By Harold Brakspear, F.S.A. 



227 



over the vestry, chapter-house, and warming-house, was the great 

 dorter or dormitory of the canonesses. It was approached by a 

 flight of steps contained in the thickness of the west wall of the 

 vestry, but the lower steps were destroyed and the upper part of 

 the staircase walled up solid after the suppression. At the foot of 

 the staircase is a small square lobby vaulted with semi-octagonal 

 ribs and entered from the cloister by a segmental-headed doorway 

 of two chamfered members — the outer resting on jamb shafts with 

 moulded caps and bases. The door was fastened on the inside 

 with a draw bar. 



The staircase is covered by a wagon vault with cross ribs at 

 intervals. It was lighted under the original pentice cloister by a 

 window formed of two pointed arches resting on detached columns 

 with moulded caps and bases, 1 and above the cloister roof by a 

 small trefoil window, now blocked up. Against the east side was 

 a wooden hand-rail ; the plug holes for its fixing to the wall still 

 remain. 



The side walls of the dorter were pierced by small lancet 

 windows ; the south jamb and sill of the southernmost towards the 

 cloister still remain. Above it are the remains of a hollow moulded 

 blocking course that ran under the eaves of the original roof. 

 Portions of a similar blocking course are also in the upper part of 

 the east walls of the vestry and chapter-house, and show that the 

 projecting part of these chambers originally had an upper story, 

 probably in connection with the dorter. 2 



Late in the 14th century considerable alterations were made to 

 the dorter. The north end was lengthened some 22 feet across the 

 rere-dorter and its drain, and a new gable built above the north 



1 As the head of this opening was above the level of the vaulting of the 

 fifteenth century cloister, the whole was refaced at that time by a smaller 

 two-light window with cusped heads, protected with cross bars but not glazed, 

 which still retains traces of colour decoration. 



2 At Burnham the dorter was of one width throughout, the chapter-house 

 alone projecting beyond the range, and the projecting part was covered by a 

 pentice roof. At the small Cistercian house of Calder was a similar 

 arrangement over the projecting part of the chapter-house, as at Lacock, 

 covered by a roof parallel to the dorter roof. 



