Cathedral Cities of England Part 13

In the years 1884 to 1891 excavations were conducted on the site of the old "Angel Inn," when it was discovered that it had been a Roman burial-place. Amongst the debris were found several funeral urns. Under St. Peter's at Gowts was brought to light a Roman altar, and remains of a Roman villa were unearthed at Greetwell. In the same year, that is to say 1884, the Blue Coat School was closed, its endowments were given to the Middle School, and the buildings were sold to the Church Inst.i.tute.

Within the last few years two memorable events occurred. In the year 1884 the See of Lincoln was deprived of the county of Nottingham, which was transferred from that see to the See of Southwell. This was followed shortly afterwards by the great lawsuit called "The Lincoln Judgment."

Great controversy arose and came to a climax. In the year 1888 Dr. King, the Bishop of Lincoln, was cited before his metropolitan, Dr. Benson, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to answer charges of various ritual offences alleged to have been committed by himself at the administration of the Holy Communion.

The action was brought by certain gentlemen of Lincoln interested in the doings of their prelate. Their religious scruples had been outraged, it appears, on two separate occasions; namely, in the Church of St. Peter's at Gowts on December 4, 1887, and in the Cathedral on December 10 of the same year. An appeal had been made to the Archbishop to restrain these illegal practices. The celebrated ecclesiastical lawsuit was heard in 1888. The judgment was confined to the declarations of the law, which were summarised. No monition or sentence was p.r.o.nounced against the Bishop of Lincoln for having committed breaches of the ecclesiastical law. The dissension has happily ended. The Bishop of Lincoln has conformed his practice to the Archbishop's judgment from the date of its delivery, and still retains his bishopric. Thus has ended the conflict between the Primate and the Suffragan, which agitated, for a brief s.p.a.ce of time, the opponents of offences of ritualism, and brought about the famous Lincoln Judgment.

Bath

Baden-ceaster.

("Doomsday Book.")

On the banks of the river Avon, in the County of Somersets.h.i.+re, is situated the beautiful and ancient city of Bath. Its ecclesiastical history is closely bound up with that of Wells, and at one time with that of Glas...o...b..ry, when it figures in the disputes concerning the See.

This unseemly quarrelling amongst prelates is now happily laid at rest.

Though lacking in all authority, Bath is the joint partner of Wells in the bishopric t.i.tle.

The origin of the city of Bath takes us far back. Perhaps the strongest link with the Roman days, besides the Roman roads, lies in the present-day existence of the Roman baths, built about 55 B.C.

These baths were probably erected to confine the hot springs, and to enjoy more thoroughly the benefit derived from the medicinal properties of these waters, which are chalybeate and saline.

Though we are told that in all probability it is a mere myth that the British king, Bladud, first founded this city of Bath, yet we are inclined to think that the presence of these springs would influence a settlement of even the nomadic British, prior to the Roman invasion.

When we remember what primitive ideas the early Britons had, we cannot wonder at the non-existence of any vestiges of their occupation. In these days of materialism one loves to respect old traditions, however uncertain they may be in substance. We would therefore give the benefit of the doubt to an early British settlement.

With the arrival of the Romans the approximate date and origin of Bath can be readily ascertained. From excavations on the place since the year 1875, it has been proved that the Romans founded here a city, which they named Aquae Solis, in the reign of Claudius. In 55 B.C. the baths had been constructed for certain. In addition to this they erected a temple to Minerva, with votive offerings, and many other buildings, and carried a line of fortifications and walls around the city. The remains of their marvellous architecture still bear testimony, though they have suffered ill-treatment and undergone restoration, to their former magnificence and grandeur.

On the retirement of the Romans Aquae Solis pa.s.sed into the hands of the Britons, under the name of Cr Palladen (the city of the waters of Pallas). During their possession of a century, two attacks made by the Saxon chieftains, lla and Cerdic, were repulsed by King Arthur.

The Saxons, by the year 577, having practically subverted the rest of the kingdom, turned their attention to the West. They seized and ravaged Bath. The Roman structures were reduced to ruins. After a while they rebuilt the walls and fortifications upon the original foundations, employing the old materials. The baths also were soon restored. By this time the Saxons had renamed the city, "Hat Bathur" (Hot baths), and "Ace-mannes-ceaster" (City of invalids). The "ceaster" tacked on to the Saxon word is the first evidence we get of the Saxon recognition of the former existence of the Roman occupation of this city.

With the spreading influence of Christianity travelling from the east to the west of England in the seventh century, a nunnery was erected here, in 676, by King Osric. This was destroyed during the wars of the Heptarchy, and on its site a college of secular canons was founded, in 775, by Offa, King of Mercia. This monarch had taken Bath from the King of Wess.e.x, and had annexed it to his own kingdom. Possibly in recognition of this victory he built an abbey in 775.

