34) 
“96 
history, for numerous flowing lines incised thereon—to the unin- 
structed eye mere accidental scratches—were to those familiar 
with such things the Medizval drawings of the Architect or mason 
who designed the windows. To Mr. J. O. Scott is due the credit 
of being the first to discover this the largest amount of Medizval 
detail drawings that exists. Collecting again together beneath 
the central Tower—in view of the inverted arches, the work of 
the fourteenth century, thrown across the North and South Tran- 
septs and West arch of Tower, for the purpose of strengthening 
the central piers of the Tower—the Members listened to Mr. 
Irvine as he went into the history of the early beginnings and 
later additions of the structure. 
Ina, he said, was probably the original founder of a Church here in 704 
with a body of priests attached. Edward the Elder founder the See of 
Wells (905 to 910), but little is known of the Saxon Cathedral which existed 
about thistime. Inthe stone Church erected possibly about 790, Brihthelm, 
one of the Bishops of this period, was buried. Bishop Gisa, who succeeded 
Dudue (1060 to 1088), built a Cloister and Refectory. To him succeeded 
John de Villula, 1088, a Frenchman from Tours, who was appointed to 
Wells by William Rufus, and was the first Bishop after the Norman 
conquest. He paid but little attention to Wells, however, as one of the first 
things he did was to remove the See to Bath (1091 or 1092). Godfrey, who 
succeeded him in 1123, did not do much for Wells. To his successor, 
however, Bishop Robert (1136 to 1165-6) was due the repairs of the Saxon 
Cathedral probably, together with the rebuilding of the Presbytery in 
Norman times. The next Bishop, Reginald Fitz-Jocelin, who had been 
Abbot of St. Excuperantius, at Corbeil, as early as 1174, and was therefore 
well up in pointed work, and was Bishop between 1174 and 1191, commenced 
rebuilding ; and to him may be attributed the architectural part (but not the 
figures) of the West front. Savaric who succeeded him was Bishop of Bath 
and Glastonbury, and may be passed over. And now we come to Jocelin 
of Wells (1206 to 1242), who, though connected with Chichester, was truly 
a Wells man, and may be said to have been the builder of the wing of the 
Cathedral as it now stands, i.e., the Transepts and what are now the three 
Western arches of the Choir. He seems to have begun from the Presbytery 
and pulled down all, including the West front of the old Saxon Church, 
which stood much short of the inside of the present front, He probably 
——-s % 
