A HISTORY OF SUSSEX 



Normandy owned land and churches in the county, and in many cases had 

 their cells in Sussex. Many of the sea-coast and some inland parish 

 churches show traces of foreign influence largely due to this connexion, but 

 in some cases merely owing to nearness to the Continent. The following 

 may be instanced mostly twelfth-century examples : East Dean (West 

 Sussex), Climping, Ford, Lyminster, Rustington, East Preston, Angmering, 

 Ferring, Broadwater, Lancing, New Shoreham, Steyning, Bramber, Rotting- 

 dean, Newhaven, Bishopstone, Seaford, Westdean and Eastdean (East 

 Sussex), Eastbourne, Hellingly, Guestling, Icklesham, Brede, and Rye. 

 Chichester Cathedral and Boxgrove Priory church also show foreign charac- 

 teristics, as, e.g., in the square abacus, retained well into the thirteenth 

 century. 



The influence of wealthy families must likewise be remembered, 

 particularly in such cases as those where the architecture wears a foreign 

 look. The de Warennes at Lewes, the de Braoses at Bramber and 

 Shoreham,* the family of de Hauterive, Earl Roger de Montgomery and his 

 successors in Arundel and the neighbourhood, Gilbert de Aquila and his 

 successors at Pevensey these and many other lords, and later the wealthy 

 merchants who traded with France and the Low Countries, contributed to 

 keep up a certain foreign strain, noticeable especially in these sea-coast 

 churches. So late as about 1537 we find a window with tracery of French 

 character put into the chantry chapel of the Oxenbridges in Brede church. 



Chichester Cathedral, the successor of the original Saxon cathedral 

 (now under the sea, at Selsey), was in building under Bishop Ralph, 1091 to 

 1 1 08, when the eastern limb and the transepts were consecrated. The 

 nave was in progress when the partial fire of 1114 occurred, the restoration 

 and completion of the building occupying the greater part of the twelfth 

 century. 5 The work is rude, and for the most part plain, but it is possible 

 to distinguish periods of execution in the details, although the original plan 

 seems to have been adhered to. In 1186-7 another and more destructive 

 fire made the cathedral almost a ruin. To this calamity, however, it owes 

 its most beautiful and characteristic features, in the remodelling of the 

 nave and the rebuilding of the retro-quire under Bishop Seffrid II, between 

 118799. It is evident, however, that there was no real pause at this date 

 in the building operations. The transformation of the rude early work, the 

 adding of chapels, porches, and sacristy, the building of upper stories to the 

 western towers, and of the lantern to the central tower, and even of 

 additional aisles to the narrow-aisled nave all this and more was in progress, 

 almost unceasingly, up to and beyond the death of Bishop Ralph Neville in 

 1244. The Galilee porch at the west end dates from about 1260. After this 

 the next landmark is the extension and partial rebuilding of the Lady 

 Chapel, under Bishop Gilbert de Sancto Leophardo (12881301). Later 

 still are the great windows of the transepts the south early, and the north 



' It is curious to note that some of the same peculiarities in detail are found in the quire of New Shore- 

 ham church and in the late twelfth-century arcades of Reigate church, Surrey (see post). Both churches 

 were built by the de Braoses, or under their influence. 



* There are reasons for believing that the ground story and triforium of the nave, and the corresponding 

 stages of the two western towers, were completed by 1130 or 1140. The church was only consecrated in 

 1 1 84, and among the last works to be finished was the vaulting of the Lady Chapel of Bishop Ralph by 

 Bishop Hilary, 1147-69. 



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