A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



this position a few years since. It may even be part 

 of the tomb of the foundress, Rohesia de Beauchamp, 

 though of course of later date than that of her death. 

 A drain has been discovered leading towards the 

 stream from the south-west angle of the buildings, 

 and the rere dorter must have stood in this position. 

 The kitchen must have stood near the south-west 

 angle, but the eighteenth-century builders have 

 destroyed any traces which may have remained. The 

 south wall of the church still exists to some height, 

 but the only feature of interest is the soath-west 

 doorway of the nave, of good thirteenth-century 

 work, like the rest of the building, with pairs of shafts 

 in the jambs, and an arch of two moulded orders. 



It seems clear that no work which can be contem- 

 porary with the foundation of the priory is now left 



the canons, whose buildings were at some distance 

 from the church to the north-east, had a cloister 

 about loo ft. square. At Chicksands the only re- 

 maining cloister is about 76 ft. square, and it is im- 

 possible to say to which division of the house it 

 belonged. If the ratio of size to numbers at 

 Watton may be used as a basis, it should have been 

 that of the canons, but in the absence of more definite 

 knowledge, it is advisable to leave the question open. 

 Tradition speaks of another cloister on the north 

 side of the church, and burials have been discovered 

 during the making of a garden north-east of the site 

 of the church. 



The church and one cloister were probably destroyed 

 soon after the Suppression, and the remaining cloister 

 converted into a dwelling-house. Its arrangements at 





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XI 





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Seventeenth-Century Plan of Chicksands Priory : Scale about 24 ft. to i in. 



standing, unless part of the south wall of the church may 

 be of that date, and nothing definite can be said of the 

 rest of the monastic buildings. Gilbertine houses, 

 being for a community of men and women, required 

 a double set of buildings, and the only Gilbertine 

 site which has as yet been adequately explored, that 

 of Watton Priory, Yorkshire, has yielded a very good 

 example of this arrangement."' Watton, according 

 to the statutes of the order, was the largest house in 

 the country, its full complement being 70 canons 

 and 140 nuns, while Chicksands came third with 

 5 5 canons and 1 20 nuns. The principal cloister at 

 Watton, the nuns' cloister, was 113 ft. by 98 ft., 

 and attached to the, north side of the church ; while 



a somewhat later date (seventeenth century), are fortu- 

 nately preserved as far as the ground floor is concerned, 

 in an outline plan in the possession of the present 

 owner of Chicksands and here reproduced to the same 

 scale as that showing the present arrangement. 



The eastern range, retaining its central wall, was 

 occupied as cellars, with the main entrance to the 

 cloister, 'the coming in,' at the north end, and a 

 second entrance at the south. Both these entrances 

 are shown on Buck's drawing of 1730, and may be 

 of mediaeval date, belonging respectively to the inner 

 parlour and the passage to the cemetery or infirmary. 

 The room at the south-east angle is called the chapel, 

 and the first floor of the range contained the hall. 



'^' Arch, Journ, Iviii, i. 

 274 



