256 THE GROUND-PLAN OF BURTON ABBEY. 
in the roof. It was a stone building from the ground 
to the first floor, and was then a half-timbered building 
with a very fine open timber roof (plate III, fig. 1). The 
timbers are of oak, very massive, and from the form and 
mouldings of about the same date as the chapel, or a 
little earlier. This may have been the house of the Far- 
merer or Master of the infirmary. Unfortunately, we have 
nothing left to show the connection of the buildings with 
the main building, but I have no doubt if excavations were 
carried out on the west side, we should be able to clear 
up the whole plan. 
All the buildings we have before glanced at have been 
situated within the inner court, the wall of which, separ- 
ating it from the outer court, is still standing, and runs at 
the south side of the Market Hall, from the garden wall of 
what is now called The Abbey, nearly to the Abbey Gate, 
opposite the end of New Street; and the precinct wall 
branches out of it at right angles and runs along the west 
boundary wall of Mr. Smith’s garden, part of it being in 
his passage; it would then return and join the south wall 
of the church. 
The Precinct wall may be seen more or less perfect run- 
ning from the Abbey Gate down Lichfield Street, Abbey 
Street, and returning along Fleet Street down to the river. 
THE ABBEY GATE. 
The basements of which remain, is given in a drawing 
in Shaw, and remains much as it was in his time. We 
have the date of this building in the Chronicle. William 
Mathew (1424-1430) laid the first stone of the south part 
of the Abbey gate. Shaw calls this the south gate of the 
Abbey, which makes a very different thing of it. Ralph 
Henley (1432-1454) built the north side of the Abbey gate, 
not the north gate as Shaw has it. The two parts were 
connected by a big arch, as at Repton, having a small 
arched doorway on the north side, as shewn by the spring- 
ers of the arches. 
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