174 ARCHITECTURAL STYLES IN FORDINGTON CHURCH. 



The church (whether Romano- British or Saxon) may have 

 suffered in consequence, and been left neglected and uncared for. 



There was also another reason, viz., it is known that building 

 operations were greatly retarded towards the end of the loth 

 century in consequence of a generally prevailing idea that the 

 end of the world was near. 



Again, if it were a Saxon Church, there is not the smallest 

 evidence of any " long-and-short " work remaining, or any copy 

 of timber forms in stone, as is the case in some of the Saxon 

 remains in this country. 



St. Aldhelm was Bishop at Sherborne in 705, and this was one 

 of the churches belonging to his diocese, Sherborne then being 

 the cathedral church. Herman, one of his successors, got the 

 Pope and King to allow him to transfer the seat of his church 

 and Bishopric to Old Sarum ; consequently Sherborne dimin- 

 ished in importance. Osmund was Herman's successor, and he 

 is said to have endowed this church. By birth a Norman noble, 

 nephew of Robert, Duke of Normandy, he came to England in 

 1066, and was appointed Bishop of Sarum 1078. He shortly 

 after obtained a grant of land from his uncle out of the Royal 

 Manor of Fordington, with which he endowed the Prebend and 

 Canonry of Fordington in his new cathedral. Adjoining Salis- 

 bury Field, Dorchester (note the coincidence of the name with 

 that of the Cathedral City), the prebendal mansion stood. He 

 also had a share in the compilation of the Domesday Survey of 

 1086. He consecrated the Norman restoration of the pre- 

 Norman Church on this site in 1092. He died at Old Sarum 

 in 1099, and his remains were translated to Salisbury Cathedral. 

 In 1456 Bp. Osmund was canonized by the Pope. He is said to 

 have written a " Life of St. Aldhelm." 



With the influx of the conquering Normans, the Norman style 

 of ecclesiastical architecture asserted itself, and was universally 

 adopted, and there can be no doubt it deserved the preference 

 given to it. 



It is said that communication between England and other 

 countries can be traced from the year 674 or thereabouts on 



