A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



work, and above the wainscot there was a fair 

 large picture of our Saviour Christ, the Blessed 

 Mary and St. John, in fine gilt work and excellent 

 colours.'*- The ' picture ' had been washed 

 over in lime, and the wainscot bore an inscription 

 recording its erection by Prior Castell in July 

 1518. On the left of the entrance doorway 

 was a strong aumbry in the stone wall, with ' a 

 fine work of carved wainscot before it . . . that 

 none could perceive that there was any aumbry 

 at all,'''^ in which was kept aU the chief plate 

 used in the Frater house on festival days," and 

 on the right a large wooden aumbry or cupboard, 

 ' having divers ambries within it, finely wrought 

 and varnished all over,' which contained the 

 table linen, salts, mazers, cups and other things 

 pertaining to the frater house and loft.'* The 

 frater pulpit is referred to as ' a convenyent 

 place at the south end of the hie table within a 

 faire glasse wyndour, invyroned with iron, and 

 certain steppes of stone with iron rayles of the 

 one side to go up to it and to support an iron 

 desk there placed ' ;** here one of the novices 

 read some part of the Old and New Testament 

 during dinner time. 



The frater is said to have retained the name 

 of the Petty Canons' Hall till Dr. Sudbury 

 erected the Library in its place.*' Nothing of it 

 has survived except the wall at the east end, 

 which is part of the west wall of the first dorter. 

 The long north and south walls are Sudbury's, 

 but the tall two-light windows** date only from 

 1858 and the embattled parapets are also modern. 

 Sudbury's doorway in the cloister, however, 

 remains unaltered and is characteristic of the 

 period, with semicircular keystoned arch below 

 a classic entablature supported by Doric pilasters 

 on panelled pedestals.** The oak bookcases 

 and other furnishings of the Library and of the 

 hbrarian's room adjoining it on the west, 



*- Ri(ei, Fowler's notes, 258. 



*^ Ibid. 81. The keyhole of the lock was under the 

 wainscot. 



** Tliis included ' a goodly great mazer called 

 Judas Cupp ' which was used only on Maundy Thurs- 

 day, when the prior and the whole convent met in 

 the frater, and a cup called Saint Bede's Bowl ; 

 Rita, 80. 



** An inventory of the plate, drawn up in 1446, is 

 printed in Rius, 8l. 



*' Ibid. 82. The base of the pulpit was identiiied 

 by Sir William Hope, built against the south wall 

 outside and covering three bays ; it is below the 

 present passage from the kitchen to the Deanery ; 

 ibid. Fowler's notes, 260. 



*'' Riles of Durh., Hunter's 2nd ed. (1743), 95- 



*' They have four-centred heads and cinquefoiled 

 lights ; no attempt was made to reproduce Sudbury's 

 windows. 



*' The building of the Library was not finished at 

 the time of Sudbury's death in 1684, but he left 

 instructions in his wdl for its completion by his 

 executors. 



128 



which partly occupies the place of the Loft,*" 



are of Sudbury's time. 



Below the hbrarian's room are the * Covey ' 

 and a cellar north of it. This cellar, which runs 

 east and west, has a restored window to the 

 cloister and a square opening in the middle of its 

 vault ; beside the door leading to it from the 

 covey is a small opening which has had a small 

 door and fastenings as if to serve drink from 

 the cellar to the covey without opening the 

 door." Between the cellar and the sub-vault 

 of the west range is another doorway, now 

 blocked. 



The MONKS' LAVER stood in the cloister 

 garth ' over against the fraterhouse door,' and 

 is described in Rites as ' being made in forme 

 round, covered with lead, and all of marble 

 saving the verie uttermost walls.' *^ The basin 

 had in it ' many little conduits and spouts of 

 brass, with twenty-four cocks of brass round 

 about it,' and in the walls were ' seven *' fair 

 windows of stonework ' with a dovecote on top 

 covered with lead. The basin still exists in the 

 centre of the garth, but is not in its original 

 position. The foundations of the Laver house 

 were discovered in 1903, opposite the eighth 

 bay (from the east) of the garth wall.^ There is 

 reason to believe that the structure was of 

 13th-century date,"** and that it had been joined 

 to Skirlaw's cloister alley by a short length of 

 pentise. A statement of accounts still preserved 

 shows, however, that the basin and trough sur- 

 rounding it were made in 1432-3 and that the 

 marble came from Eggleston.^* The basin is 

 wrought from a single block and is octagonal in 

 form, the sides sloping outwards, each with a 

 blank shield in the middle and another at each 

 angle.'"" It now rests on the ground, but was 



*" After the Dissolution the loft was made the 

 dining room of the fifth prebend's house, and after 

 the suppression of six of the prebendaries it was con- 

 verted to its present purpose ; Rites, Fowler's notes, 

 269. 



« Ibid. 268. 62 Hites, 82. 



63 This shows that it was octagonal externally, the 

 eighth side containing the entrance from the cloister 

 alley, to wliich it was attached. ' The building appears 

 not to have been vaulted, but to have had a wooden 

 ceiling surmounted by a pyramidal roof covered with 

 lead and containing a dovecote ' ; Hope, Arch. 

 Iviii, 447. The dovecote was probably a later 

 addition. 



6* The foundations of a small 12th-century lavatory 

 were also found on the same site, as already stated, 

 together with a channel for the lead pipe and a well 

 of the same period. The discoveries then made are 

 fuUy described by Sir William Hope in Arch. Iviii, 



444-57- ... , ^ 



66 The evidence for this is given at length, op. cit. 



452. 



«» Ibid. 448. 



6* The diameter of the basin is 7 ft. and it is hollowed 



