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THE COUNTY OF
ROXBURGH
VOLUME II
[Photograph Inserted]
Royal Commisssion
on the Ancient Monuments
of Scotland |
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THE COUNTY OF ROXBURGH has
proved a fruitful field for archaeolo-
gical research. It contains most in-
teresting buildings of the mediæval
and later periods, and is extremely
rich in prehistoric and Dark Age
remains. There are also some impor-
tant traces of the Roman occupation.
The present volumes provide a
comprehensive, detailed and fully
illustrated survey of all this material,
prefaced by an introduction explain-
ing its wider significance. Provision
is thus made for the general reader
as well as for the expert. Aerial
photography, which has been used
throughout the survey, has made it
possible to achieve much greater
completeness than ever before; great
numbers of earthwork monuments
having thus been discovered which
were scarcely visible, or even quite
invisible, to observers on the ground.
Price £5 5s. 0d.
Per Set of Two Volumes
National Monuments
Record of Scotland
RCAHMS
[Note]
24826
Archive Copy |
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[Note]
5601
24826 |
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Roxburghshire |
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[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 326. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; E. end.
Photo Ministry of Works.
Frontispiece |
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[Coat of Arms Inserted]
THE ROYAL COMMISSION ON THE
ANCIENT MONUMENTS OF SCOTLAND
AN INVENTORY OF THE ANCIENT
AND HISTORICAL MONUMENTS OF
ROXBURGHSHIRE
VOLUME II
EDINBURGH
HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE
1956 |
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Crown copyright reserved
Published by
HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE
To be purchased from
13A Castle Street, Edinburgh 2
York House, Kingsway, London W.C.2
423 Oxford Street, London W.1
P.O. Box 569, London S.E.1
109 St. Mary Street, Cardiff
39 King Street, Manchester 2
Tower Lane, Bristol 1
2 Edmund Street, Birmingham 3
80 Chichester Street, Belfast
or through any bookseller
Price £5. 5s. 0d. net.
Printed in Great Britain under the Authority of HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE
by T. and A. CONSTABLE LTD. Edinburgh |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_008 |
CONTENTS
-- PAGE
INVENTORY OF THE ANCIENT AND HISTORICAL MONUMENTS OF ROXBURGHSHIRE
(MELROSE TO YETHOLM) -- 265
APPENDICES :-
A. Dere Street -- 463
B. The Wheel Causeway -- 474
C. A main drove-road -- 477
D. The Catrail -- 479
E. A note on the term " Pele " -- 483
F. Armorial -- 485
ADDENDA -- 487
GLOSSARY -- 488
INDEX -- 493
-- v |
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INVENTORY
OF THE ANCIENT AND HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
OF ROXBURGHSHIRE
MELROSE PARISH
CHURCHES, CASTLES, ETC.
567. Melrose Abbey. GENERAL. The Abbey
of St. Mary at Melrose, the earliest Cistercian settle-
ment in Scotland, was founded by David I. ¹ It was
constituted on 23 March 1136 ² by a colony from the
northern mission-centre of the Order at Rievaulx, in
Yorkshire, under the leadership of Abbot Richard.
The place selected for the new abbey lay within the
shadow of the Eildon Hills, on the level haughland
bordering the right bank of the Tweed about two
and a half miles upstream from the early monastic site
(No. 592) that was already known as Old Melrose by
1285-91.³ If shelter was still available at Old Melrose
in 1136, there would presumably have been no need
to provide, at the new site, the temporary accom-
modation laid down in the Cistercian Statutes ; ⁴
and whether this was done or not, the monks, as at
Rievaulx, commenced their permanent buildings
soon after their arrival, their church being sufficiently
complete to permit of its dedication on 28 July 1146. ⁵
Although the chapter-house only comes on record in
1159, ⁶ it may have been, and probably was, finished
some ten years earlier, as this is a part normally built
in sequence with the adjoining transept.
A general idea of the remains as they stand today
may be obtained from the air photograph reproduced
in Fig. 329, and from the plan given in Fig. 328.
The development of the church and its early found-
ations are illustrated respectively in Figs. 350 and 327.
The first particulars of the church are given in the
year 1198-9, when Jocelyn, bishop of Glasgow and a
former abbot of Melrose (1170-4), was buried " in
the choir of the monks on the north side of the
church ". ⁷ The privilege of burial in a Cistercian
choir was restricted to sovereigns, their consorts, and
bishops. ⁸ Of this early church a mere fragment
remains above ground (infra). The foundations of
its E. end, however, were unearthed in 1923 by H.M.
Office of Works within the ruin of its successor.
They showed a ground-plan comprising an oblong
presbytery two bays in length, with N. and S.
transepts each three bays in length and having an E.
aisle. The two outer bays of each aisle opened into
two shallow E. chapels similar to those at Brombach
Abbey in Germany ; as at Byland Abbey, the chapels
were separated by solid stone walls and were appar-
ently covered with pointed barrel-vaults which sprang
from N. to S. The innermost bay of each E. aisle
formed the entry to another chapel lying E. of it and
flanking the presbytery, and also gave entry to the
monastic choir through the introitus superior. ⁹ This
echelon ending, normal for churches of canons
regular, is exceptional for a Cistercian church, al-
though it also occurred in the choir of Fountains
Abbey before the extension for the " Nine Altars "
was made. At Melrose this type of ending was
retained when the church came to be rebuilt.
Some 210 ft. W. of the foundation of the E. gable
the base of a transverse wall can still be seen, standing
just sufficiently high to show the lowest rybats of a
very plain central doorway and an external buttress
of slight projection. This wall, which includes in
its masonry many characteristic Romanesque ashlars,
is a fragment of the W. gable of the original 12th-
century church, and its survival is sufficient proof
that the great reconstruction that took place over the
14th, 15th, and 16th centuries never saw completion.
Excavation has proved that the structural nave of the
original church was nine bays in length and that it
had a narrow aisle on each side. This nave was set
out from the nearly contemporary one at Rievaulx,
the only difference being that the central area at
Rievaulx was 5 ft. wider. In both churches the pier
arcade was similarly spaced and the width of the
aisles was identical. It may be assumed, on the
analogy of Rievaulx, that the aisles at Melrose were
covered with pointed barrel-vaults with their apices
running N. and S., and that the pier arcade was
screened off by solid partitions of stone in order to
enclose the choir of the conversi.
The position of the cloister, on the N. side of the
1 Liber de Melros, i, 2-5.
2 Melrose Chronicle, 33.
3 Ibid., 121 lxiv.
4 Institutiones Capituli Generalis, cf. Paris, Nomasticon
Cisterciense, 215.
5 Melrose Chronicle, 34.
6 Jocelyn of Furness cited in Scotichronicon, vi, cap. xxv.
7 Chronica M. Rogeri de Hovedene, Rolls Series, iv, 85.
8 Paris, op. cit., 344.
9 Yorkshire Archaeol. Journal, xv, 301.
VOL. II. - A
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
church, was chosen for convenience of water-supply
and drainage, of which something may now be said.
On the E. of the site ran a little stream, known later
as the Malt-House Burn and long since diverted from
its original course. Unless at the very outset, this
source of supply does not seem to have been utilised.
On the N. of the site ran the Tweed, about a quarter
of a mile away and too distant to the drawn upon
directly ; but the river was too valuable a source to
be neglected and could be made available by means
of an arrangement already adopted at Rievaulx and
at Newminster. It was accordingly dammed at a
[Plan Inserted]
Fig. 327. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; early foundations of church.
convenient bend and part of the stream was diverted
into a canal ; this canal was led close to the N. side
of the site and ran E. for a total distance of a mile
and a quarter before rejoining the river. On the way
it supplied power to the corn-mill. Branches were
led from it to flush the sewers and others may at first
have supplied drinking-water ; but latterly, as at
Rievaulx, spring water was laid on, carried in lead
pipes from Dingleton, ¹ a distance of some 700 yds.
The canal was evidently among the earliest works
undertaken by the community. The cloister itself,
which does not seem to have been completed before
the last quarter of the 12th century, measures 121 ft.
from N. to S. by 128 ft. from E. to W. and is almost
identical in size with that of the daughter-house of
Newbattle. ² Both these cloisters, although unusually
large for Scotland, compare unfavourably with that of
Rievaulx, which is 140 ft. square. The claustral
buildings of Melrose are fragmentary and it is no
easy matter either to date or to analyse the remains,
which are shown on the plan (Fig. 328) and described
in detail in the architectural description that follows.
There are certain points in the primary lay-out to
which attention may be drawn here. In the first
place the cloister had a lane on its W. side, such as
was provided in France at both Cîteaux and Clair-
vaux, and in England at Kirkstall, Beaulieu, Byland,
and less certainly at Whalley and Buildwas. The
purpose of this feature is really unknown. The lane
at Byland served as the cloister of the conversi. The
usual reason given for its provision is that the lane
prevented the noise occasioned by the work of the
conversi from penetrating the monk's cloister ; but
there is no evidence to show that the workshops were
in the cloister's immediate proximity. Whatever its
purpose, the lane at Melrose was demolished, as
happened in other houses, and its area was thrown
into the cloister.
Another point in the primary arrangement to which
attention may be drawn is the position of the W.
range, the domus conversorum. Unlike its prototype
at Rievaulx, this extends W. of the gable of the church,
following the arrangement seen in the common
ancestor Clairvaux, the church of which was dedi-
cated as late as 1175.³ It overlaps the church, how-
ever, so as to leave room for a staircase, the access
1 Milne, A Description of the Parish of Melrose, (1794). 45.
2 Inventory of Midlothian, No. 182.
3 Melrose Chronicle, 41.
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[Plan Inserted]
Fig. 328. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; general plan.
To face p. 266 |
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
from the dorter of the conversi to their choir. Lastly,
in this earliest arrangement the frater stood on the
N. side of the cloister parallel to the church as at
Rievaulx and Dundrennan, ¹ the latter a sister-house
of Melrose ; this was replaced in the 13th century
by a frater running N. and S.
Such then was the arrangement of the infant abbey,
a plain little cross-kirk with a north cloister. From
the beginning and throughout its early years the
abbey prospered. Within four years of its entry the
convent was sufficiently strong to send out a colony to
settle Newbattle Abbey, other contingents emigrating
within a century to form new houses at Holm-
cultram, Kinloss, Coupar-Angus, Balmerino, and
possibly Glenluce as well ; while priories at Mauch-
line and at Berwick-on-Tweed were also manned
from Melrose. These new foundations must indicate
an influx of adherents to the mother-house. Materi-
ally, too, the place was soon flourishing. Credit for
this must be given to Waldeve, step-son of David I,
who became second abbot, in succession to Richard,
in 1148 ² and died in 1159. ³ Within his lifetime
Melrose came to possess great wealth in oxen, sheep,
and pigs, with dairy and garden produce in plentiful
supply, and acquired by gift from various donors
lands, pastures, fishings, salt-marshes, and peat-
mosses in addition to ecclesiastical property. By the
time of Renier, seventh abbot, that is before the close
of the 12th century, the abbey was doing business
beyond the boundaries of Scotland. Renier became
security for Roger de Quinci's debt to the well-known
Hebrew financier, Aaron of Lincoln. In 1223-4
Henry III granted Abbot Adam's men, who were
carrying money overseas, a safe conduct throughout
his dominions ; and in the following year he granted
the abbot leave to send a ship, laden with wool and
other merchandise, to Flanders, under the direction
of William de Led and Friar Thomas of Boulden (Bow-
den). Five years later a similar permit was given, and in
1271-2 the abbot and monks of Melrose received simple
letters of protection for three years. ⁴ Such entries show
some of the ramifications of the abbey's business.
By the beginning of the 13th century the Melrose
monks found themselves in a sufficiently good fin-
ancial position to consider improving their buildings.
The façade of their church they embellished with
a handsome Galilee porch, of which a fragment
survives ; while pieces of early 13th-century detail
which have come to light within the church show
that they also effected some internal improvement.
There is evidence, too, that the chapter-house was
extended to the E. and provided with a new font on
the cloister side in or about the year 1240. Then,
towards the close of the century, the choir-monks'
frater was rebuilt upon a different axis, an alteration
which must have affected the warming-house, kitchen,
and day-stair to the choir-monks' dorter. The E.
and W. ranges were both extended N. of the cloister
in the 13th century, rib-vaulting being introduced
into the undercrofts at some time after 1250. Abbot
Matthew, who was elected in 1241, is credited with a
good deal of building during his twenty years of
office, and the camera on the bank of the canal (p. 287)
is ascribed to him.
With the Wars of Independence the prosperity of
the abbey was interrupted. Although Edward I in
1290 had granted the abbot and convent freedom
from distraint, ⁵ in 1296 their property in North-
umberland was seized and their servants removed.
On 28 August of the same year Abbot Patrick, in
company with his brother-abbots of Jedburgh, Dry-
burgh, and Kelso, swore fealty to Edward I at
Berwick-on-Tweed. ⁶ In 1307 the abbot and convent
of Melrose petitioned Edward to confirm their
charters ; they also asked for timber from Selkirk
forest for the repair of their buildings which had been
" burned and destroyed while at his peace and pro-
tection " ⁷ and were allowed forty oak-trees. In
1322, when Edward II invaded Scotland, his troops
on their return from Edinburgh despoiled the abbey
" causing great desolation ". They not only slew the
prior, William de Peebles, as well as a sick monk and
two blind conversi in their dormitory, and seriously
wounded several other monks, ⁸ but even cast down
the Host from the high alter and carried off the silver
pyx. The convent seems to have resisted stoutly,
as at least four of Edward's Gascons were killed. ⁹
The material damage must have been great, so ex-
tensive in fact that it was decided to rebuild the
Abbey church completely ; in fact, however, the
fabric appears only to have been repaired at this time.
