1 86 DALE CHURCH : ITS STRUCTURAL PECULLARITIES. 



were inserted by the builders of the noble Abbey choir. The 

 aisle may have had a lean-to roof; but it would be more in 

 accordance with the time that it also should have a lofty gabled 

 roof. Its windows had pointed heads, and its western door 

 opened into the outer space, for there was no house adjoining. 

 It is easier to picture the structure after its fifteenth century 

 modifications and additions. Fig. 3 will give a good idea of 

 its appearance. The high pitch of the roofs indicates that they 

 were thatched. 



Documentary and Traditional Notices. The beginnings 

 of Dale Abbey form the subject-matter of a most interesting 

 chronicle by one of its thirteenth-century canons. Fragments of 

 the original and a fifteenth-century transcript are now bound up 

 with the chartulary and preserved in the British Musuem. 

 Excellent translations are to be found in Glover's Derbyshire, and 

 Vol. V. of this JourfiaL We gather from it : — 



(i) That the hermit, the first inhabitant of the place, cut out 

 of the sandstone rock on the south side of the valley, "a very 

 small dwelling, with an altar towards the south." This accounts 

 for the rock hermitage of Dale. Date, circa 1135. 



(2) A little later he received the tithe of Borrowash Mill, and 

 finding a small spring west of his dwelling, he made near it a 

 new hermitage — " a cottage, and built an oratory to the honour of 

 God and the Blessed Virgin." These, tradition has, I believe, 

 ever made the starting-point of the present Cliurch, and identified 

 the spring with the " Hermit's Well," a Hltle east of the Church. 



(3) The next event was the assignment of Depedale and its 

 appurtenances to the lady known as " the Gome of the Dale " for 

 life. Depedale was the ancient name of the spot, but it did not 

 include the site of the Abbey — a point to be noted. She iiad a 

 son whom " she caused to be ordained a priest, in order to 

 perform the Divine service in her chapel of Depedale ; and such 

 ministry he performed." Tradition again has constantly identified 

 the present Church with this chapel; and the Norman work 

 corresponds with the time of her coming to Dale, which 

 could not have been later than 1156. Was her chapel the 



