The abbot's house, allowing for alterations, is the most perfect part of these remains, and is still habitable; its date, however, is more than two centuries later. It is Tudorfar from being of the best kind-and is diminished in extent. The upper floor still shows the abbot's refectory or hall, and the withdrawing room or parlour beyond. There are indications of a gallery at one end of the former. Both these rooms have large corbelled pedestals in all the window-jambs, which were intended for service, or side tables to fill the recesses; they do not touch the floor by upwards of an inch. A view of one of these windows, with its pedestals and the original oak shutters, is shown in Fig. 1, Plate XIII. The refectory (Fig. 2) has a water drain and sink. There is also a double cupboard in the divisional wall, with ledges for shelves to be fitted in as mentioned for the windows (Fig. 5). These rooms are accessible from a newel staircase, as well as from the open corridor. On the north side of the hall were the sleeping apartments. On the lower story are several rooms thoroughly modernized and the antique appearance obliterated. The chapel is in better preservation, and retains the stone altar (F, Plate x) and the worn steps which have the marks of the former railing. A stone reading desk was dug out of the ruins some few years ago; it is of Wenlock marble, sculptured with late Norman sculpture; there is only one other known. Parker figures this altar and lectern in his glossary.1 There is here a small sitting statue of a saint, cross-legged, with a crown on her head, and holding either a closed book or a bag. This may be meant to represent St. Milburg, but it is a carving made long after the church was dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, and is therefore hardly probable. It may have been intended for Isabel de Sai, Lady of Clun. This carving, which is of the end of the thirteenth century, would be more consistent with that view than the other. Mr. Planché, at our Congress at Newbury in 1860, informed us that, in his opinion, the representation of cross-legged figures was indicative of the person represented having feudal jurisdiction, and that this power, and this manner of representing it were not restricted to men. There is a garderobe on the ground floor (G on the plan) which is covered by a stone slab of earlier date, with carved panelling on the underside. Parker2 gives a tolerably accurate description of the abbot's lodging, though I cannot subscribe to all his suggestions or conclusions. His plans are not quite accurate. Several writers mention a former painting on the walls of the abbot's parlour; one is described to be a representation of St. George and the Dragon. 1 Vol. ii, plate 2. At page 17 it is described as of Early English workmanship, but he corrects this in his Domestic Architecture. 2 Domestic Architecture, iii, 336. The front of the lodging consists of a wide two-storied corridor, extending the whole length, with continuous ranges of windows, which have been glazed on both stories. They are divided into bays of four windows by buttresses; the sub-divisions are made by smaller intermediate piers and buttresses. The roof, which commences from the eaves of the corridor, is enormously high. From the lower corridor there are some unusual and curiously splayed "squints" into the house; these are large enough to have been used for the passing of small parcels, but are more likely to have been used simply for looking from the inside to the outside.1 Of the seals of the priory few have been noticed. One is said to have been found at Clun Church in 1760, of which no particulars are given. Willis2 mentions one of Arms az. 3 garbs, or, in pale a crozier, arg. Another mentioned by Dugdale3 is a coarse representation of St. Milburga, sitting in a homely dress, with an instrument like a two-pronged fork on her right shoulder. A later one is a full length, with a book in the left hand and a bunch of flowers in the right. A fourth is a seal to a deed in the Harleian Collection (83 D, 3) 30° Henry VIII. It is oval, a Virgin and Child. Beneath, in two niches, are an armed figure, probably St. George with the dragon below, and a female figure. The reverse is a female half figure with a crozier. The inscriptions are "SIGILL' ECCL'. . . . VALIS. MONACHORVM. D' WENLOK" and "SANCTA. MILBVRGA. " 4 One not hitherto mentioned I have been favoured with by the present possessor, the rev. T. F. More, of Linley Hall. It is a brass matrix coated with gold, and was found at Hopton Castle by Colonel L. More, in whose family it has been since retained. It consists of a representation of St. George and the dragon, within a vesica piscis, two inches and a half long and one inch and a half broad. The figure is beneath a trefoiled canopy, which is supported on two slender columns; the wings and head of St. George fill the tre-foils. It appears to be of the thirteenth century. The legend round is "s' ECCLIE : CONUENTUALIS DE WENLOK: AD CAVSAS: TANTUM." The connection of this seal with the alleged painting on the wall and the previously named seal is obvious. In the late Mr. Caley's collection of Howlett's drawings of ancient seals there were1. The common seal of Wenlock Priory, from a deed of the xii sæc. 2. The seal of Prior Humbert, xii sæc. 3. Seal and counterseal of the Priory, from conventual lease, 28th Henry VIII, in the Augmentation office. 1 Parker, in his account, altogether avoids mentioning these, although he shows them in his plan. The scale of my plan is too small to show them. The front of the Bablake College, Coventry, has a very similar two-storied corridor, with a similarly disproportioned roof. This is figured in the sixteenth part of Dollman and Jobbins's Analysis of Ancient Domestic Architecture. 2 Mitred Abbeys, ii, 192. 3 Monasticon, v, 74. 4 Ib. 4. From an early charter s. d. in the Chapter House, Westminster. 5. Seal of Prior John Stratton, from a charter of the date of 1468 in the Augmentation office.1 The ruins have been subjected to very rude treatment. Mr. Moore, writing in 1787, says that, many years before, great part of the abbey was pulled down to rebuild some houses, and only four years prior one of the clustered pillars of the church was nearly levelled and a cart was waiting to take it away. To the credit of the late Sir Watkin Williams Wynn it should be observed that he, as well as the subsequent owners, put a stop to further depredations. In the grounds on the east of the church I observed a heap of worked stones gathered from the ruins, and on looking over these I discovered one which had been part of a base (Fig. 4, Plate XIII); on the upper surface were some very beautifully incised lines of Early English mouldings, which illustrate the subject of ancient architectural drawing; the lines show that they were cut as moulds, and not for the purpose of the stone itself; indeed they extend beyond the points where they could have been available, and there are other mouldings neither connected nor applicable. I believe this to be the only instance of the kind yet discovered. There, also, I found a comparatively rare example of paving tile, a small portion of simply incised pottery, for a drawing of which, as restored, see fig. 3, Plate XIII. There are many pieces of tiles scattered about the ruins, bearing representations of shields, animals, and various emblems; one, two inches and three quarters square, has a representation of the moon's face in incised lines; the tile is red. There are no fish-ponds to be seen, indeed they seem to have been long destroyed, but there are appearances of some to the east of the abbot's lodging. Leland, in his Itinerary, fo. 182, relates that there was formerly a little brooklet running west from the hills through the town, and called Rhe, which ran into the Severn two miles distant. Of the Priors of Wenlock the following is a list compiled from the most perfect as given by the Rev. Mr. Eyton : Evidences of 1120 1139 1148 1155) 1160 1169, seceded to Paisley.2 1 The drawings, upon the death of Mr. Caley, were purchased by Mr. Thorpe, bookseller, in Piccadilly, and by him dispersed to various purchasers. 2 Paisley was one of the priories affiliated to Wenlock. CC The site, says MR. BLAKEWAY, was granted to one AUGUSTINIS, whose name bespeaks him a foreigner. He was, perhaps, one of the king's physicians. He sold it in 1545 to Thomas LAWLEY, whose descendants again disposed of it to the family of GAGE, from whom it passed to SIR J. WYNN. It is now owned by J. M. Gaskell, Esq., M.P. |