To provide funds for the reconstruction, Robert I,
on 21 March 1326, granted a charter ¹⁰ to the abbot
and convent awarding them certain feudal dues from
the county of Roxburgh, stated to be worth £2000
sterling. In so doing the king may have carried out
in another form a pious intention already expressed
in the abortive treaty that he had arranged with the
Earl of Carlisle in 1322-3. ¹¹ After Bruce's death,
and acting on his instructions, Sir James Douglas
carried the King's heart overseas on a campaign
against the Infidel ; but after the death of Douglas,
in Spain, the heart was brought back to Scotland and
was buried at Melrose, apparently on the orders of
the Regent. ¹² However, despite careful search, no
trace of the relic has been found.
On or about 10 August 1385 ¹³ the abbey was burnt
and utterly destroyed by Richard II. In 1389, how-
1 Inventory of Kirkcudbright, No. 398.
2 Melrose Chronicle, 34.
3 Ibid., 35.
4 Cal. of Docts., i, 1108-1272, passim.
5 Ibid., ii, 1272-1307, No. 452.
6 Ibid., No. 817.
7 Ibid., No. 1982.
8 Scotichronicon, xiii, cap. iv.
9 Cal. of Docts., iii, 1307-57, No. 1015.
10 R.M.S., i, 1306-24, No. 331.
11 Cal. of Docts., iii, 1307-57, No. 803.
12 Barbour, The Bruce, (ed. Mackenzie), bk. xx and notes ;
Cal. of Docts., iii, No. 991 ; S.H.R., xxxii (1953), 18ff.
13 Extracta, 199, etc.
-- 267 |
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No, 567
ever, in compensation " for the destruction and
burning sustained by the abbey when he was there
with his army ", ¹ Richard granted in alms to the
convent a reduction in custom upon each " saak "
of Scottish wool, up to one thousand sacks, sent by
it to Berwick-on-Tweed. In 1398 arrangements
were made for paying one of the feudal casualties
granted towards " the new werke of thaire kirke of
Melros " ² With two exceptions - the early frag-
ments already mentioned and an alteration which
will be described presently - the church now seen is
the one rebuilt after 1385. The work of reconstruc-
tion extended from the end of the 14th century until
some time after 1505, yet it failed to reach completion
owing to the impoverished state of the community. ³
David de Binning, who was elected abbot about 1394,
took credit for this restoration which, however, he
can only have initiated. ⁴
This new church was no more fortunate than its
predecessor. In 1544 the abbey was burnt by the
English under Sir Ralph Eure, or Evers, ⁵ and it is
included in the list of places on the Tweed that were
" raced " in 1545 by the Earl of Hertford. ⁶ In 1555-6
James Stewart, natural son of James V and com-
mendator of both Melrose and Kelso, granted a feu
charter to certain lands " in consideration of a sum
of money paid towards the repair and rebuilding of
the abbey of Melrose destroyed by the English . . .
at the time of war last past " ; the charter ⁷ is signed
by the commendator, the sub-prior, and eleven
monks. This and other moneys raised for a like
purpose were, however, diverted to other uses by
the commendator, and in the same year the monks
raised a protest which reveals the sorry state of the
abbey buildings : even the lead from the roofs was
being removed and sold. ⁸ In 1569 James Douglas
became commendator, ⁹ and in 1573 he took action
against Sir Walter Scott of Branxholm who, in 1569,
had taken away stones, timbers, lead, iron, and glass
from the abbey and kirk of Melrose. ¹⁰ But this com-
mendator was equally guilty himself, as he used the
abbey as a quarry in 1590 when reconstructing the
Commendator's House. ¹¹ The picture is clear enough
- after the Reformation the cloister, and to a less
extent the church, were allowed to fall into ruin, the
surviving members of the convent becoming pen-
sioners. ¹² Shortly after 1590, with the death of
" Jo. Watsoun pensionarius de Melros", the com-
munity became extinct. ¹³
Even so, there was still life in the place, for the
church, or part of it, had become parochial at some
time before 1443. ¹⁴ The process by which this came
about has been explained by Dr. James Curle. ¹⁵ At
the Reformation it was served by a reader, ¹⁶ and in
1606 and 1608 it was styled " the paroche kirk of
Melros ". ¹⁷ In 1618 a new church was instituted in
what was left of the structural nave. This church
extended from the pulpitum, or E. screen, three bays
eastwards to the crossing, the archways of which
seem to have been already built up. As the high
vault of the nave had already fallen and its rebuilding
was too ambitious a project to be seriously contem-
plated, four massive piers of masonry were built
inside the N. pier arcade, and the span of the central
area was thus reduced sufficiently for it to be covered
in with a semicircular barrel-vault. This barrel -
vault, which was lower than the original rib-vault,
was covered on the outside with stone flags resting
on its extrados and not with a leaded, wooden roof
like the original high roof. It was also necessarily
too low to include the tops of the existing clearstorey
lights ; all the rear-arches of these windows were
accordingly taken down and rebuilt at a lower level,
the old stones being used again ; but the outside of
the windows was not disturbed and, when their
glazing was entire, the reduction cannot have been
obvious externally. It may be inferred that the
crossing-tower, which still contained its bells in
1555-6, had already become ruinous before 1618,
since a belfry was built upon the apex of the S.
transept-gable. This belfry contains a Dutch bell,
measuring 1 ft. 4 in. in diameter by 1 ft. 2 in. in
height and bearing the inscription IAN BVRGERHVYS
ME FECIT 1608 between two lines of crest-work.
Little respect seems to have been shown for this
reconstituted church, as the contemporary Robert
Baillie records ¹⁸ that the Rev. Thomas Forrester, the
eccentric incumbent of Melrose from 1627 to 1638,
" made a way through the church itself for his kine
and sheep ".
The remainder of the fabric of the abbey was used
as a quarry in the early 18th century. ¹⁹ In 1810 the
parish church was removed to a new site, and there-
after the Abbey church was used only as a place of
burial. In 1919 the property was placed in the
guardianship of H.M. Office of Works.
THE PRECINCT. The abbey buildings lay within
the precinct, an irregularly shaped enclosure of some
1 Cal. of Docts., iv, 1357-1509, No. 397.
2 Liber de Melros, i, 488.
3 Calendar of Papal Registers, Letters, x, 1447-1455, 501 ;
L. and P., Henry VIII, i, pt. i, No. 300 ; Stat. Eccles. Scot.,
lxxi n.
4 Calendar of Scottish Supplications to Rome, S.H.S., 309.
5 Hamilton Papers, ii, No. 420.
6 Printed in P.S.A.S., i (1851-4), 277.
7 Laing Charters, No. 642.
8 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S., iii, 158, 218.
9 Register of Presentations to Benefices, in H.M. General
Register House, Edinburgh, i, f. 23.
10 Acts and Decreets of the Court of Session, in H.M.
General Register House, vol. xviii, f. 423.
11 Wade, History of St. Mary's Abbey, Melrose, 251.
12 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S., iii, 192.
13 R.M.S., 1580-1593, No. 1796.
14 Calendar of Papal Registers, Letters, ix, 412.
15 A Little Book about Melrose, 34.
16 Register of Ministers, in H.M. General Register House,
s.a. 1567.
17 Liber de Melros, ii, 658, 660, 661.
18 Fife, Scottish Diaries and Memoirs, 1550-1746, p. 208.
19 Milne, A Description of the Parish of Melrose, 22 ;
Pococke, A Tour through Scotland, 1760, S.H.S., 340.
-- 268 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_014 |
PLATE 61.
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 329. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; general view of church and precinct from the air.
By courtesy of the Air Ministry and of the Cambridge University Committee for Aerial Photography.
To face p. 268 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_015 |
PLATE 62
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 330. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; general view from SW.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_016 |
PLATE 63
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 331. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; choir and S. transept from SE. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_017 |
PLATE 64
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 332. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; gable of S. transept.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_018 |
PLATE 65
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 333. Choir and N. transept from NE.
Fig. 334. General view form WSW.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
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PLATE 66
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 335. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; cloister from NW. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_020 |
PLATE 67
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 336. Window in S. nave aisle.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
Fig. 337. Window in S. nave aisle.
Photo Ministry of Works.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_021 |
PLATE 68
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 338. Arcade on E. side of cloister. -- Fig. 339. Abbot's seat in cloister arcade.
Fig. 340. Processional doorway with seat to W.
Photo Ministry of Works.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_022 |
PLATE 69
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 341. Apex of E. gable, with the Coronation of the Virgin.
Fig. 342. Apex of S. transept gable.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
Photos Ministry of Works. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_023 |
PLATE 70
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 343. Nave arcade from NE. -- Fig. 344. Arcade to chapels in N. transept.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
Both by courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_024 |
PLATE 71
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 345. N. aisle of nave from W. -- Fig. 346. S. aisle of nave from W.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_025 |
PLATE 72
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 347. Interior of S. transept. -- Fig. 348. Doorway of S. transept.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
Both by courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
To face p. 269 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_026 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
forty acres bounded by a stout mantel-wall. Although
all trace of this wall has gone, excavation supple-
mented by record evidence has enabled Dr. James
Curle to follow its course with some accuracy. The
following particulars have been taken from Dr.
[Plan Inserted]
Fig. 349. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; plan of precinct.
Curle's account, ¹ and the line of the wall, as deter-
mined by him has been shown on the plan (Fig. 349)
together with the principal monastic buildings in
solid black.
Church and cloister were situated about the middle
of the enclosure. The main gate stood astride the
approach, which has become the modern Abbey
Street, at a point 166 yds. S. of the church. As at
Beaulieu, there was a chapel above it, and in front
of it rose the Abbey Cross (cf. No. 585). The pre-
cinct had three other gates, respectively to N., E.,
and W., as shown on the plan. Two of its minor
divisions can be located, the penthouse yard, situated
at the SW. corner and SE. of the main gate, and " the
baikhouse yeard " occupying the NW. corner. The
latter was bounded on the N. and W. by the mantel-
wall, on the E. by the path leading to the N. gate,
and on the S. by the canal or mill-lade. In the corner
formed by path and lade stood the corn-mill. As
the lade cut off about one-quarter of the precinct it
was bridged at several places. The westernmost or
upper bridge carried the path running to the N. gate,
and when the path became a road the bridge had to
be widened on both sides, but the stout soffit-ribs of
the original portion can still be seen. The next
bridge downstream, situated immediately N. of the
Commendator's House (p. 287), is post-monastic.
A third, situated beside the Abbot's camera (p. 287),
is represented only by its S. abutment. The fourth
stands comparatively entire still farther E. This has
a present width of 12 ft. 10 in. and has two stout
soffit-ribs, both stop-chamfered on their outer sides.
The surviving buildings of the abbey stand S. of the
lade, but at present they are divided into two groups
by Cloisters Road, formerly Valley Gate, which
branches E. from Abbey Street. Church and cloister
stand on its S. side, while extensions of the E. and
W. ranges, the Commendator's House, and the
Abbot's camera all lie to the N. of it. Since this road
cuts across the outer ends of the E. and W. ranges of
the cloister it is obviously post-monastic in origin.
MATERIALS. With a view to identifying the sources
from which the builders of the abbey obtained their
material, the Geological Survey of Great Britain, at
the Commissioners' request, had an examination
made of the masonry. The following facts are taken
from the report of the officers who carried out the
work. ² The abbey occupies the site of a pre-glacial
channel of the Tweed, pebbles of stream-worn grey-
wacke being still seen in the bottom of the drains.
The earlier buildings, those dating from between
1136 and 1385, are constructed largely of agglomerate,
mainly obtained from Quarry Hill (cf. No. 621)
situated SW. of Melrose between Dingleton and
Harleyburn. In the work constructed between 1385
and 1505 sandstones were most extensively used ;
these were no doubt quarried on the Eildon Hills,
where the remains of the workings marked " Bourjo "
(No. 622) on the O.S. map, can still be seen N. of
the path leading to the neck joining Eildon Hill
North to Eildon Mid Hill, and also near Ploughlands
(No. 566), a mile and a half E. of Maxton. The
extensive use of agglomerate in the Commendator's
House, together with the unusual mixture of stones,
bears out the statement that it was constructed largely
of re-used material (p. 287).
ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION. In Britain the
negative attitude of the Cistercians towards art
became modified in the 13th century, and by the
close of the 14th century, when this church came to
be rebuilt, the prohibitions laid down in their statutes
no longer held good. No more splendid church was
ever erected in Scotland, the only Scottish building
comparable with it in wealth of ornament being the
choir of St. Matthew's Collegiate Church at Roslin, ³
dating from about 1457. Another significant change
from early Cistercian custom was that the Order had
become less exclusive. The first hint of this at
Melrose is in a Papal indult of 1320 ⁴ granting per-
mission to the widow of Sir Alexander Stewart, who
1 A Little Book about Melrose, 1-22.
2 P.B.N.C., xxx, 1938-46, 178-182.
3 Inventory of Midlothian, No. 138. Similarity in some of
the architectural details suggests that Melrose masons went
on to Roslin.