After this the city evidently increased in prosperity, for it was important enough to witness the coronation of Edgar in 973, as King of England, by Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury. At the same time Edgar converted the college of secular canons into a Benedictine monastery.

This, with the church, was again demolished by the Danes.

This city of Bath, like all other cities of that time, came under the Norman Survey, and was entered in Doomsday Book as Baden-ceaster.

William Rufus had scarce been crowned king when Bath was seized and burnt, the most part by Geoffry, Bishop of Coutances, and Robert de Mowbray. They had jointly risen in support of the claim laid to the throne of England by Robert Duke of Normandy. But under the abbacy of John de Villula it soon recovered prosperity. This abbot, on promotion to the See of Wells, about 1090, purchased the city from Henry I. He built a new church, and removed the See from Wells to this place. Here it remained till 1193, when Bishop Savaricus handed it over to Richard I., in exchange for Glas...o...b..ry Abbey.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BATH

PULTENEY BRIDGE]

About this time Bath received its first charter as a free borough from this monarch, and was represented in Parliament in 1297. In 1330 the manufacture of woollen cloth was established by the monks. By reason of this the shuttle was incorporated in the arms of the monastery. In 1447, and in 1590, Henry VI. and Elizabeth respectively granted charters, which materially increased the prospects of the city.

This present cruciform Abbey Church dates from 1499. It is dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, and forms one of the best specimens of the later style of English architecture. It rests upon the site of the conventual church of the monastery founded by Osric. After a course of eight hundred years it became dilapidated, and was rebuilt from the old materials in 1495, by Bishop Oliver King. He is said to have been admonished in a dream. He did not live to see the completion of the building.

As the citizens refused to purchase it from the Commissioners of Henry VIII., the walls were left roofless till Dr. James Montague, Bishop of the Diocese, with the aid of the local n.o.bility and gentry, procured the necessary funds, and finished it in 1606.

On the west front is sculptured the founder's dream of angels ascending and descending on Jacob's ladder. The church is crowned with a quadrangular tower of 162 feet in height from the point of intersection.

Though the medicinal properties of the springs of Bath attracted from the earliest times the continuous attention of invalids, it was only under the guidance of Beau Nash, the gamester, and the enterprise of John Wood, the architect, that it reached to the highest pinnacle of fame as a place of fas.h.i.+onable resort in the eighteenth century. The works of Fielding, Smollett, Jane Austen, d.i.c.kens, Thackeray, and others, give us a clear insight into the meteor-like prosperity of the city, for, after the death of Nash, it gradually relapsed to its normal state, and, in fact, according to statistics, the number of inhabitants has decreased even within the last few years.

A brief sketch of Beau Nash and the means adopted will account in some measure for the marvellous change in Bath in the eighteenth century.

Nash was educated at Carmarthen Grammar School, and Jesus College, Oxford. He then obtained a commission in the army. This he soon threw up to become a law-student at the Middle Temple. Whilst there he gained much attention by his wit and sociability. These qualities induced his fellow-students to elect him as the president of a pageant that they prepared for William III. The king was so pleased with Nash that, it is said, he offered him a knighthood. This Nash refused unless accompanied by a pension, which was not granted.

He was much addicted to gambling, which, in addition to a restless spirit and an empty purse, led him in 1704 to try his luck at Bath, a place which then offered opportunities to a gamester. There he soon became master of the ceremonies, in succession to Captain Webster. Under his authority reforms were introduced which speedily accorded to Bath a leading position as a fas.h.i.+onable watering-place. He formed a strict code of rules for the regulation of b.a.l.l.s and a.s.semblies; allowed no swords to be worn in places of public amus.e.m.e.nt; persuaded gentlemen to discard boots for shoes and stockings when in a.s.semblies and parades, and introduced a tariff for lodgings.

As insignia of his office he wore an immense white hat, and a richly embroidered dress. He drove about in a chariot with six greys, and laced lackeys blew French horns. When Parliament abolished gambling it caused a serious check to the visits of fas.h.i.+onable people to the city.

However, the Corporation, in recognition of his valuable services, granted Nash a pension of 120 guineas a year, and at his death in 1761 he was buried with splendour at the expense of the town. A year after his demise his biography was anonymously published in London by Oliver Goldsmith.

John Wood, the architect, though hardly as well known to posterity as Nash, must not be overlooked. Till he appeared in Bath in 1728, the city had been confined strictly within the Roman limits. The suburbs consisted merely of a few scattered houses. Wood improved and enlarged the city by his architectural efforts, which led to the quarrying of freestone found existing in the neighbourhood. His successors carried on his enterprise.

