182 



Notes on Churches visited in 1898. 



which it is built is 3ft. 5£in. thick : that the arch itself is an insertion 

 is shown by the relieving arch not being carried up from the 

 springing — on the north side it starts about 3ft. and on the 

 south about 2ft. 3in. above that point, and I am informed by the 

 Kector that the arch was raised from the level of the parts of the 

 relieving arch seen below, in 1812, to make room for a family pew. 



There is a piscina of decidedly early type in the south wall of 

 the nave, about 4ft. from the east end, and a later one in the corres- 

 ponding position in the north wall. In the chanbel, near the 

 south-east angle, is a detached piscina 3ft. high, consisting of a 

 circular shaft let into the paving, and having a " cushion " cap 

 lOin. square, and a curious circular base very like the cap at 

 Jarrow, which is illustrated in Hickman and other works. Inside 

 the new doorway of the extended nave is a stoup, the bowl of 

 which is very similar to this base. Rickman calls this Jarrow cap 

 Saxon (and it certainly gives one that impression) , but Parker, in 

 his later work 1 states that it has been proved that the Church was 

 built under Walcher, Bishop of Durham, after 1075. There is a 

 fragment of Norman soulpture built into the south wall of the 

 nave showing a head, the cap of a column, and parts of two arches. 



The early walls do not appear to have had any buttress or pilasters 

 at the quoins. The Rector states that when the chancel floor was 

 laid in 1865 there were found the foundations of the Saxon apse 

 and that a low window was at some previous period of restoration 

 destroyed in the south walls of the chancel, where the lower jambs 

 of a doorway still exist. 



The font, which is illustrated in Paley's Baptismal Fonts, is a 

 circular one of " tub " shape with tapered sides, 2ft. 9in. in diameter 

 at the top, and is richly ornamented by ten arched panels filled 

 with figures which are as follows — all excepting No. 2 are trampling 

 on crouched figures at the foot : the inscriptions (which are here 

 literally transcribed) recording the names of the principal figures 

 (eight of which represent Virtues) are cut on the arches of the 

 openings, and those of the minor figures (eight of which are 



Introduction to Gothic Architecture, 