4 Calendar of Papal Registers, Letters, ii, 1305-42, 208.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_027 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
had been buried at Melrose, to visit the abbey once a
year ; and by the early 15th century visitors were
being encouraged, Jedburgh having set the example
in 1371. ¹ In 1427 the abbey was said to possess a
notable collection of relics much resorted to by
pilgrims. ² Such visitors were, of course, a valuable
source of revenue.
Change of function, coupled with the evolution of
architectural style, inevitably resulted in the church
that was designed after 1385 differing markedly in
its architecture from earlier churches of the Order ;
yet so strong was the Cistercian structural tradition
that certain early characteristics were retained. Thus
the new church had no triforium ; it was given a
very low crossing-tower ; the wall-shafts for its high
vaults were corbelled out after the fashion adopted
at Pontigny in the third quarter of the 12th century ;
the choirs, both of the choir-monks and of the
conversi, were designed to be enclosed by solid stone
walls about 9 ft. in height. In passing it may be
noted that, in the majority of Cistercian houses in
Britain, the conversi ceased to exist as a class after the
Black Death, which in 1349 swept across England
and reached Scotland, where it played havoc through-
out 1350. But the " converses " of Melrose still
existed in 1389 ³ and therefore required accommoda-
tion in a separate choir.
Accordingly the new church had not only to
accommodate a community of two classes, like its
predecessor, but had also to include a series of chapels
for secular use ; at Rievaulx, similarly, in the late
14th-century chapels for the laity were introduced
into the 12th-century nave-aisles, but there the choir
of the conversi was removed. As will be seen from
the plan (Fig. 327), the new church was on a much
larger scale than the old one. One practical con-
sideration which helps to determine the plan of a
monastic church is the number of choir stalls to be
accommodated and, since the new choir was made
30 ft. longer than the old one, it is a fair inference that
the number of choir-monks had increased or was
expected to do so. Again the extensive provision
of altars indicates that most, if not all, of the monks
were in priests' orders, as required by the decree of
the Œcumenical Council of Vienne held in 1311. ⁴
Yet another factor controlling the plan of the new
church was the presence of an existing cloister ; this
determined the position of the transepts and of the
wall of the N. aisle of the nave. Room for expansion
could thus only be found by encroaching upon the
cemetery and the ground adjoining it.
THE PLAN. The plan is cruciform and includes a
structural nave, ten bays in length, flanked on the
N. by a narrow passage-aisle and on the S. by a
wider one - the latter giving access to a lateral chapel-
aisle, in which eight chapels still remain. To the
W. may be seen the foundations of two more chapels.
The transepts each have an E. aisle three bays in
length, in which the two outer bays contain chapels
while the inner one serves as a lobby in front of a
chapel which projects farther E., flanking the presby-
tery. This echelon ending, a repetition of the earlier
plan, has obvious aesthetic advantages which were
probably the principal reason for its retention.
BUILDING PROCEDURE AND PERIODS. The building
procedure is obvious. The site was not cleared ; on
the contrary the new church was built round the old
one, like a nut-shell enclosing a kernel, and as each
new part neared completion its predecessor was taken
down. Thus the monastic routine was never seri-
ously interrupted. The new foundations were
apparently set out in one operation, or in two at
most, but the walls were erected piecemeal, com-
mencing at the E. end, in sections which are easily
distinguishable in the parts still standing. These
show no fewer than five separate periods of con-
struction. The first section undertaken included the
presbytery, its flanking chapels, the central bay of
either chapel-aisle, two piers of the S. transept-
arcade and at least one pier of the N. transept-arcade.
All this could have been carried out without inter-
fering materially with the old church, which must
have been patched up after the destruction of 1322.
The second stage saw the construction of both
transepts, the completion of their E. aisles, and the
erection of the crossing-piers and of the three E. bays
of the nave arcade, together with the pulpitum. The
E. bay of either nave-aisle was also constructed in
order to complete the customary " abuttal section ".
A certain amount of the earlier fabric had to be
demolished before these parts could be built, and it
is not surprising to find that recumbent tombstones
of lay-folk were removed either from the old floor
or from the cemetery and were broken up for use in
found-courses and thresholds - the footing of the W.
wall of the N. transept is formed entirely from old
grave-slabs. The first and second stages overlapped ;
on the completion of the walling at the E. end some
of the masons were transferred thence to the S.
transept-gable and the E. clearstoreys of both tran-
septs. The second stage halted at the springing-level
of the W. windows of the N. transept, but in it the
transept gable was carried up sufficiently high to
receive the roof of the choir-monks' dorter, which
was also being rebuilt at this time ; while on the
walls facing the cloister an arcaded seating was pro-
vided and, above this, provision for the pentice roofs
of the alleys. The first stage may be dated from the
close of the 14th century onwards, the second ending
about 1425 ; both stages were thus within the time
of Abbot Binning.
In these first thirty years of reconstruction three
master-masons had a hand. The designer of the E.
end was obviously trained in a Yorkshire lodge. John
Morow (infra) was presumably responsible for the
design of the S. transept, which is clearly influenced
1 Calendar of Papal Registers, Letters, iv, 163.
2 Ibid., vii, 570.
3 Cal. of Docts., iv, No. 398.
4 Coulton, Five Centuries of Religion, i, 126 n. 2.
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[Plan Inserted]
Fig. 350. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; development plan of church.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
from France. The N. transept and nave arcade are
the work of someone familiar with Carlisle.
In the third stage of the reconstruction the parts
left incomplete in the second were finished, and the
new fabric was continued westwards. The wall of
the N. aisle of the nave, for instance, was rebuilt
between the abuttal section on the E. and the W.
gable of the old church, and was provided with
arcaded seating of a simpler type than that of the
second stage (Figs. 338, 340). On the S. side of the
church the second chapel, counting from the transept,
was built, together with two others farther W., while
the fifth chapel was begun in order to provide abut-
ment. Part of the vaulting may also have been erected
at this stage over the presbytery, E. chapels, N.
transept, and the monastic choir. This third stage
extended roughly over the second quarter of the 15th
century, and when it ended the monastic choir was
near completion. In 1441 the convent went to law
over the choir-stalls, which had been ordered many
years previously from Cornelius de Aeltre, citizen
and master of the carpenters' craft in Bruges, and
which, although paid for, had not yet been delivered.
It appears from the record ¹ that the stalls were to
be made after the form and fashion of those in the
Cistercian church of Dunis in West Flanders, and
were to have as much carving on them as there was
on the stalls in the sister church of Thosan, at
Lisseweghe near Bruges.
The fourth stage of the reconstruction may be
dated to the years immediately before and after the
middle of the 15th century, and began in the time of
Abbot Andrew Hunter who held office from about
1444 until 1471. Hunter completed the fifth chapel
W. of the S. transept, started another one beyond
this and laid the lowest courses of the S. wall and W.
gable. He may also have built the crossing-tower.
But his main task was vaulting. The vault of the
S. transept can be definitely assigned to him, and
there is every reason to suppose that he also carried
out the vaults of the nave aisles and of the five lateral
chapels then built. He may also have begun the
high vault of the nave, since he built or completed
its abutment-system. Hunter's immediate suc-
cessors, Robert Blacader and Richard Lambe, have
left no mark upon the fabric, but this does not
necessarily mean that the work came to an immediate
halt with Hunter's death ; on the contrary, three
bays of the nave (infra) W. of the pulpitum may have
been constructed in the last quarter of the 15th
century. But as the evidence stands there was a
considerable interval between the fourth and fifth
stages.
The fifth stage of the work can be attributed to
Abbot William Turnbull, who was in office from 1503
to 1507. Turnbull carried the chapel aisle three bays
westwards, so that it came in alinement with the W.
gable of the original church; but the three chapels
that he built were never completed, having neither
been vaulted nor otherwise covered in.
EXTERIOR OF CHURCH. Even such parts of the
church as were finished are ruinous today. The
structural nave is fragmentary, being represented by
no more than its three E. bays, which have survived
through having been incorporated in a parish church
(p. 268). With the exception of the N. presbytery-
chapel, the E. end and transepts as well as the lateral
chapel-aisle are in better case. The masonry is of
ashlar throughout, the sandstone varying in texture
from fine-grained flagstone to rather coarse grit, and
in colour from pale yellow to pink, red, and purple.
Each of the external corners of the building is defined
by a pair of buttresses, surmounted by crocketed
pinnacles and bearing tabernacled niches on their
outer faces. A base-course with an undulating ogival
section, very similar to that on the W. end of Dry-
burgh and having an upper member moulded with a
bowtel and fillet, runs round the outer walls and
buttresses but does not occur on the walls facing the
cloister. A continuous string-course higher up
emphasises the level of the window-sills.
The presbytery (Figs. 326, 333) is an admirable
composition, the E. gable, with its decoration concen-
trated in a single zone at the top, being especially
noteworthy. The central feature of this gable is a
great five-light window with an equilateral pointed
head filled in with rectilinear tracery ; this is the type
of tracery evolved specifically for the display of
historical stained glass, ² and its occurrence here
proves amply that the prohibition of the use of
stained glass in Cistercian churches no longer held
good at the close of the 14th century. The long
slender mullions rise vertically from the sill of the
E. window to give support to its arch-head and are
themselves stayed against lateral movement by a
transom ; this transom bears a foliated cresting on
its upper surface and is cuspated on its lower edge
to form the cinquefoiled heads of the five lights
beneath it. With two exceptions the subordinate
tracery-members are straight. All are elaborately
foiled. The window opening has simple roll-and-
hollow mouldings, the rolls having fillets. The hood-
mould, crocketed on the upper surface and enriched
on the under one with foliaceous paterae, rises from
carved stops in the form of human heads and bifur-
cates near its apex, the inner branch returning round
the arch-head and the outer one taking an ogival
curve in order to include a richly-treated central
niche containing a representation of the Coronation
of the Virgin. When complete, it terminated in a
gable cross. On each side of the window there is
another niche, its crocketed gablet curved in two
1 Curle, op. cit., 30 ff. ; Arch., xxxi, 346. The original
document is preserved in the archive of Bruges.
2 A small piece of coloured glass from Melrose is pre-
served in the National Museum, cf. P.S.A.S., ii (1854-7),
33. Other pieces examined in 1742 were seen to be of
" uncommon thickness, not strained through but painted
upon " (Glenriddell MS. preserved in the National Library
of Scotland, vi. 25.) These latter were obviously grisaille
glass.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
planes. These flanking niches rise from the level of
the hood-mould stops ; they are surmounted by the
lowest of a series of panels with cinquefoiled heads
which flank the central niche and are immediately
below the moulded and decorated course, inclined
like a raking cornice, that defines the gable-top.
Certain of these panels formed a backing for effigies,
most of which have disappeared. The second panel
on either side of the central niche contains an angel
censing, while the panel next the dexter angel bears
the effigy of an ecclesiastic wearing chasuble, stole,
and mitre. The privilege of wearing the mitre was
given to the abbots of Melrose in 1391,¹ and this
effigy is almost certainly a representation of Abbot
Binning. Above the panels and the moulded course
the gable-top finished in an inclined parapet pierced
with circular and quatrefoiled perforations. When
complete this pierced parapet must have been a most
decorative element seen against the open sky.
At both corners of the E. gable there are buttresses
in three stages, bearing small figures, grotesque or
fabulous, on their lowest intake-courses. The niches
higher up contain image-brackets protected by
elaborate canopies, the soffits of which are carved to
represent rib-vaulting. The panelled-and-foiled
buttress-tops end in crocketed pinnacles, those of
the two eastern buttresses being lower than those at
either side. To combine the neighbouring pair of
pinnacles effectively, a third and higher pinnacle has
been introduced, resting on the wall behind - an
expedient sufficient to show the skill and experience
of the designer.
The adjoining bay on each side of the presbytery
has a single, pointed, transomed window of four
lights, moulded like the E. window, but lower in
height. The N. window has flowing tracery ; the
tracery of the S. window, although of rectilinear type,
has most of its subordinate members curved. In
neither case is the hood-mould enriched. The S.
hood-mould rises from boldly carved stops, one a
male head, the other a female one. Above these
windows the wall-head is defined by a cavettoed
eaves-course enriched with foliaceous paterae.
In their outward appearance the two presbytery
chapels were originally almost identical. The one
to the N. is now fragmentary, but the other one is
still fairly entire. Each chapel had a two-light
transomed window looking E., and another one in
the side wall ; the jamb-sections differ in the two
chapels. The tracery is rectilinear and the hood-
moulds of all four windows rise from stops in the
form of human heads. The chapel wall-heads have
a cavettoed eaves-course enriched with foliaceous
paterae, and when complete were surmounted by
parapets pierced with cinquefoils. The roofs were of
the lean-to variety and were covered with lead. On
the N. side of the church can be seen a single clear-
storey-window of a usual English rectilinear type, the
survivor of two which lit the inner end of the presby-
tery from the N. This window, contained within
an almost semicircular outer arch, is divided by a
main central mullion ; both divisions are subdivided
by subordinate mullions into three compartments,
cuspated at the springing-level, and are enclosed by
sub-arches filled in with a grid of tracery. The hood-
mould rises from boldly carved stops, the one on the
E. side representing a man's head and the one on the
W. that of a woman with a head-dress showing a
wimple over horns, a fashion current towards the
beginning of the second quarter of the 15th century.
