105 DALE CHURCH : ITS STRUCTURAL PECULIARITIES. 



Depedale and its appurtenances were bestowed upon it. One of 

 the conditions was that " a priest of the congregation should every 

 day for ever celebrate, within the chapel of Depedale, mass " for 

 the donor's, etc., souls. The remains of the altar in the chancel, 

 hacked away in true Reformation style, indicate that masses were 

 said there to the last. 



(6) AVe now come to the fifteenth-century metamorphosis. 

 Whatever its object, it is clear enough that a new function was 

 added to the structure. So far as I am aware, history is silent as 

 to its nature ; but Mr. Kerry has probably again struck the right 

 note when he suggests that it was the Abbey Infirmary. The 

 large upper hall would admirably serve the purpose, as the sick 

 and infirm would be able to both see and hear the priest at the 

 altar ; and the new wing would furnish other necessary chambers. 

 And equally well would an anchorite below in his own apartment, 

 and a simple layman in the nave, see and hear ; yet each would 

 be invisible to the other spectators. 



It was a by no means unusual arrangement for domestic and 

 other chapels to have their rear portion divided into two stories, 

 each opening into a common chancel of one story. Parker, in 

 his M'edieTal Domestic Architecture, gives several examples, 

 notably those of East Hundred (Berkshire), Berkeley Castle, 

 Ghibburn (Northumberland), Trecarrel House (Cornwall), Godstow 

 Nunnery, VVigston Hospital (Leicester), and Sherbo.ne Alms- 

 houses (Dorset) : and Cutts, in his Middle Ages, mentions 

 similar arrangements at Chobham Preceptory, in a chapel at 

 Tewkesbury Abbey Church, and elsewhere. These western 

 chambers of domestic chapels, at least, " usually had fire-places 

 (it is just possible that the large 'abutment' at Dale was the 

 basement of a chimney-stack that supplied the upper chamber 

 with a fire-place), and it would appear that they were not 

 exclusively devoted to sacred purposes. When the chapel was 

 used, the upper room was the place for the lord and his family, 

 or guests ; the lower, for the domestics, or sometimes the upper 

 room was for ladies." * 



* Parker, Vol. III. 



