136 MEDIAEVAL FLOOR TILES. 



the superfluous material had been cleaned off, the " quarrel" thus 

 obtained was burnt in a kiln. 



The final process was to dip these tiles in a yellow-tinted 

 metallic glaze, in which the lead and perhaps a little decomposed 

 brass acted on the iron and salt in the clay, and fire them once 

 more, and they were then ready for use. If the different kinds 

 of clay used happened to be of unequal drying qualities, the 

 firing sometimes bulged or cracked them, as is shown in some of 

 our Fordington examples. To obviate this evil the makers usually 

 pierced the reverse of the tile while it was soft with dozens of 

 small holes of the size made by a packing needle, but this was 

 not always successful. Very slow firing was, I think, the most 

 certain road to the desired finish. Modern manufacturers have 

 failed to match the variegated admixture of ruddy brownish 

 green and old gold, which you see on those specimens I have 

 placed in the show case on the table. The reproduction craze 

 of the Victorian era has introduced us to churches with 

 " restored " pavements of staring red combined with glaring 

 white, fondly imagined to be faithful copies of mediaeval tiles. 

 But they have been merely imitated from excavated fragments 

 which had lost their glaze through centuries of wear. I have 

 here several samples in mint preservation to show you what St. 

 George's floor looked like in the days when John, afterwards 

 Cardinal, Morton was our prebendal rector, and I venture to say 

 that not a vestige of red or white would appear on its whole 

 surface. You could then walk upon a pavement burnished after 

 the manner of the streets of the New Jerusalem. A rich sheen 

 of dark green glaze, blended at times with a tint of brown, 

 formed a velvety background, whereon stood out depicted in 

 golden yellow the armorial bearings of kings, nobles, and 

 bishops, the vine and the ivy inter-twining the eagle, the griffin, 

 and the dragon of St. George, and the whole, bordered by the 

 fret key-pattern, ending at the intersections with the mysterious 

 fylfot cross. Such was the floor pressed by the knees of the 

 worshippers in old St. George's in the days of its prebendal 

 glory. 