From the W. side of this window one of the few
surviving flying buttresses, moulded on the soffit and
crocketed on top, extends across the N. chapel-roof
to a pinnacle set over the angle formed by the chapel
and the N. transept-aisle.
On the outside of the transept-aisles the junction
of the work done in the first and second stages (p. 270)
is clearly marked. In the N. aisle the earlier work
halted when the southernmost window reached the
springing-level ; northwards it extends as far as the
first intermediate buttress upon the aisle wall, the
buttress itself with the remainder of the aisle having
been constructed in the second stage. In the S. aisle
the earlier masonry can be traced as far as the centre
of the S. window; the N. jamb of this window was
built in the first stage and the rest of it, with a slight
departure from the original design, in the second
In both transepts each bay is defined externally by a
buttress, surmounted when entire by a crocketed
pinnacle from which a flying buttress, rather later in
detail than those of the presbytery, sprang across the
aisle roofs to the high E. wall of the transept beyond.
Each bay contains a window, the S. bay of the S.
transept having an additional window in the side.
All five windows are of two lights and have pointed
heads, but the southernmost window facing E. has
been made narrower than the others, apparently as
the result of an afterthought ; in this last the carved
stops of the hood-mould, which take the form of
angels playing on musical instruments, are specially
noteworthy. The N. window of the transept aisle,
the only one in the series completed in the first stage,
has a transom and its head is filled in with rectilinear
tracery ; in these respects it differs from the other
windows in this series, which are without transoms
and have their heads filled with tracery of a native
pattern which differs in character from the curvi-
linear tracery seen on the N. side of the presbytery.
Of the high E. wall of the transepts only the two
outer bays are left. Each of them contains a pointed
clearstorey light corresponding with one division of
the surviving clearstorey-window on the N. side of
the presbytery. At the NE. corner of the N. transept
there is an access to the aisle roof. The gable of the
N. transept, being mutual to the church and the
cloister buildings, may be regarded as an internal wall
and is described on p. 278 ; it may be noted here,
however, that neither the string-course nor the upper
1 Lawrie, Annals of the Reigns of Malcolm and William, 100 n.
VOL. II. - A a
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
member of the base-course mentioned on p. 272
extends beyond the gable of the N. transept-aisle.
The gable of the S. transept (Fig. 332) is one of the
major features of the church, and, if it does not quite
achieve the unity of the E. gable it is an outstanding
composition none the less, grouping most happily
with the adjacent parts. Unlike the E. gable it had
to accommodate two openings, the lower one being
the doorway to the monastic cemetery, the upper one
a great five-light window, kept low in order to allow
a more effective display of image-work than had been
possible at the E. end. Moreover, the transept being
wider than the presbytery, its angle buttresses had
to be arranged differently if a corresponding verti-
cality of façade was to be maintained. Thus, instead
of the transept buttresses being placed simply as
extensions of the walls, as at the E. end, each pair is
separated by a corner of the building and this corner
is treated as a minor buttress and enriched with a
single niche. The main buttresses each have two
niches set one above the other, skilfully placed so as
to emphasise the vertical lines of the composition ;
each buttress of the pair is united to its neighbour,
as on the E. façade, by a single pinnacle, canopied on
all four sides, which rises higher than the subordinate
pinnacles above the buttresses themselves. The
image-bracket of the lower niche of the main E.
buttress is carved to represent a crouching figure
holding a scroll inscribed in Gothic letters PASSUS
E (ST) Q (UIA) IP (S) E VOLUIT (" He suffered because He
Himself willed it "). The corresponding figure on
the bracket of the W. buttress holds a scroll inscribed
CU (M) VEN (IT) JES (US) SEQ (UAX ?) CESSABIT (U) MBRA
(" When Jesus comes the shadow will yield and
depart "). A figure on the buttress projecting S. from
the transept similarly bears a scroll inscribed TIMET (E)
DEU (M) (" Fear God "). The last of these texts
corresponds 1 Peter, ii, 17, but neither of the
others corresponds exactly with any passage in Holy
Writ. This transept or at least the major part of it
may be attributed to John Morow, whose honorific
inscription it bears inside (pp. 279 f.).
The fine doorway (Fig. 348) in the lower part of
the gable was apparently hewn at the bench and
then built into an aperture left to receive it - a
procedure which would account for the manipulation
of the walling which borders it outside - or alter-
natively it may have replaced an earlier doorway. It
has a pointed-arched head, the multi-membered
mouldings of the arch returning down the jambs,
uninterrupted by an impost, to rest on high, stilted
bases rather coarsely contoured. It is bordered by
two pilaster-like buttresses, panelled on the front and
surmounted by the remains of gableted and crocketed
pinnacles. From these buttresses a hood-mould,
crocketed on its upper surface, rises and sweeps
upwards in an ogival curve towards the apex, where
it terminates in a finial in the form of a bearded
figure, probably intended for St. John, holding a
scroll inscribed ECCE FILIUS DEI (" Behold the Son of
God "). The finial must therefore have supported
an effigy of our Lord. Below the apex of the hood-
mould there is a shield surmounted by the Royal
crest, a crowned lion sitting front-face ; but the paws
and the sword and sceptre that they held are de-
stroyed. The shield bears the Royal Arms: Within
a double tressure flory-counter-flory a lion rampant;
and it is interesting to note that the lion here " re-
spects the altar", that is, it faces sinister to avoid
turning its back on the altars inside. The shield is
supported on the dexter side by a lion and on the
sinister side by a unicorn. If the arms are those of
James I (1406-36), as they seem to be, this is a very
early instance of the use of supporters - the Royal
Arms do not appear with even a single supporter
until this reign, when a single supporter, a unicorn
sejant, is placed with the king's seal upon a coin,
and on his privy seal his arms are supported by two
lions. ¹
Rising from the hood-mould of this doorway there
are eight little bays of trefoiled arcading. The two
bays in the middle contain sprays of foliage and those
next to them kneeling figures, one having his hands
clasped and the other holding a book. In the outer
niches on the dexter side appear SS. Andrew and
Peter, balanced by SS. Paul and Thomas in the
corresponding ones on the sinister. The arcade is
surmounted by a cornice enriched with foliaceous
paterae ; this runs at the level of the sill of the great
S. window, which has been altered to suit it. The
doorway may have been introduced to commemorate
the release of James I, in March 1424, from his
eighteen years' captivity in England. James and his
Queen, Joan Beaufort, were at Melrose on 5 April
1424, and were crowned at Scone on the 21st of
May following. ²
The S. window has an obtusely pointed arch-head
rising from a foliaceous impost and filled in with
curvilinear tracery. It contains five main lights with-
out transoms. The hood-mould, crocketed on its
upper surface and enriched with paterae on its under
one, springs from boldly carved stops, the dexter
one representing a male head in a roundlet cap
covered with pleated drapery and the sinister one a
female head wearing a chaplet and wimple. As it
sweeps upwards it assumes an ogival curve, encloses
a richly treated niche with a canopy, and terminates
in a finial in the form of a bearded head set at the
apex of the raking cornice, a moulded and enriched
course which defines the top of the gable. Flanking
the central niche and outside the hood-mould there
are two quatrefoiled openings, provided to ventilate
the space between the transept vault and its wooden
roof. The area between these openings and the S.
buttresses of the gable is occupied by a series of
niche-panels, four on either side of the window,
which have richly treated canopies, curved in two
planes. The gable-head has been surmounted by a
1 Stevenson, Heraldry in Scotland, ii, 397.
2 Dunbar, Scottish Kings, 187.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
pierced, quatrefoiled parapet, at either end of which
there has been a pedestal adorned with a turret-like
projection like those still to be seen on the coronal of
the crossing-tower. The belfry on the gable-head
is an obvious addition (cf. p. 268).
The W. wall of the transept (Fig. 330) forms one
side of a re-entrant angle into which projects a stair-
turret, finely designed. The base of this turret is
almost plain, being relieved only by the three hollow-
chamfered slits that light the stair inside ; but above
the level of the nave-aisle wall-head the super-
structure is developed to an octagonal plan and stands
free except for its attachment to the transept wall.
The exposed sides bear angle-shafts. The shaft at
the SW. corner is interrupted by a niche, the central
and highest-set member of a group of three ; the
others are centred respectively in the adjoining sides
of the turret. Above the transept wall-head the
octagon is complete and stands entirely free. It bears
a cornice enriched with two rows of floral paterae.
Immediately below this cornice may be seen a
doorway giving access from the stairhead within to
the outside of the transept roof. Above the cornice
an open balcony or bartizan, which apparently once
had a wooden balustrade, encircled the little crocketed
and crested spire (Fig. 366) in which the turret
finishes. In Fig. 330 two of the W. clearstorey
windows, of two and three lights respectively, may
be seen beyond the stair-turret. Pointed-arched and
filled in with curvilinear tracery, these windows are
quite different in character from the corresponding
lights of the N. transept shown in Fig. 335. This W.
clearstorey of the N. transept contains a group of four
lancet-windows and an isolated fifth light farther S.
The lancets all have equilateral arches, the three inner
ones having trefoiled heads and identically contoured
jambs while the outermost member of the group
differs from the others in jamb-section and its head
is not trefoiled. The isolated light has a trefoiled
head within a drop-centred arch.
The crossing-tower is now represented only by its
W. side and the W. ends of its N. and S. sides. But
enough remains to show that when complete the
tower was low in height and square on plan, that all
four sides were identical in treatment, and that what-
ever terminal it had was of wood, and probably took
the form of a low pyramidal roof. Each side bore a
raking weather-table for the purpose of protecting
the end of the high roof abutting on it. As will be
seen from Fig. 335, the one complete weather-table
is considerably above the present high roof of the
nave (p. 268). Immediately above the apex of this
weather-table a moulded and enriched string-course
defines the bell-chamber and forms a sill-course for
its windows, of which there were three in each wall.
These openings have pointed heads moulded, as are
the jambs, with a series of rolls-and-hollows. The
piers on either side of the central opening once
carried projecting shafts; these rose from the sill-
course to a wall-head course which is moulded and
enriched with floral paterae. Similar shafts are still
to be seen at the corners of the tower, where they
start some five courses below the sill-course. Above
the wall-head these shafts are surmounted by pedestals
in the form of mock turrets with embattled tops, and
between the pedestals there runs a pierced quartre-
foiled parapet, now fragmentary.
On both sides of the church each of the three
surviving bays of the structural nave has two clear-
storey lights with pointed trefoiled heads. The wall-
head above them, which dates only from 1618, when
it was rebuilt out of the old material, is rather lower
than the original one. The N. wall-head, facing the
cloister, is unadorned; the S. wall-head, on the
other hand, is moulded and enriched with boldly
carved paterae from which project two gargoyles, one
in the form of a monster, the other one representing
a pig playing bagpipes (Fig. 389), a motif not confined
entirely to Scotland. To transmit the thrust of the
high vault of the nave, flying buttresses are carried
across its aisle roofs, a double series being required
on the S. side of the nave, where there are two aisles
(Fig. 330). All have moulded soffits and crocketed
tops. Those on the N. abut on pinnacled counter-
forts which rise without projection from the aisle
wall-head and have provision on their N. faces for
image-work. Those on the S. are received on pin-
nacled buttresses, the buttresses common to both
the outer and inner series having richly treated niches
on their S. faces. Two of these niches still contain
effigies, one of the Virgin and Child, and the other
of St. Andrew. The effigy of the Virgin (Fig. 364),
possibly the finest piece of mediaeval figure-sculpture
left in Scotland, is decidedly Flemish in treatment,
and it may therefore have been carved in Flanders,
like the choir-stalls. Its position, in alinement with
the pulpitum and thus marking externally the W.
limit of the monastic choir, is particularly appropriate,
the Cistercians being the first order to dedicate them-
selves to the Blessed Virgin. The niche in which
this image stands is more elaborate than its neigh-
bours. The outer buttresses, those projecting from
the wall of the nave chapel-aisle, also have provision
for image-work, the easternmost one having a niche
corresponding to those on the transept buttresses
while the others, which are later in date, have only a
corbelled bracket and projecting canopy.
The outer wall of the N. aisle of the nave shows
very clearly the end of the abuttal section formed in
the second stage (p. 270) and the westward continua-
tion of the work of the third stage - the junction
coming almost directly below the E. counterfort.
The E. end of this wall contains the professional
doorway (Fig. 340), the threshold of which is a tomb-
stone in secondary use. An unusually good specimen
of a common 15th-century type, this doorway has a
semicircular head built in three orders, the middle
one heavily undercut; the head is enclosed by a hood-
mould, foliaceously enriched and received on foli-
aceous stops, and the jambs have stout engaged shafts
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_033 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
with fillets, which rise from depressed bell-shaped
bases to delicately carved capitals. The cloister
seating on either side is described below in the section
dealing with the claustral arrangement (pp. 282 ff.).
Each bay of the N. aisle contains a single two-light
window, high-set in order to clear the pent-house
roof of the cloister-walk; these windows have
pointed-arched heads with late geometrical tracery.
It is interesting to note that, in this church, the evolu-
tion of window tracery - which normally runs from
the geometrical type through the curvilinear into the
rectilinear - has been reversed, the rectilinear tracery
being here the earliest in date. The N. aisle wall-
head originally had a moulded eaves-course enriched
with foliaceous paterae, but today only a few sections
of it are to be seen below the counterforts. These
bear grotesque heads pierced for rain-water con-
ductors of lead, which appear to have been carried
through the counterforts to drain the gutter behind
them. The modern roof of this aisle is at the original
level. At some time, however, probably in 1618, a
secondary roof was constructed higher up which
must have covered the N. clearstorey lights.