The grand Pump-room, erected in 1797, with a portico of Corinthian columns; the King's Bath, with a Doric colonnade; the Queen's Bath; the Cross Bath, so called from a cross erected in the centre of it; the Hot Bath, on account of its superior degree of heat, were once thronged by fas.h.i.+onable gatherings in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

The architecture in the eighteenth century at Bath was an adaptation of the Doric and Ionic orders. Nearly all the princ.i.p.al buildings were constructed after these cla.s.sic principles. St. Michael's Church belongs to the Doric, with a handsome dome, and was erected in 1744. Even the Greek influence is the prevailing feature of Pulteney Bridge.

In conclusion, amongst eminent men of Bath may be mentioned: John Hales, Greek Professor at Oxford in 1612; and Sir Thomas Bodley, founder of the Bodleian Library at Oxford, was a native of, and received his early education in the Grammar School of this city. Benjamin Robins was born here in 1707; he was a celebrated mathematician, and wrote the account of the voyage of Commodore Anson round the world.

Amongst the tombs in the Abbey are those to the memory of Quin, Nash, Broome, Malthus, and Melmothe.

The hot springs of Bath still continue to alleviate the aches and pains of invalid visitors. The interesting history, the curious mingling of Roman and Later English architecture with the revival of the Ionic and Doric orders in the eighteenth-century buildings, can never fail to be of interest alike to the student and the casual visitor in Bath.

Salisbury

Salisberie.

("Doomsday Book.")

Salisbury affords a remarkable instance of the complete transference of the cathedral followed by the ultimate desertion of the city in the change from old Sarum, the original site, to New Sarum, another within a short distance--one might almost say within a stone's throw. In the old days of prosperity Old Sarum, now simply a conical ma.s.s of ruins, was peopled with the Belgae, who came from Gaul and ousted the original inhabitants. How this site ever came to be chosen as a desirable place of settlement seems to be rather a mystery, for even in those early days constant difficulties arose with regard to the insufficiency of water.

They aptly called it "the dry city," which is supposed to be the meaning of the old name Searobyrig, which later underwent a further contraction--Scarborough. This arid spot, however, received the attention of the Romans, who possibly were attracted by the natural advantages of defence offered by the conical mound rising abruptly, as it does, from the valley. They carried on the old name and Latinised it, as they invariably seemed to have done, or rather made a compromise between the native and their own formation, and arrived at Sorbiordunum.

The scarcity of water seems not to have deterred them in any way, as witness the many evidences of their fossae, extensive ramparts, and fortress--signs which indicate that in their hands Old Sarum was held to be of considerable importance. Roman roads branched out of it, no doubt pointing to the four cardinal points, in accordance with regular custom, though their whereabouts may be difficult to define, seeing that several centuries have pa.s.sed since the desertion of Old Sarum.

With their pa.s.sing away the Roman conquerors have left behind them many relics, possibly in their day considered worthless, but the unearthing of which has caused, for many a year, unalloyed joy and given a priceless treasure to the unwearied antiquaries. Another great source of speculation to the archaeologists has been the temple of the Druids erected some time at Stonehenge. It lies beyond the city on the great Salisbury plain. This primitive form of architecture takes us back to many years before Christ, when the early Britons wore no clothes, save the skins of animals they slew in the chase, and when they could neither read, write, weave, nor do anything which would be considered nowadays as civilising. They were to all intents and purposes mere savages, kept in control by their priests and lawgivers, the Druids, whom they held in the greatest respect. The Britons, we are told, had the additional discomfort of dwelling in holes burrowed in the ground, or in miserably constructed huts. In view of this poor state of domestic architecture, how they ever managed to erect roofless temples, as at Stonehenge and at the island of Anglesea, and to overcome, what must have been to them a very great engineering feat, the setting up of the heavy blocks of stone _in situ_, seems marvellous and not easy of explanation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SALISBURY

HIGH STREET GATEWAY INTO THE CLOSE]

The great veneration in which the Britons held these temples of the Druids is much accentuated by an incident during the second occupation of Britain by the Romans. Suetonius Paulinus, one of their greatest generals, thought that by destroying the temple at the island of Anglesea he would shake the faith of the Britons in their priests, and gain thereby a speedier conquest, much in the same way as when Clive in India knocked down Dupleix's column to undermine the French influence over the natives. In the latter case history has a.s.sured us of the ultimate fulfilment of hopes, and it was the same with Paulinus in 61, only on his return to the mainland he all but suffered a reverse from an unexpected rising of Britons under Boadicea. Nevertheless, the power of the Druids was irretrievably broken by the slaughter of their order and the felling of the groves at Anglesea, as Paulinus had foreseen. What the object and origin of these remains at Stonehenge were, still serve as an interesting matter for controversy. Competent authorities, like Geoffrey of Monmouth, Polydore Vergil, and in the eighteenth century Dr.