The Architecture of Malmesbury Abbey Church. 89 



was desirable to have as much blank wall as might be ; the arches 

 therefore have bold projecting responds. The object of this 

 arrangement, which may be seen in many other Norman churches, 

 is to get as much uninterrupted backing for the stalls as possible. 

 It follows thus, although the lantern is a square, and not an oblong, 

 like Stanley and Bath, the side arches are very much narrower 

 than the east and west ones. Hence they are very much stilted, 

 to keep them at the same level. One wonders they were not 

 pointed, as in the earlier example at St. Bartholomew's in London, 

 and the later in Oxford Cathedral ; and we might be tempted to 

 ask whether this non-use of the pointed arch, where one would 

 naturally have looked for it, does not prove the nave arcades to be 

 of later design ? But love of at least comparative uniformity might 

 induce the architects to make them all semicircular, while to have 

 the eastern and western arches — the most prominent arches in 

 the church — pointed, would seem a further development beyond 

 using that form in the arcades of the nave. 



Over the arches are some traces of Norman ornaments which 

 have been cut through by a Perpendicular vault. This is the usual 

 fate of Norman lanterns, to have a great part of what was origin- 

 ally open to the church cut off by a later roof. In many cases this 

 was done in order to hang bells in the tower, and in some cases, as 

 at Winchester and Romsey, it seems to have been connected with 

 the destruction of a previously existing campanile. Here however, 

 as we shall presently see, this was not the state of things, but the 

 reverse. The change therefore seems the more wanton ; but we 

 may probably find its cause in a consideration of practical expedi- 

 ency. The choir, as we have seen, was under the tower, and we 

 have no reason to suppose the monks of Malmesbury to have been 

 more impervious to cold than other mortals ; to diminish the height 

 of the choir might therefore be an important gain in point of 

 practical comfort. 



The character of the central tower, which these arches supported, 

 we can only conjecture. We only know that it was crowned by 

 an enormously lofty spire, but that both tower and spire fell some 

 time before the dissolution and were never rebuilt. Perhaps we 



