By C. E. Pouting, F.S.A. 



181 



is probably less than it originally was, for it is almost certain that 

 there has been some raising of the floor level.) These proportions 

 (which it is rendered more difficult to realize from the recent 

 lengthening of the nave westward) — the great height as compared 

 to length — are an almost certain proof of Saxon work. 



Only one of the windows of this period remains, that on the 

 north side of the eastern half : this is very symetrically-formed 

 for the period — the jambs being vertical and parallel and not 

 tapering as is not unusual — but I have no doubt of its pre-Norman ' 

 origin ; it has a semi-circular head and wide inside splay, which is 

 carried round jambs and head and as a slope to the sill. There is 

 no outer splay to this window, which is placed very high up, the 

 arch coming within a few inches of the top of the wall. There was 

 doubtless a corresponding window in the south wall opposite, but 

 it has given way to a three-light window inserted in the fifteenth 

 century. No windows appear to have existed in the side walls of 

 the western half of the nave, which must have received its light 

 from the west end — whatever original windows were here, however, 

 were destroyed and others inserted long ago, before the recent 

 demolition of the wall. There are the usual north and south 

 doorways at about the centre of the Saxon nave, both of which are 

 now blocked. Their inside arches are alike, but the outer arch of 

 the north doorway is richer than the other ; it has a small roll 

 member and a double diaper ornament on the arch stones — the 

 latter was probably cut as a subsequent embellishment. The arch, 

 tympanum, and parts of the jambs only, exist here ; a sixteenth 

 century doorway with square head has been inserted under the 

 arch when the early jambs were much cut away. The south 

 doorway, too, has only parts of its outer arch left. 



The chancel arch is a fine one of a very early type : it is semi- 

 circular with plain soffit unmoulded, and enriched on the nave 

 side only by a very early kind of diaper ornament carved on the 

 face of the voussoirs ; the jambs, like the arch, are built with square 

 edges and they are not ornamented : there is a chamfered abacus at 

 the springing level. The width is lift 4in. between the jambs and 

 the height from nave floor to springing is lift. 5in. The wall in 



