CITY OF DURHAM 



details more than once during the progress of 

 the building, especiaUy in the earlier stages, 

 and an interesting feature of these changes is a 

 departure from and subsequent return to the 

 original design for the use of detached marble 

 shafts on the piers, which are built on the arc 

 of the former apse. A change in the design of 

 the feretory platform of St. Cuthbert between 

 these piers is also to be suspected. The chapel 

 was not finished until 1280, and here again the 

 problems of vaulting seem to have occasioned 

 difficulty and delay, and possibly more than one 

 accident. The work was probably continuous, 

 and the south-east corner appears to have been 

 the point of completion, for there are indications 

 here that the southernmost pier in the east wall 

 had been standing unroofed for some time, and 

 needed repair before the vault was built. 



The junction of the chapel and the quire 

 was certainly completed in one design with the 

 rest of the chapel, the whole of this work being 

 finished between 1242 and 1255, but the details 

 of the vaulting, both of the chapel and the quire, 

 are distinctly later in character, and were 

 probably not considered until, at the earliest, 

 1270. The vault of the chapel, especially, dis- 

 plays a remarkable series of ingenious make- 

 shifts of construction. The interval of delay 

 may be traceable to the impoverishment of the 

 see by the alleged wrongful reservation of certain 

 lands by Nicholas de Farnham after his resigna- 

 tion in 1249 and the seizure by the king of the 

 rest of the temporalities. The latter were 

 probably restored on the consecration of Walter 

 de Kirkham at the end of the same year, but 

 Nicholas de Farnham lived till 1275, retaining 

 the reserved lands. As one of the first acts of 

 Walter de Kirkham was an attempt to have the 

 reservation set aside, it seems likely that the 

 money was needed for building, for, as the pope 

 pointed out, he had no case for recovery what- 

 soever.'' It is very likely, therefore, that the 

 vaulting was not begun till the bishopric of 

 Robert of Holy Island (1274), though the main 

 lines of the design were probably earlier. 



The work of the fourteenth century includes 

 no structural additions except the cloister, which 

 was begun about 1390, but was not finished 

 until 1418. The Jesse window in the west wall 

 of the nave and the window of the Four Doctors 

 in the north transept were inserted about the 

 middle of the century by Prior John Fossor, 

 who also built the fine kitchen of the monastery 

 in 1365-70. In the episcopate of Bishop Hat- 

 field the altar-screen or 'French peir'** was 



* Matt. Paris, Chron. Maj. ed. Wats, 1684, pp. 

 658, 666, 701. 



"The dedication of the high altar in 1 380 

 probably marks the completion of the ' French peir.' 



erected by John Lord Neville, and the Bishop's 

 throne, which incorporates m its design the 

 chantry tomb of this bishop, was set up by him 



c. 1375- 



Walter de Skirlaw (i 388-1406) contributed 

 largely to the work in the cloister, and the wood- 

 work of the roof near the chapter house is of his 

 time, and contains his arms. He also built the 

 dormitory at the west of the cloister. 



In the fifteenth century Thomas Langley 

 (1406-1437) made the two doorways from the 

 nave aisles to the Galilee Chapel, erected the 

 Lady Altar in the old west doorway of the nave, 

 with his own tomb before it, and also buttressed 

 the west wall of the Galilee Chapel, inserting 

 new windows, adding a new roof, and supple- 

 menting the twin columns of the arcades by 

 additional shafts (c. 1420). The Te Deum 

 window in the south transept is of c. 1430. 



About 1470 the rebuilding of the central 

 tower, which had been long failing, was under- 

 taken and the lower gallery of the lantern and the 

 arcade above it were completed in the time of 

 Bishop Laurence Booth, the belfry being added 

 about 1490, under the direction of Prior Auck- 

 land. 



From this time no additions were made, and 

 the church was fearfully despoiled at the 

 Reformation. Bishop Cosin (1660-72), however, 

 erected the stalls and tabernacle work of the 

 quire, and the font-tabernacle is his work, as 

 were also the destroyed quire screen and a fine 

 screen about the feretory, now removed. 



The church suffered much from the devasta- 

 tions of Wyatt, at the end of the eighteenth 

 and beginning of the nineteenth century, 

 when the Galilee Chapel was only saved 

 from destruction by the vigorous intervention 

 of Lord Cornwallis, then newly appointed 

 Dean, who was too late to save the chapter 

 house, which was pulled down, except its 

 most westerly portion, in 1796. The exterior 

 of the building was most horribly scraped, re- 

 ducing the Norman mouldings to mere shadows, 

 and a ridiculous ' restoration ' of the north 

 porch was carried out. The great ' rose ' 

 window in the east wall of the Chapel of the 

 Nine Altars is Wyatt's work, and is perhaps less 

 disastrous than the rest of his meddling, which 

 actually included the destruction of the old 

 stained glass of the eastern windows. 



In 1859 the central tower was restored by 

 Sir Gilbert Scott, who also supervised a restora- 

 tion (1870-76) in the course of which the quire 

 screen and pulpit were inserted, and the quire 

 stalls replaced. In 1895 the chapter house 

 was rebuilt as a memorial to Bishop Lightfoot, 

 unfortunately departing, in the vaulting of the 

 apse, from its original design, although record of 

 the latter had been preserved. 



95 