The S. chapel-aisle of the nave has a modern roof
rather higher than the original one and with a plain
wall-head. The whole of the E. bay and the nearer
half of the one adjoining it, as well as the buttress
common to both, were built at one time as an abuttal
section to the S. transept. In each of these bays
there is a pointed-arched window; the one to the
E. is smaller than the other, on account of the pro-
jection of the adjoining stair-turret, and has only
three lights while the other window has four. The
mouldings of both are, however, identical and their
tracery is geometrical in pattern, the tracery of the
W. window being a little later than that of the E.
window. The work of the third stage can be seen
extending from beneath this W. window over two
complete bays, where it ends below the window of
the fifth bay from the transept. In each of these two
bays there is a four-light window of a different jamb-
section to those farther E. The tracery is curvilinear,
and includes a circular compartment at the top sub-
divided into a triquetra of three vesica-shaped lights.
The aisle roof extends no farther W. than the
buttress between these windows.
The fourth stage saw the window of the fifth bay
completed, the adjoining buttress built, and the outer
wall of the aisle carried W. below the window of the
sixth bay. On the image-bracket of this buttress
there is a shield (Fig. 377) upheld by angels and
charged: Two crosiers saltire-wise between three
hunting-horns stringed and garnished, in chief a rose
and in base a mason's " mell ". The hunting-horns
were borne by Abbot Andrew Hunter (1444-71), the
crosiers indicate his office, and the " mell " and the
rose together form a rebus giving the place-name of the
abbey. This abbot's initials A H, with the H carved
upside-down, appear below the two upper hunting-
horns. The window in the fifth bay (Fig. 336),
completed by Hunter, shows a different pattern of
tracery from those on either side. Hunter must also
have completed the system of flying buttresses which
still stand W. of the S. transept, since his coat of
arms, as described above, was carved on the image-
bracket of the intermediate buttress next to the transept;
the top of the shield, bearing the tops of two crosiers
in saltire with a rose between their heads, can
still be seen on this bracket and the lower part is
preserved in the Abbey Museum (p. 289).
During the fifth stage the work was continued
westwards from the point at which Hunter had left
off in the fourth stage, the sixth bay being completed,
and the seventh and eighth bays built. This work is
by no means of the same high order as the remainder
of the fabric, the carving in particular being crude
though not without vitality. The windows of the
sixth and seventh bays are copied from the curvi-
linear windows of the third and fourth bays. The
window of the eighth bay also has curvilinear
tracery, but the vesica-shaped compartments formed
by it differ in pattern from those of the other windows.
The image-bracket of the sixth buttress W. of the
transept has a shield on which the " mell " and rose
have been carved in the chief, but the abbot's coat of
arms has not even been begun. The westernmost
buttress of this chapel-aisle has a shield on the image-
bracket inscribed with the sacred monogram I H S.
An armorial panel lower down exhibits the Royal
Arms of Scotland on a shield, supported by two
unicorns gorged with crowns having chains attached,
and surmounted by an open crown of four crosses-
patty and four fleurs. Flanking the crown there are
the initials I Q, for Jacobus Quartus (1488-1513),
and above it there is a scroll with a motto, now
illegible but almost certainly IN DEFENS. At the foot
of the panel, the date ANNO D (OMI) NI 1505 is carved
above a vine-scroll. Between the date and the Royal
Arms there is a second shield, upheld by angels and
flanked by a " mell " and a rose. The coat of arms
is no longer legible but presumably it was a bull's
head erased, as given on p. 302, for Abbot William
Turnbull (1503-7). At the SW. corner of the church
the facework of the outer walls has been torn out
leaving a core of masonry no more than 3 ft. 8 in.
high at the W. gable, the part best preserved. The
foundations, which were exposed in 1949, are of red
sandstone and Quarryhill stone, most of the stones
showing evidence of having previously been used
elsewhere ; oyster shells and slates are used for
pinning up stones to a level bed. These foundations
may not have been laid until the time of Abbot
Hunter (1444-71). The westernmost chapel at the
corner opened to the nave by an archway, but the
one to the E. of it was intended to be entered through
a doorway.
INTERIOR OF CHURCH. As in most Cistercian
churches, the internal arrangement here is two-
storeyed, comprising pier arcade and clearstorey, the
triforium stage being omitted. The presbytery is
-- 276 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_034 |
PLATE 73
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 351. Nave and pulpitum from NW. -- Fig. 352. W. arch of crossing, from N. transept.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
To face p. 276 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_035 |
PLATE 74
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 353. Capital of S. pier at pulpitum. -- Fig. 354. Capital in nave arcade.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
Fig. 355. Base of S. pier at pulpitum. -- Fig. 356. Capital in nave arcade.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_036 |
PLATE 75
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 357. Perpendicular tracery in clearstorey. -- Fig. 358. Perpendicular tracery in clearstorey.
Fig. 359. John Morow lintel. -- Fig. 360 String-course with grotesque figures.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
Photos Ministry of Works. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_037 |
PLATE 78
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 365. Buttress pinnacle on S. side of nave. -- Fig. 366. Top of stair turret on S. transept.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
Fig. 367. Niche on staircase buttress of S. transept. -- Fig. 368. Buttress on W. side of S. transept.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567)
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_038 |
PLATE 79
[Photographs Inserted]
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_039 |
PLATE 80
[Photograph Inserted]
Fig. 378. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; vault of choir showing bosses (cf. Figs. 379-381).
Photo Ministry of Works. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_040 |
PLATE 81
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 379. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; vaulting bosses in choir numbered 1 to 6 in key (Fig. 383). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_041 |
PLATE 82
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 380. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; vaulting bosses in choir numbered 7 to 11, and 15, in key (Fig. 383). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_042 |
PLATE 83
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 381. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; vaulting bosses in choir numbered 13, 14, 16, 17, and vaulting corbel numbered 18, in key (Fig. 383); with (A)
vaulting boss in doorway of pulpitum (the Deity). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_043 |
PLATE 84
[Photographs Inserted]
Fig. 382. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; vaulting bosses. -- 1, 2, foliaceous devices in N. nave aisle; -- 3, Cistercian rose
with foliage in N. nave aisle; -- 4, young male head in chapel of S. nave aisle; -- 5, thistle device in chapel of S.
nave aisle; -- 6, youth's or woman's head in S. bay of S. transept.
By courtesy of the late Mr. C. F. P. Cave, F.S.A.
To face p. 277 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_044 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
three bays in length. Its easternmost bay has a large
window at the end and another one at each side.
Beneath the E. window there are two lockers, the
lintel of the one to the S. being a gravestone in
secondary use which may be the stone described ¹ as
bearing " a cross and falchion said to be in memory
of James, 2nd Earl of Douglas, but all that is left
are two incised parallel lines possibly indicating
the cross-shaft ". Below each of the side windows
there is a contemporary tomb-recess, neither of
them destined to become a royal sepulchre. On the
W. side of the N. tomb there is a locker. On the W.
side of the S. tomb a trefoil-headed credence and an
ogival-headed double piscina ² have been inserted
at some time in the 15th century.
On the side walls and at the E. angles of the presby-
tery there are projecting wall-shafts for the vault.
These shafts stop short of the floor-level, leaving
room for a wall-bench below them. Round them
there returns a moulded string-course which emphas-
ises the sill-levels of the windows, and they are also
banded half-way up. Their capitals, from which the
vault-ribs spring, are richly foliated. The elaborate
lierne-vault of the presbytery, now represented only
by its E. bay, is very domical. Its webs are con-
structed of slabs set on edge. All the ribs - wall,
ridge, transverse, diagonal, tierceron, and lierne -
are moulded, and have at their intersections carved
bosses arranged as described below. It will be seen
from Fig. 378 that the tierceron-ribs were meant to
be continuous from their springing to the ridge,
although a simpler and even more interesting pattern
could have been obtained by stopping them against
the central octagonal compartment.
The central boss represents the Trinity, facing E.
and flanked by two censing angels, the crucified
[Diagram Inserted]
Fig. 383. Melrose Abbey (No. 567) ; key to roof bosses of
choir, as shown in Fig 378.
Christ appearing between the knees of the seated
Father, while a dove symbolises the Holy Ghost.
The eight bosses of the rib-intersections at the
corners of the central octagonal compartment repre-
sent the following apostles, reading from the western-
most one by S., E., and N.: St. Andrew with the
saltire cross, St Bartholomew with the flaying-knife,
St. Peter with the keys, St. Thomas with a spear,
St. James the Less with a fuller's club, St. James the
Greater with his pilgrim staff and scrip, St. Paul
with a sword, and St. Matthias with a battle-axe.
In addition to their emblems some of the figures bear
scrolls. The outer series of bosses on the tierceron-
ribs includes: NW. of St. Andrew a foliated boss;
SW. of St. Andrew an unidentified saint, perhaps
St. John as he has a book; SW. of St. Peter a foliated
boss; SE. of St. Peter a boss carved with a rose,
symbolising the Blessed Virgin; SE. of St. James
the Less an angel; NE. of St. James the Less a
foliated boss; NE. of St. Paul a boss with carving
too much worn to be deciphered; NW. of St. Paul
another one with a snail-like pattern. The W. boss
at the intersection of the ridge-rib and transverse
rib is decayed; each of the two on either wall, at
the junction of the transverse and tierceron-ribs,
represents an aged bearded man bearing a scroll,
presumably one of the Patriarchs; while the E. boss
at the junction of the ridge and tierceron-ribs is
foliaceous. Illustrations of these and other bosses
in the church will be found grouped together in Figs.
378 to 382.
The two inner or W. bays of the presbytery are
represented by little more than the N. side of the E.
bay, yet enough remains to indicate what the ordin-
ance has been. On each side of the presbytery there
were two archways, the E. member of the pair
opening into the presbytery chapel and the other
forming the introitus superior, or upper entry of the
monastic choir. The NE. archway alone is entire.
Its respond shows a base-section rather earlier than
that of the corresponding pier; its capital, too, is
foliaceous, while the capital of the pier is moulded
and enriched with small paterae and ball-ornament.
The pier-section includes semi-rounds alternating
with pointed bowtels, and on the surviving pier of
the N. bays the S. member develops into twin wall-
shafts for vaulting. These wall-shafts are joined by
a third shaft, which is set out on a grotesque corbel
placed immediately above the pier capital. A
projecting niche on the S. face of this pier defines
the upper end of the monastic choir; the elaborate
canopy remains, but the image bracket below, which
was supported by the figure of an angel, has been
deliberately mutilated. The surviving arch of the
choir arcade is obtusely pointed and built in three
orders, the central one defined by undercutting. The
clearstorey passage above it has a traceried screen
towards the choir, built in two divisions within a
flat arch-head confined by the wall-rib of the high
vault. The lower part of the screen included a
pierced quatrefoiled parapet with an embattled top.
1 Glenriddell MS. preserved in the National Library of
Scotland, vi, 20.
2 On the use of the double piscina see Bond, The Chancel
of English Churches, 146-8.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
The ruinous clearstorey on the opposite side of the
choir shows how the high roof was reached from a
small newel-stair. Within the presbytery lie four
mediaeval grave-slabs, one of which has been identi-
fied as coming from Frosterley Quarry, Co. Durham.
It is probably the coffin-slab of a bishop, since until
the 14th century abbots had not a right to the honours
of the choir ; but it looks too late to be that of William
de Bondington, bishop of Glasgow, who is known to
have been buried beside the high alter in 1258. ¹
The outer walls of the N. presbytery-chapel,
though very incomplete, show that there was a
window in each with a locker below the sill. Origin-
ally this chapel had no piscina, but at some later time
one was provided on the respond of the choir arcade,
where its drain can still be traced. The arch on its
W. side has thin voussoirs more like those of a
vaulting-arch than of a main structural one. Its
respond has a base-section intermediate in develop-
ment between that of the choir-arcade respond and
the corresponding pier, yet there can be little differ-
ence of date, if any, between the three. A noteworthy
feature of this chapel has been its vaulted ceiling,
now unfortunately fragmentary. In contrast to the
domical vault of the presbytery, the tierceron-vault
of this chapel was almost flat, and this evidently for
appearance and not from structural necessity. It
rose from a cornice enriched with paterae. The two
W. groups of ribs are received on foliated corbels,
and the two E. groups on circular wall-shafts which
rise from the floor level. The ridge-rib running N.
and S. is supported by two intermediate tierceron-
ribs. The webs are thin and close-jointed. This,
the earliest of the vaults, was something of a tour de
force - so much so that, when the vault of the S.
chapel came to be constructed, it was made much less
flat while two additional tiercerons were introduced
on N. and S. for further safety. The S. chapel was
otherwise structurally identical with the N. chapel,
although from the beginning its S. wall had contained
a double piscina with an ogival trefoiled head as well
as a locker with a pointed head.
The gable of the N. transept includes, at floor level,
a central doorway with a semicircular arched head.
