roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_046

Transcription

No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567

Peter with key and book; by association of ideas the
bearded figure to the S. (Fig. 362), clad in frock and
cowl, has been identified as St. Paul, but this is not
altogether certain. In the third or S. bay of the
transept, the W. clearstorey rises in order to clear the
arch of the nave aisle. The upper part of the wall
containing this arch is recessed from the general wall-
plane, the result of a reconsideration of the original
design as exemplified in the corresponding part of
the S. transept. The archway itself has a steeply
pointed head built in three orders. The pier has
finely carved foliaceous capitals and moulded bases,
the latter having a similar section to those of the
arcade opposite, but not standing so high. The
clearstorey opening above the archway is flat-arched
like its window and has a heavily foiled and cuspated
rear-arch springing from corbels representing male
heads.
The three bays of the N. transept-aisle seem to
have been separated from each other by low screen-
walls about 2 ft. 7 in. in height, suitable plinths for
fences of wood or metal. The two outer or N. bays
were chapels with paved floors at a higher level than
the transept floor. The bases for their altars can
still be seen. The N. chapel has a locker and a small
bracketed credence in the N. wall. The S. chapel
has a locker on the S. side of its altar. Reredoses,
features expressly forbidden by the Carta Caritatis,
were inserted in both chapels after these had been
completed, and part of the projecting sill-course of
the windows was cut away to make room for them.
All three bays of the transept aisle had tierceron
vaults with level ridges, of which a fragment remains
at the NE. corner. The surviving vaulting-bosses
are foliaceous.
The two S. bays of the S. transept are almost entire
(Fig. 347). The bay system is identical with that of
the N. transept in general design and almost identical
in detail, the principal differences being that the
southernmost vaulting-shafts extend to the floor
while the base of the pier respond is bell-shaped and
fluted. The high vault is of the tierceron variety.
The master boss of its central bay, the N. of the two
surviving bays, has a shield with crosier behind it,
the initials A H flanking the crosier-head. The shield
bears three hunting-horns, for Abbot Andrew Hunter
(1444-71). The corresponding boss of the S. bay
represents a youth's or woman's head; the long
curled locks are encircled by a fillet with a jewel at
its centre. The gable of this transept differs con-
siderably in arrangement from the one opposite.
Its central doorway had a drop-centred arch-head
below a double relieving-arch; the arch-head and
the jambs are wrought with a filleted edge-roll
flanked by hollows. The great S. window above,
admirably placed in the gable, rises approximately
from the level of the pier-capitals, its breast forming
a passage or gallery leading to the clearstorey through
little doorways formed in either jamb. The inner
side of this gallery has been fenced off with a pierced
and foiled balustrade, most of which has been
destroyed. At either end of the balustrade there
have been little terminal buttresses with canopied
tops. Beneath the perforations of the balustrade
there is a moulded cornice of two members, the
upper one enriched with paterae and the lower one
with foliated scroll-work. From this cornice project
six image-brackets in the form of angels, the two in
the centre holding scrolls and the others holding
musical instruments; one of these has been identified
as a Welsh crwth, a stringed instrument played with
a bow, ¹ and another can be identified as a psaltery. ²
The window itself has shafted jambs, the two inner
shafts on either jamb rising from corbels set out on
the lintel of the passage doorway and the two outer
shafts flanking the doorway. The foliated capitals
of these shafts form a continuous impost for the
arch-head of the window.
The W. wall of the transept, almost entire in all
three bays, is hardly as successful a piece of design
as the corresponding part of the N. transept. The
archway opening to the nave aisle, which is situated
in the N. bay, has projecting piers rising from large
bell-shaped bases, rather coarsely moulded. The
arch, more obtusely pointed than that of the N. aisle,
has moulding which is similar although not identical.
The middle bay has no opening on the ground storey.
The S. bay contains the entrance to the stair-turret,
the outside of which has been mentioned on p. 275.
This doorway has chamfered arrises. Its lintel is
surmounted by a foiled panel containing a shield
charged for John Morow (p. 290): Two pairs of
mason's compasses saltire-wise cantoned with three
fleurs-de-lys. There may have been a fourth fleur-
de-lys at the top. Associated with this coat of arms
are two inscriptions in 15th-century Gothic lettering,
evidently intended to be read in conjunction; these
are only partly legible, and in the versions given
below blanks have been made up from earlier read-
ings. ³ The lower inscription, which is cut on either
side of and below the panel and ends on the S. jamb
of the door, reads
[SA YE / CVMPAS] GAYS / EVYN ABOVTE
[S] VA / [TROVTH] / AN [D] / LAVT [E SALL] DO BVT DIVTE
BE HALDIE TO YE HENDE Qº / IOHNE MORVO

(" As the compass goes evenly about, so truth and
loyalty shall do without doubt. Look to the end
quoth John Morow.") The last line contains a
translation of the well-known tag " respice finem ".

1 Arch., iii, 30.
2 Farmer, Music in Mediaeval Scotland, opp. p. 128.
Giraldus Cambrensis states, in a well-known passage
(Scotichronicon, xvi, xxix) that the native Scots instruments
were three in number, namely the harp, the drum, and the
" chorus ", this last having been identified by Pinkerton
as a bagpipe (The History of Scotland, i, 180; cf. also
Farmer, op. cit.); Sir Richard Holland, however, in his
Buke of the Howlat (stanza 59), written about 1453, lists
no less than twenty-three instruments.
3 P.S.A.S., ii (1854-7), 166 ff., etc.

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