ECCLESIASTICAL ARCHITECTURE 



Font covers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries some of which 

 have been destroyed have been recorded at Battle, West Grinstead, Nut- 

 hurst, Patching, Sedlescombe, Sompting, and Ticehurst the last two 

 singularly interesting and elaborate structures with doors. That at Ticehurst 

 has much late tracery of Flemish character. Good seventeenth-century 

 covers remain at Penhurst and Trotton. 



Of ancient wooden doors there are singularly few examples, nor are 

 there many mediaeval door fittings remaining. Arundel, Barlavington, 

 Chichester Cathedral, 

 Coates, Pulborough, 

 Rye, Steyning, Ter- 

 wick, Ticehurst, Trot- 

 ton, and Westbourne, 

 are almost all the old '. t 



examples left. Ter- 



wick west door has the 



original hinges of the 



twelfth century, and 



two of the doors at 



Trotton have very graceful hinges (c. 1290), while the door at Coates is a 



perfect example of early sixteenth-century work. The north door and some 



internal doors at Chichester Cathedral retain their original hinges, roses, and 



scutcheons. The south door at Botolphs church is dated 1612, and that at 



Wadhurst 1682. 



The screen-work is scanty and mostly of plain character, but there are 

 more examples of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries than in any other 

 county. The germ of the rood-screen of a later period is found in the 

 rood-beam, such as the remarkable beam with the double billet moulding 

 upon it (date c. 1120) across the east wall of the nave at Old Shoreham. 

 At Binsted the ends of another early rood-beam, richly moulded (date 

 c. 1260) have been left sawn offin the wall, at a height of about 7 ft. from the 

 floor ; while at Bury we have a rood-beam of about 1280, which now crowns 

 a screen of the fifteenth century. A complete chancel screen of about 

 the date 1270 is found at Old Shoreham, with very beautiful trefoil-arched 

 openings and trefoil piercings above, having slender octagonal shafts and a 

 battlemented cornice. This plainly never had a gallery or loft. Of about 

 the same date is the low screen at the east end of the south aisle of Rodmell 

 church (it is not clear that this is its original position) , having a battlemented 

 cresting and delicately moulded quatrefoil and trefoil tracery of very early 

 design. A truly magnificent piece of thirteenth-century screen-work 

 (c. 1290), in a state of almost untouched perfection, is found in the rood- 

 screen dividing the nave of St. Mary's Hospital, Chichester, from the 

 chancel. This consists of eight bays of window-like tracery on moulded 

 shafts, each bay under a crocketed pediment between pinnacles. The two 

 centre bays form the ' holy doors,' and their posts are carried up to give 

 support to a richly-moulded beam, with carved scroll-work of bold design on 

 its soffit, ' curling ' off the beam in a very original manner. For beauty and 

 antiquity combined this screen is perhaps unrivalled, especially taken in 

 conjunction with the perfect returned quire stalls of the same early date. 



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