This opened into the sacristy, the southernmost
compartment in the undercroft of the E. range of the
cloister (p. 283). A similar doorway higher up and
farther W. led from the choir-monks' dorter to the
church by way of the night-stair, traces of which are
still to be seen on the W. wall of the transept. At the
foot of the stair there is a benatura with a slightly
ogival head. About half-way up the gable there is a
central horizontal panel, its border having vine-scroll
enrichment at the sides and top. This panel contains
fourteen small bases, alternating with a similar
number of larger ones, which were evidently meant
to support images of saints flanking a central crucifix
- an arrangement directly contravening the Carta
Caritatis, which laid down that only an image of the
Saviour could be exhibited in a Cistercian church.
The clearstorey in the upper part of the gable is
defined by a string-course, and its passage opens to
the transept by three lancets which have had a
pierced quatrefoiled balustrade in the lower part of
the embrasure. The W. end of the passage, where a
stair rises to the high roof, shows a minor departure
from the original design. Between the lancets and
the apex of the transept vault there is a small circular
window filled in with a cuspated pentacle of tracery.
But for their vaults the two N. bays of the N.
transept are almost entire (Fig. 344). The bay system
is well proportioned and shows a fine sense of design.
The pier arcade on the E. side rises nearly as high as
the clearstorey, which is here at the same level as on
the gable. The piers, set on moulded bases identical
with that of the surviving pier in the presbytery, have
large circular members at the cardinal points and
between them smaller ones with fillets; the W.
member is developed into twin vaulting-shafts which
are joined, about two courses above the arch-springing,
by a third shaft corbelled out in advance of them.
This construction, less common in Britain than on
the Continent, was adopted here and in the nave for
aesthetic reasons, as structurally the shafts on the
piers are not needed ; other shafts which have a
definite structural function are corbelled out above.
The outer member of the arcade arch is finished off
on the nearer twin-shafts, a corbel being set out at the
junction; against the under-surface of this corbel
the outer or third vaulting-shaft stops, while from the
upper surface rises another series of triple vaulting-
shafts, a little in advance of those below, and it is
this upper series which receives the vault-ribs and
transmits their load downwards.
The southernmost of the two surviving piers of the
arcade has a moulded capital enriched with small
paterae, but the adjoining pier and its respond both
have foliated capitals. The arcade arches are obtusely
pointed and are built in three orders. The clear-
storey above, which is defined by a horizontal string-
course, has finely arcaded double openings towards
the transept, delicately moulded on the mid-shaft
and jambs, and having foiled heads. Over all rise
the wall-ribs of the high vault. This vault was of
the tierceron variety, built in oblong severies approxi-
mating in shape to a double square.
The clearstorey with its passage and string-course
are at a lower level on the W. wall of the transept
than elsewhere, this low setting of the windows giving
more equal illumination. The two N. clearstorey-
lights indicate clearly the difference between the
window heads already referred to. At the foot of the
windows can be seen the remains of the quatre-
foiled balustrade that fenced in the lower part of the
embrasure. Between each pair of windows rises a
corbelled shaft, ending in a foliated capital sur-
mounted by a corbelled canopy. Each capital sup-
ports an image. The N. one (Fig. 361) represents St.
1 Melrose Chronicle, 116.
-- 278 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_046 |
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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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
Beside the name is cut a mason's mark. The second
inscription is cut on a horizontal panel which may be
an insertion of later date than the first. This panel,
which bears scroll-work on its margin, rests on a
string-course which runs between the aisle archway
and the SW. corner of the transept and there returns
upwards to join the cornice above the S. door. The
inscription (Fig. 390) is greatly wasted, but the follow-
ing reading has been supplied from the replica in the
Abbey Museum:
[IOHN MOROW SVM TY] M CALLIT / [WAS I
AND BORN] IN PARYSSE / [CERTANLY
AND HAD] IN KEPYNG / [AL MASON WERK]
OF SANTAN / [DROYS YE HYE K] YRK
OF GLAS / [GW MELROS AND ] PASLAY
OF / [NYDDYSDAYLL AND OF] GALWAY
[I PRAY TO GOD AND MAR] I BATHE
[& SWETE SANCT IOHNE TO KEPE THIS HALY KYRK
FRA SKATHE]
There is no uniformity in the arrangement of the
vaulting shafts upon the W. wall of the transept. For
example, the shaft in the SW. corner descends to the
floor, where it ends in a keel-shaped base. The
adjoining shaft is corbelled out from the string-
course that runs below the second inscribed panel
mentioned above. The corbel represents a crouching
figure. Above it there is another corbel, carved
apparently with two lions, which served the purpose
of an image-bracket. Higher up still the shaft is
banded, the moulded band having sufficient pro-
jection to support a second but smaller image. The
shafts farther N. rise from the capitals of the aisle
archway, the piers of the archway having a special
member on which the shafts are received. This was
the arrangement proposed for the corresponding bay
of the N. transept, which could not be carried out,
however, owing to the difference in the width of the
two aisles. The W. clearstorey only appears in the
N. and central bays, the S. bay having to accom-
modate the turret-stair; the opening in the central
bay is identical with those on the E. sides of this and
the other transept, while in the N. bay the opening
balances the corresponding opening of the N. transept.
The central and S. bays on the E. side of this
transept are entire. Both bays have accommodated
chapels separated, as in the other transept-aisle, by
low screen-walls. Each chapel was provided with
an ornate piscina and a plain locker. The one on the
S. alone shows traces of an altar, above which an
image-braket has been inserted. The tierceron vault
above these chapels is still almost entire ; two keel-
shaped vaulting-shafts for its support are provided
within the S. corners of the aisle, but the one on the
N., which rests on the sill-course of the S. window,
has not been made use of. When this vault came to
be constructed it was extended beyond this shaft to
the capital of the pier respond, the arch of the pier
arcade having to be cut into for its reception.
The crossing is represented today by its two W.
piers and the arch (Fig. 352) that they support. The
piers are composed of cylindrical members flanking
a pointed bowtel ; they rise from high bases, rather
coarsely moulded, to well-carved foliaceous capitals.
The arch is built in three orders. The crossing was
originally designed to be covered with a tierceron
vault with level ridges; when the vault came to be
built, however, some adjustment was found to be
necessary, and the crossing-arches were cut into in
order to receive the vault ribs. Above the vault there
were two storeys, the lower one giving access to the
roof spaces and parapets of the high roofs while the
upper one, which was reached from a staircase at the
SW. corner of the tower, was the bell-chamber.
The structural nave, as represented by the three
surviving bays between crossing and pulpitum, was
set out on a three-bay system, of which three further
bays survived as late as 1742. ¹ If the system was
continuous throughout a nave of ten bays, as sug-
gested on p. 270, it would follow that one bay was
devoted to the retro-choir, a space bounded on the
E. by the pulpitum and on the W. by the rood-screen;
but the system need not have been continuous and
there is no evidence for a rood-screen of stone. The
pier arcade on either side of the nave was closed in by
solid stone walls about 9 ft. high, which are integral
with the piers and not built against them as is usually
the case. These screen-walls are still traceable in
the bays E. of the pulpitum, which marks the lower
end of the monastic choir, and there is evidence that
they also extended W. of it. The piers at the
pulpitum, like the crossing-piers to which they corre-
spond, are bold in outline, while the intermediate
piers differ from them and show, towards the nave,
a double-membered shaft such as was noted in the
transepts and presbytery. All the piers have moulded
bases, while their capitals are finely carved with
spirited foliage (Figs. 353-356). The obtusely-
pointed arches of the pier arcade, rising almost to
the string-course that defines the clearstorey, are
built in three orders. Between each pair and at the
pulpitum there is a triple-membered vaulting-shaft,
those between the arches being corbelled out on the
piers, while those at the pulpitum rise from the
capitals. Above the pulpitum these shafts support a
stout transverse arch corresponding to the W. arch
of the crossing. The space between these two arches
has been covered in with three bays of tierceron
vaulting, and it is obvious that the abutment system
was inadequate as the vault has thrust the lateral walls
outward, the deformation extending upwards from
the capitals of the pier arcade. Immediately below
the vault came the clearstorey with two openings in
each bay. As mentioned above, these openings were
reduced in height in the 17th century and given
segmental heads considerably below the level of the
original pointed rear-arches. Like those of the other
parts, these openings have had pierced balustrades.
1 Glenriddel MS. preserved in the National Library of Scotland, vi, 25.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
The pulpitum or E. screen (Fig. 351) rose about
11 ft. above the church floor and supported a loft
from which some central feature, probably an image
of the Saviour, once projected. On the E. side the
screen was unadorned, being covered by the return
stalls of the choir, but the W. side has a moulded
cornice enriched with scroll-work. The character-
istic feature of a pulpitum is the central doorway, and
this one has shafted jambs and a depressed arch-head,
the outer order of the arch being foliaceously en-
riched. On its S. side there is a locker. This doorway
opens into a little lobby in the thickness of the screen.
The lobby is ceiled with a mock tierceron-vault on
which the central boss represents the Deity and the
others are foliaceous. A staircase on its N. side led
to the loft above.
On examination of the 17th-century alterations on
the structural nave it will be found that the W. arch-
way of the crossing must already have been shut off
before the parish church was formed in 1618, as the
E. of the four massive piers then added on the S.
side of the N. pier-arcade obviously abutted on a
pre-existing wall. These piers rest on high chamfered
bases and have simple imposts from which spring
arches, slightly pointed, and chamfered at the arris.
Above these later arches ran a gallery, entered from
two doorways above each arch. The two middle
doorways have segmental heads, the others are
lintelled. All were approached from the original
clearstorey-passage which runs behind them. Higher
up, an enriched 15th-century cornice, re-used, runs
along both side-walls and serves as an impost for the
barrel-vault that has replaced the monastic rib-vault.
Evidence that the rib-vault had already fallen before
the parish church was formed is supplied by two of
its bosses, which have been rebuilt into the later
masonry on the N. side; one is foliaceous and
the other represents a man's head, bearded and
moustached, enclosed within a circular foliated
border.
For a church of the first rank, the N. aisle of the
structural nave is quite exceptionally narrow, a
circumstance for which the explanation is given on
p. 270. In each bay it has a high-set window, while
the E. bay includes the processional doorway as well.
All these openings have segmental rear-arches. In
connexion with the doorway it may be noted that
the screen-wall of the choir had a hatch-like opening
directly opposite, as if for the purpose of overlooking
the choir; alternatively, the E. alley of the cloister
came under observation from the choir if the door
was open. On the W. of the doorway the 17th-
century memorial numbered 1 on p. 289 has been
inserted in the wall of the N. aisle. The aisle itself
is covered with a quadripartite vault with level ridges.
The tas-de-charge on the N. spring from corbels,
those on the S. from the capitals of the pier arcade.
The vaulting bosses are foliaceous.
The S. aisle of the nave, normal in breadth, gives
access to the chapels in the parallel aisle on its S. side.
It is covered with a tierceron vault with level ridges.
Before this vault was constructed provision had been
made for it upon the arch opening to the S. transept,
and a tierceron vault must thus have been contem-
plated from the outset; but as the arches of the pier
arcade had eventually to be dressed back to accom-
modate the vault members and all the diagonal ribs
of the vault itself had to be backed up in order to
avoid distorted webs, it is clear that the details had
not been fully worked out. The northernmost boss
of the W. surviving bay of this vault shows a shield
charged with three fleurs-de-lys, ¹ the other bosses
are foliaceous.
The original W. gable (p. 265) is of rubble, rough-
axed and still showing traces of thin plaster or lime-
wash on both sides. The S. end is incomplete; the
N. end has been renewed and spliced up to the later
N. wall of the church. On its outer side a Roman-
esque buttress projects in alinement with the N.
pier-arcade, and on the inside, where a respond might
be expected, the masonry has been disturbed. The
central doorway has plain jambs with ashlar ingoings.
Along the front of this gable ran the vaulted Galilee,
two bays wide and five in length. On the evidence
of the single surviving base of its arcade the Galilee
can be dated to the early 13th century. The base is
of water-holding type and has supported a four-lobed
shaft.
In the S. chapel-aisle of this church, as in some of
the greater secular churches on the Continent, each
bay other than the second one from the W. is a
separate cell opening to the nave-aisle proper through
an archway. The progress of this side of the fabric
is clearly indicated internally by differences in the
base sections of the piers of the archways. Thus, one
type of base extends from the transept over the pier
between the first and second bays and a second from
the pier between the second and third bays to that
between the fifth and sixth bays, while a third type is
found on the three piers farther W. The arches that
these W. piers support have been built at one time,
and they are later in date than the five farther E.
Although the chapels were built piece-meal, they
have an identical arrangement - a window and piscina
to the S., an altar and altar-pace against the E. wall,
and a locker in the W. wall.
The easternmost chapel has a string-course at the
level of the window sill. This ran round all three
walls, but the E. section has been removed to accom-
modate a high reredos of wood (p. 279). In the W.
wall, three courses above the springing-level of the
entrance archway, there has been inserted an in-
1 This charge, which corresponds with the arms of
" France modern " introduced about 1365 by Charles V in
place of the semée-de-lys, may here stand for the Duchy
of Touraine. Archibald, 4th Earl of Douglas, a notable
benefactor to the abbey, was created Duke of Touraine in
1424, and on being slain at Verneuil later in the same year
was succeeded in the earldom and duchy by his son
Archibald, who carried the fleurs-de-lys in the first quarter
of his shield in virtue of his duchy.
VOL. II. - B
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
scribed fragment which runs NINIANI KAT(HER)-
IN(A)E / THOM(A)E PAULI CUTHB/(ER)T(A)E S(ANCTI)
PETRI KE(N)TIG(ER)NI (" Of Ninian, Katherine,
Thomas, Paul, Cuthbert, St. Peter, Kentigern ").
