts of the cathedral. The Puritan trooper had wrought havoc in the ancient glass, smashing it wherever a pike-thrust could reach; and modern piety has been almost as ruthless in erecting windows which are quite incredibly hideous.

In September, 1872, Canterbury was once more damaged by fire, just about seven hundred years after the memorable conflagration described by Gervase. On this occasion, however, the damage did not go beyond the outer roof of the Trinity Chapel. The fire broke out at about half-past ten in the morning, and was luckily discovered before it had made much progress, by two plumbers who were at work in the south gutter. According to the “Builder” of that month, “a peculiar whirring noise” caused them to look inside the roof, and they found three of the main roof-timbers blazing. “The best conjecture seems to be that the dry twigs, straw, and similar dÉbris, carried into the roof by birds, and which it has been the custom to clear at intervals out of the vault pockets, had caught fire from a spark that had in some way passed through the roof covering, perhaps under a sheet raised a little at the bottom by the wind.” Assistance was quickly summoned, and “by half-past twelve the whole was seen to be extinguished. At four o’clock the authorities held the evening service, so as not to break a continuity of custom extending over centuries; and in the smoke-filled choir, the whole of the Chapter in residence, in the proper Psalm (xviii.), found expression for the sense of victory over a conquered enemy.”

Thus little harm was done, but it must have been an exciting crisis while it lasted. “The bosses [of the vaulting], pierced with cradle-holes, happened to be well-placed for the passage of the liquid lead dripping on the back of the vault from the blazing roof,” which poured down on to the pavement below, on the very spot which Becket’s shrine had once occupied. “Through the holes further westward water came, sufficient to float over the surfaces of the polished Purbeck marble floor and the steps of the altar, and alarmed the well-intentioned assistants into removing the altar, tearing up the altar-rails, etc., etc. The relics of the Black Prince, attached to a beam (over his tomb) at the level of the caps of the piers on the south side of Trinity Chapel, were all taken down and placed away in safety. The eastern end of the church is said to have been filled with steam from water rushing through with, and falling on, the molten lead on the floor; and, in time, by every opening, wood-smoke reached the inside of the building, filling all down to the west of the nave with a blue haze.” The scene in the building is said to have been one of extraordinary beauty, but most lovers of architecture would probably prefer to view the fabric with its own loveliness, unenhanced by numerous streams of molten lead pouring down from the roof.

Since that date Canterbury Cathedral has been happy in the possession of no history, and we pass on, therefore, to the examination in detail of its exterior.