274 Recent Excavations on the site of Shaftesbury Abbey. 



in large churches of early Norman date.^ In this instance it is 

 likely that the gradual increase in the importance of the Abhey, 

 and the popularity which it had acquired by the translation thither 

 of the body of St. Edward the Martyr, in 982, demanded a larger 

 Church than the one which had been erected by King Alfred. 



All the walls hitherto discovered are at least 7 feet in thickness, 

 and the width of the Presbytery from the apse westward is 28 feet, 

 a measurement nearly equal to the corresponding portion of the 

 Abbey Church of St. Alban (also erected during the Norman period) 

 and indicating a church not less than 350 or 400 feet in length 

 from East to West. The tower (said to have been surmounted by 

 a lofty spire) was in all probability central, as at St. Alban's, and 

 there is also another point of resemblance between the ancient 

 Norman plan of St. Alban's as engraved by Messrs. Buckler,^ and 

 that of Shaftesbury so far as the examination hitherto permits. 

 Each terminated in a semicircular apse, which was divided by a 

 solid wall from the aisle on either side. The floor of the Presbytery 

 is paved throughout with encaustic tiles of various patterns, but 

 very much worn, and rises gradually eastward, by a gentle slope 

 from (a) to (b); at which point is a single step. There were apparently 

 three others at the entrance to the apse (c), and still further eastward 

 were distinct traces of several more on which the Altar anciently 

 stood. In a straight line and at a distance of nearly 40 feet west- 

 ward from the point a, the ground was opened, and a continuation 

 of the tile paving found at an additional depth of 17 inches, thus 

 showing the height of the pavement of the apse, and the elevation 

 of the Altar above the level of the western portion of the Church, 

 which yet remains to be uncovered. 



The grave (e) formed of large stones, built in the solid wall,^ was 



* As in the Cathedrals of Norwich and Peterborough. In several instances 

 traces of the ancient semicircular apse may still be found, although the super- 

 structure has been altered, or rebuilt, at a later period ; as at Gloucester, 

 Canterbury, and Winchester, where the crypts still retain the semicircular form. 



2 History of the Architectiu-e of the Abbey Church of St. Alban, 1847, p. 9. 



^ The situation of this grave, on the North side of the High Altar, is probably 

 not far from the spot in which the body of St. Edward the Martyr is said to 

 have been interred. 