A most interesting memorial in the shape of a prie-
dieu of stone (Fig. 375), dating from about the turn
of the 13th and 14th centuries, has been set into the
floor. Its back and front measure respectively 1 ft.
4 in. and 1 ft. 1 in. in height ; the width is 1 ft. and
the thickness 6 1/2 in. On the upper surface runs the
inscription in Lombardic lettering † ORATE PRO /
ANIMA FRATRIS PETRI CEL(L)ARII (" Pray for the soul
of brother Peter, the cellarer "). On the back is
carved a penannular design very similar to that found
on contemporary grave-slabs. The chapel is covered
with a lierne vault, from which most of the ribs have
disappeared. The ridge-ribs have had trefoiled
soffits, like some of the vault-ribs in St. Matthew's
Collegiate Church, Roslin.1
The second chapel has a string-course only on the
S. and E. walls, and the E. section has been removed
to accommodate a reredos. Behind the alter can be
seen a " waster ", a stone set out for an inscription
in four lines within a scrolled border which has not
been completed. This chapel has a tierceron vault
and all its bosses are foliaceous. The third chapel has
a similar vault. There is a string-course upon the
S. wall only. The W. wall contains the Renaissance
memorial numbered 2 on p. 289. The E. wall of the
fourth chapel shows definite signs of fire, as if a tall
wooden reredos set against it had been burnt. On
the S. wall there is a string-course and below that the
memorial numbered 3 on p. 290. Memorial 4 (p. 290)
is inset in the floor. The fifth chapel is covered with
a tierceron vault in which the master-boss probably
represents St. Michael. The boss to the E. of this
bears a man's head, and the one to the W. a shield of
arms ; the charges are decayed, but they were pre-
sumably those of Abbot Andrew Hunter. The other
bosses are foliaceous. In the floor there are memorials
5 and 6 (p. 290).
The sixth chapel, open to the sky like the two
farther W., was intended to have a tierceron vault
with level ridges. The string-course only occurs on
the S. wall. The piscina below seems to have been
inserted after the S. wall had been completed, since
the drain debouches on the chapel floor. A stone
inserted at the back of the piscina bears the initials
V T, presumably for Abbot William Turnbull (1503-7).
Memorial 7 rests against the S. wall. The two
chapels farther W. show nothing of special interest,
while the two beyond these are represented only by
their foundations.
Illustrations of the church not specifically referred
to above will be found in Figs. 330, 331, 337, 341,
342, 343, 345, 346, 357, 358, 360, 363, 365, 367, 368,
369, 370, 371, 373, 376, 384, 385, 386, 387, 388, 391,
and 392.
THE CLOISTER. Along each of the four sides of the
cloister ran the usual covered alley or gallery, its
outer side pierced by open arcades in order to admit
light and air ; fragments of the primary arcade, dating
from the last years of the 12th century, have been
set up in relation to one another in the museum. In
the abbey's early days, when there was a lane on the
W. side of the cloister (p. 266), the garth or open
space measured some 93 ft. from N. to S. by 100 ft.
from E. to W. ; when the lane was done away with
the latter dimension was increased to 115 ft. On the
N. side may be seen foundations of a lavatory, one
of the most important provisions of a Cistercian
cloister,2 projecting into the garth. Situated in a
position convenient for the choir-monks' frater and
kitchen alike, this is a small square building con-
taining a circular basin.3 In their present state of
ruin, it is uncertain to what extent the cloister-build-
ings were affected by the late 14th-century recon-
struction, but the S. alley as well as the S. end of the
E. range and its alley were obviously rebuilt with the
church. Although nothing remains of the alleys but
their floors, the provision made for them on the walls
of the church (Fig. 335) supplies a certain amount of
evidence for their treatment. Thus from the chapter-
house down to the SE. angle of the cloister may be
seen a series of seven arcaded seats (Fig. 338), boldly
moulded and richly carved. Similar seats were
intended to run along the S. alley also, that is on the
N. side of the church, and one of them (Fig. 340)
was built on the W. side of the processional doorway.
But when this had been completed, together with the
abuttal section, in the second stage of the construc-
tion (p. 270), work was interrupted, and when it was
resumed a simpler variety of arcaded seating was
adopted, having foiled heads rising from corbel-stops.
The central seat of the latter series (Fig. 339),
intended for the abbot, is more elaborately treated
than the others and is marked off from them by little
wall-shafts. These seats along the wall of the church
were used during collation, a short reading from the
Lives of the Fathers, which took place between vespers
and the last service of the day, compline ; 4 and it
is clear from the Consuetudines that the ceremony of
foot-washing was also preformed here. If, as at
Rievaulx,5 there were carrels or desks for the study in
the cloister alleys, they would have been placed
against the arcaded outer wall. At the junction of
the E. and S. alleys a projecting benatura is con-
veniently placed beside the processional doorway,
the entry to the church from the cloister. Nothing
is left to indicate the position of the armarium
claustri, the bookcase normally provided between the
chapter-house and the processional door.
1 Inventory of Midlothian, No. 138.
2 Le Duc, Dictionnaire Raisonné de l' Architecture Fran-
çaise, vi, 170.
3 The one Cistercian abbey in the British Isles in which
the lavatory is still intact is that of Mellifont, Co. Louth.
4 Marquise de Maillé, L'Eglise Cistercienne de Preuilly,
70.
5 Chartulary of Rievaulx, Surtees Society, vol. 83, 340.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
On the church walls two rows of putlog-holes can
be seen above the seating and at a still higher level
there is a row of corbels below a weather-table, the
last serving also as a sill-course for the nave-aisle
windows. The corbels bore the runner of a pent-
house roof, the rafters of which rested on this runner
on one side and on the outer wall of the alley on the
other side. The toes of the rafters seem to have been
tenoned into a special form of tile wall-head, speci-
mens of which are preserved in the museum. The
upper putlog-holes received one end of the tie-
beams, the lower ones accommodated a series of
inclined braces corresponding to the rake of the
rafter-feet ; the ties, braces, and rafter-feet were
probably boarded in to form a coved ceiling. A
slight difference in the width of the E. and S. alleys
accounts for discrepancies in the levels of the corbels
and lower putlog-holes on the two sides. This was
the arrangement where the alleys were reconstructed
with the church, but the early alleys may have been
barrel-vaulted-so much, at least, is suggested by
the evidence for a short stretch of barrel-vaulting
that may be seen immediately S. of the chapter-
house.
The S. compartment on the ground floor of the
E. range, a vaulted chamber opening out of the N.
transept (p. 278), is known as the " wax-cellar ".
In a common arrangement the compartment in this
position is divided in two, the part opening to the
church forming a sacristy and that part opening to
the cloister serving as a treasury. Here there is one
compartment only, presumably a sacristry ; it prob-
ably acquired its name from the fact that the money
paid twice a year towards the cost of maintaining
lights in the church was called ceragium. With the
exception of its N. wall, which survives from the
12th century and contains three round-arched
recesses, the wax-cellar was entirely rebuilt when the
transept was reconstructed ; and its present vault is
even later, as it has replaced an earlier one. It is lit
from the E., the single, small, lintelled window being
set so high as to require three steps within its breast.
There are steps at the entrance too, for the floor, like
that of all the ground-floor apartments in the cloister
buildings, is considerably lower than the church
floor. The lowest step is a re-used tombstone dating
from either the 13th or the 14th century and bearing
an inscription in Lombardic letters of which only
the beginning is exposed ; this reads † HIC IACET /
IOHANNA D(E) ROS [. . . . .]. The family of Ros or Rous
were prominent on the East March, owning the castle
and manor of Wark in Tynedate. This tombstone
presumably came from the part of the cemetery taken
in when the church was enlarged, since the burial of
women within Cistercian churches was prohibited.
On the N. side of the wax-cellar lies the chapter-
house which, although reduced almost to its founda-
tions, shows extensive signs of alteration. Where so
little is left the size and shape of the original chapter-
house cannot be precisely determined, but a close
approximation can be made. The width from N.
to S. has always been in the neighbourhood of 34 ft.
6 in. This indicates that the first chapter-house
was aisled, as the Cistercians preferred, while a pier
on one side-wall may stand on the line of the
original E. wall, in which case the building did not
project E. beyond the limits of the range. If these
inferences are correct, it follows that the early build-
ing was vaulted, and was three bays wide and two
bays long, as at Preuilly, measuring 30 ft. 6 in. from
E. to W.
The chapter-house was already in existence in
1159 1 when Waltheof, the second abbot, who was
afterwards canonised, was buried beside the entrance
in a position which he had himself chosen. In 1170
his tomb was opened by Ingelram, bishop of Glasgow,
who found the body entire and its vestments intact,
and thereupon provided a new grave-cover of polished
marble. In 1240 the grave was once more disturbed,2
a tooth and some small bones being removed as
miracle-working relics ; but for the purpose of the
present account the importance of the record lies in
a previous sentence, which states that, at the same
time, the bones of other abbots who had been buried
beside the entrance to the chapter-house were trans-
ferred to the E. part of the building.3 This entry
proves that in 1240 the chapter-house had already
been enlarged to its present dimensions ; and the
inference may be drawn that the work was then still
in progress.4 After its enlargement the chapter-
house, like that of Tintern, was a rectangular vaulted
hall, three bays wide and five in length, having a
width of 34 ft. 6 in. and a length of 53 ft. The
arcaded front, of which only the lower part has
survived, is richly treated. The central doorway and
its side-openings have shafted jambs built in recessed
orders, the shafts, which were detached, having
finely moulded bases of the " water-holding " variety.
In 1921 excavation proved that the floor had been
tiled. Contrary to the Cistercian regulations, some
of the tiles are ornamented in contrasting colours,
motifs such as the fleur-de-lys, the star, and the petal
being used ; since the Chapter-General of 1218
ordained that such pavements, where they existed,
1 Jocelyn of Furness cited in Scotichronicon, vi, cap. xxv.
2 Although the chronicle is silent on the point, it is
probable that in this year the saint's tomb was enclosed
within a feretory-fragments of one of this time were found
beside the chapter-house and are now on display in the
museum.
3 The privilege of burial in the chapter-house of Melrose
was not confined to abbots. From 1215 onwards lay bene-
factors of the house were buried both in then old building
and in the new one ; the first burial recorded in the latter,
after the translation of the abbots' remains, was that of a
woman, Christian Corbet, wife of William, second son of
Patrick, Earl of Dunbar. (Melrose Chronicle, 61, 71, 89,
90, 107.) She died in 1241, and was probably thus
honoured both on account of her father's benefactions and
because her husband was reputed miles bone oppinionis (sic)
and was also the fortunate possessor of one of St. Waltheof's
teeth (supra).
4 Cf. Melrose Chronicle, 35, 39, 87.
-- 283 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_051 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
should be removed,1 the fragments of tiling seen here
must be dated to some considerably later period.
These fragments, and those of another pavement in
the conversi cloister (p. 286), are the finest examples
of mediaeval tiled pavements remaining in situ in
Scotland.2
To the N. of the chapter-house there is a narrow
cell in which rose the original day-stair to the choir-
monks' dorter. On the rearrangement of the cloister,
this compartment became a passage and was provided
with a drain running E. North of this passage there
is a wider cell having a stone bench at either side,
evidently the parlour, the only apartment in which
converse was permitted. The long pillared hall
beyond the parlour is the northernmost compartment
on the ground floor of the E. range. This was the
cella novitiorum, or novice-house. As it stood in the
12th century it measured 40 ft. long and 26 ft. 6 in.
wide ; but in the 13th century it was rebuilt and
extended some 50 ft. 6 in. farther N., the junction
between old and new being easily traced on the W.
wall, where it is seen immediately S. of a 13th-century
doorway and buttress. The new 13th-century gable
overrode the main sewer, and had corner buttresses
together with a central flying-buttress which sprang
across the sewer. The novice-house or dorter-
undercroft, thus enlarged, was covered with a quad-
ripartite rib-vault, two bays in width and seven in
length, which received intermediate support from a
central row of six circular pillars ; the bases of these,
where still extant, show the " double-roll " section
current for a century after 1250. This vault must
have fallen at some time, as one of the rib-inter-
sections can be seen re-used in a late refacing on the
outer side of the W. wall of this undercroft. At the
S. end of the apartment there were two doorways ;
the one to the W. has been altered twice and that to
the E. three times. Another alteration has been
the introduction of partitions shutting off the E.
halves of the second, third, and fourth bays ; the
enclosure so formed was entered from two doorways
broken out through the E. wall, the one on the S.
opening to the sanitary wing on the E. (infra) while
the one on the N. gave admission to a lobby situated
within the re-entrant angle formed by the sanitary
wing and the novice-house.
The compartment into which this lobby led has
been almost entirely demolished. When the part of
the undercroft which lies under Cloisters Road comes
to be excavated it will probably be found that the
undercroft has been divided by a cross-partition ;
and if that proves to be the case, the N. division will
represent the later novice-house, while the S. division
would be a day-room-possibly the auditorium, a
place where the choir-monks assembled to receive
instructions for manual work and where the necessary
tools were given to them.
The sanitary wing, or " reredorter ", extends to
the E. at right angles to the novice-house, so that it
formed the NW. corner of the " farmery " (in-
firmary) court ; that court, however, has not yet been
explored. The N. side of the sanitary wing overrides
the main sewer, over which the latrines on the first
floor were placed. The wing has been reduced in
width from the S., a change accounting for one of the
three alterations upon the E. doorway of the novice-
house. The sewer which runs below has a width of
about 5 ft. and is exposed for a length of 62 ft. 6 in. ;
it is built of ashlar, the lower part dating from the
second half of the 12th century and the upper part
rebuilt in the 13th century. It is flushed by a stream
which takes a course best apprehended from the plan
(Fig. 328). The reredorter proper, situated on the
upper floor of this wing, no longer exists ; it was
entered by way of the dorter.
The upper floor of the E. range was devoted to the
choir-monks' dorter, which originally had a length
of 124 ft. but which, after extension in the 13th
century, measured 174 ft. by 26 ft. 6 in. The dorter
was served by two separate stairs-one, which is
referred to below, being intended for use by day, and
the other for access to the church during the night
offices. The latter has already been mentioned in
connexion with the N. transept (p. 278). Its door-
way, round-arched towards the church, has a seg-
mental rear-arch ; its threshold is a re-used grave-
slab. This slab, which dates from either the 13th
or the 14th century, bears a circular floriated cross-
head of penannular type surmounting the upper part
of a sword with bulbous pommel and straight quillons.
On the sinister side of the sword there is a shield
charged : A sword bendwise, point downwards, a
mullet in sinister chief-arms almost identical with
those of Symonds Toune (Symington) of that Ilk as
illustrated in the Lindsay MSS., p. 117, where the
sword is shown point upwards. This doorway, the
communication between church and dorter, is con-
siderably higher than the extrados of the wax-cellar
vault (p. 283) ; that vault is of late date, however,
and the one that it replaced rose to the level of the
threshold of this doorway. On the dorter side of the
doorway the remains of a newel-stair may be seen
at the SE. corner of the dorter ; this stair, which
still ascends to the clearstorey level of the church,
originally continued upwards as an access to the high
roofs of both dorter and transept. Beneath the
lowest step a secret receptacle, thought to be a
repository for valuables,3 was discovered in 1730.4
1 Paris, Nomasticon Cisterciense, 282.
2 Cf. P.S.A.S., lxiii (1928-9), 284, 293, and 295 for
further particulars and illustrations.
3 In some monasteries a treasury was associated with the
dorter and in some instances it was situated over the E. bay
of the chapter-house. Bishop Pococke (A Tour through
Scotland 1760, 339) also records this discovery but states
that, on removal of the first step of the stair, entry was
had to " a private vault " above the wax-cellar. As the
present vault of the wax-cellar is a post-monastic insertion
the " private vault " may simply have been a void space
which it was felt unnecessary to fill in.
4 Wade, A history of St. Mary's Abbey, Melrose, 304.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_052 |
PLATE 85
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 384. Label-stop with figure of angel musician.
Fig. 385. Royal Arms on W. buttress of
S. side.
Fig. 386. Carved niche-base in S. transept.
Fig. 387. Carved niche-base in S. transept.
Fig. 388. Carved niche-base in S. transept.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567).
All photos Ministry of Works.
To face p. 284. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_053 |
PLATE 86
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 389. Gargoyle, pig and bagpipes.
By courtesy of the late Mr. B. C. Clayton.
Fig. 390. John Morow panel.
Photo Ministry of Works.
Fig. 391. String-course with grotesque head.
Photo Ministry of Works.
Fig. 392. String-course with human head.
Photo Ministry of Works.
Fig. 393. Romanesque capital in the Abbey Museum.
Fig. 394. Romanesque capital in the abbey Museum.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_054 |
PLATE 87
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 395. Commendator's House from SSE.
Fig. 396. Commendator's House from NNE.
MELROSE ABBEY (No. 567). |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_055 |
PLATE 88
[Picture inserted]
Fig. 397. The site of Old Melrose (No. 592) ; general view from E., with the Eildon Hills in the background.
Photo " The Scotsman ".
To face p. 285 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_056 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
The dorter itself was lit on either side by a tier of low,
lintelled windows with splayed and rebated jambs ;
those facing W. were placed immediately over the
lean-to roof of the cloister alley. The weather-table
formed on the transept gable to protect the S. end
of the dorter roof has a flat top, but it does not follow
from this that the roof was flat-topped throughout its
length. Probably the greater part was ridged while
the S. end was dropped to a platform in order to clear
the circular window that lights the upper part of the
transept. The gable itself probably ended in a belfry.
The range on the N. side of the cloister is extremely
dilapidated. At its W. end are seen the foundations
of the kitchen, which was an oblong apartment
measuring 29 ft. by 19 ft. The kitchen was entered
from the alley on its S. side, and for privacy there was
a passage along its N. side as entrance to a Cistercian
kitchen and communication with the staff on duty
was restricted to those having business there. The
fireplace, now fragmentary, stood detached near the
E. end of the room. At the W. end the wall is still
sufficiently entire to show a serving-hatch com-
municating with the domus conversorum (infra). On
the E. of the kitchen was the frater. In the 12th-
century arrangement this stood parallel to the church,
and beyond it the primary warming-house abutted
on the E. range of the cloister ; but in the 13th
century Melrose, like other Cistercian houses, rebuilt
its frater on an axis running N. and S. and this
alteration, which is referred to more particularly
below, made possible a more convenient arrangement
of the whole N. range. Thus the day-stair to the
dorter was removed from the E. range (supra) to a
position at the E. end of the N. range. Between this
staircase and the new frater was placed the new
warming-house, the only apartment in addition to
the kitchen in which a fire was maintained. The W.
end of the primary frater, the area between the kitchen
and the new frater, was probably occupied by a
staircase leading to the frater proper, as this was on
the first floor of the new building ; the lower part
of the staircase may have served as a passage giving
access to such buildings as lay N. of the cloister
assemblage (infra).
The primary frater is represented mainly by the
bed of clay and rubble prepared for its foundations.
The 13th-century building that replaced it is not in
much better case except at the NE. corner, where the
lowest courses of the walls remain. But its founda-
tions are still fairly entire, and these show that the
13th-century frater stood upon a vaulted undercroft,
three bays in width and eight in length, entered from
the cloister on the S. The dimensions of the building
are about 119 ft. from N. to S. by 42 ft. 6 in. from
E. to W. over all. The side walls are buttressed, and
there are two intermediate buttresses on the N. gable.
In the fourth bay from the N. on the W, side a pro-
jecting base is provided to support the frater pulpit,
which was entered from the upper floor.
The W. range is rather less dilapidated than the
other two, but its chronology is even less explicit ;
the dating of any part, as given here or on the plan,
must consequently be regarded as tentative. The
existing remains are those of the undercroft or lower
floor. The arrangement of this floor has been normal,
an outer parlour through which the cloister was
entered being situated near the NW. corner of the
cloister with the conversi frater on its S. side, and
beyondthis another apartment separated from the
church by a cell ; while on the N. of the parlour there
was a cellar from the W. side of which the undercroft
of the conversi reredorter extended at right angles to
the range, roughly in alinement with the reredorter
of the choir-monks. The missing upper floor,
devoted to the dorter of the conversi, was reached by
a day-stair and a night-stair and also communicated
with the reredorter. At the S. end of the undercroft
the conversi cloister extended to the W., as at Tintern.
On its E. side an alley ran N. between the conversi
cloister and the W. side of the W. range-there was
no alley along the E. side of the range in the first
instance on account of the open lane (p. 266). The
foregoing arrangement dates from the 12th century
and much of the existing masonry seems to be of that
time ; but there is also abundant evidence of altera-
tion and extension, which will be described shortly.
The cell at the S. end of the range, adjoining the
church, is divided transversely by a stout wall. To
what use the W. division was put is unknown, but
the E. division must have housed the night-stair
leading from the conversi dorter to the conversi choir-
entrance. This stair may have been of wood. The
apartment immediately on the N. of the cell measures
24 ft. 6 in. by 30 ft. 6 in. and occupies the full width
of the range. This was probably either a cellar or
a buttery. Its outer walls and the W. end of the
partition on its N. side seem to date from the 12th
century, to which time may also be attributed the
one surviving jamb of a doorway on the W. as well
as both jambs of an opening to the E.-either a
doorway or, more probably, a low-set window. At a
later stage, probably to be dated to the second half
of the 13th century, four bays of rib-vaulting were
introduced and, finally, the apartment was divided
by a transverse partition into two almost equal cells,
a doorway opening to the E. being broken out within
the one to the S.
The conversi frater on the N. of the last measures
about 24 ft. 6 in. by 49 ft., and is mainly primary.
The principal entrance is from the alley on the W.
but, as at Culross Abbey,1 a second doorway gives
access from the outer parlour. Along the S. wall ran
a stone bench. Alteration is as obvious within the
frater as elsewhere. For example, in the E. wall there
is a recess, for a window or a fireplace, which is
clearly an insertion ; this alteration cannot be dated,
but it may be noted that in the cellarium of Rievaulx
fireplaces were introduced in the 14th and 15th
1 Inventory of Fife, Kinross and Clackmannan, No. 150.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
centuries. As in the apartment farther S., rib-
vaulting was inserted in the frater towards the turn
of the 13th and 14th centuries-four bays long and
two wide. The vaulting received intermediate
support from a central row of circular pillars resting
on high, simply moulded bases. To make way for
the S. respond of these pillars, the E. half of the
partition between the frater and the apartment on its
S. side was demolished, the apartment becoming, as
it were, an annexe of the frater. But the opening was
closed up eventually, probably when the conversi had
ceased to exist as a class within the community, since
a platform was now raised against the E. wall of the
frater for the purpose of containing a continuous
water-trough, used presumably for some industrial
purpose, such as the scouring of wool.
The outer parlour has a doorway at either end, the
one to the W. sufficiently large to require a two-leaved
door. On the N. side is a lobby which may have
contained the day-stair to the conversi dorter ; there
is, at any rate, room both for a stair and for passage
beside it. A doorway, made up on one side with old
material, leads off the N. side of the lobby into a
corridor running N. between the undercroft of the
conversi reredorter on the one hand and the kitchen
on the other. Into this corridor opens the serving-
hatch previously mentioned (p. 285) ; it had two
doors, one on the passage side, the other one opening
to the kitchen. Farther N. a secondary doorway on
the opposite side of the passage gives access to the
undercroft of the reredorter. This undercroft is
fragmentary-on the S. a single door-jamb survives
to mark the position of the original entrance, the only
recognisable feature. Above the apartments just
described there was an upper storey containing the
dorter and reredorter of the conversi.
In the primary arrangement the W. range did not
extend N. of the reredorter and passage. But, like
the E. range, it was extended N. in the 13th century.
This extension overrides the main sewer of the
abbey and comes to within 60 ft. of the mill-lade.
Thus, when it had been completed, the W. range had
a total length of about 358 ft., abnormal in comparison
with the cellarium of Culross (198 ft.), Newbattle
(178 ft.), and Kirkstall and Rievaulx (both 170 ft.),
but not greatly larger than that of Fountains (302 ft.).
The extension was made from the reredorter and its
side walls do not run in continuation of those of the
primary W. range. The S. end, which runs below
Cloister Road, has yet to be explored.
The undercroft of the extension, the cellarium
broper, was built in easy stages-the distribution of
puilding-stones suggested to the officers of the Geo-
logical Survey (p. 269) that the four southernmost
bays were more recent than the remainder, being
constructed " predominantly of sandstone, whereas
the northern portion is built chiefly of agglomerate,
as is the case with the other buildings of the early
period ". On the other hand the N. end of the
building, the part that extends beyond the main
sewer, seems an obvious addition. When first built
this cellarium was not vaulted, but at some time after
the middle of the 13th century quadripartite rib-
vaulting was inserted-two bays wide and fourteen
long. The vault had intermediate support from a
central row of circular pillars which rested on high
bases, chamfered on the upper surface. To stabilise
this vault, buttresses, which include in their masonry
stones previously used elsewhere, were added to the
side walls of the cellarium ; but despite their provision
the vault fell vertically and, when the cellarium was
explored, the components of the vault were found
upon the floor, the stout chamfered ribs lying in
correct relationship to the rubble webs.
The cellarium was probably divided into two or
more compartments from the beginning, and cer-
tainly was so at the time when vaulting was introduced
as there are differences in the levels of the pier bases.
But the walls have been so greatly reduced that few
particulars of the arrangement are now apparent.
In the second bay from the S. the W. wall contains a
re-used 13th-century window-sill, heavily chamfered
and checked and placed back to front ; farther N.
there are slight traces of a window which opened to
the E. ; and in the fifth bay from the N. the W. wall
shows the remains of a large fireplace-presumably
an insertion. Towards the close of the monastic
occupation an oven was introduced into the S. half
of the cellarium. A little to the N. of this a lead water-
pipe may be seen sunk in the floor, running from W.
to E. There is another pipe near the N. end of the
cellarium, running N. apparently to discharge into a
square ashlar-lined cistern sunk in the floor at the
NW. corner. The roof of the cellarium was tiled,
the tiles having nibs or projections by which they
hung from the tiling-battens.
The cellarium in its turn eventually received an
addition-a cross-hall having been attached to its
NW. corner in the 14th century. Although this is
a very late date for such a building, this hall may
have been the conversi infirmary ; on the other hand
it may have been a new reredorter. It takes the form
of a nave with side aisles, of which the four E. bays
only have been exposed.1 This building extends
farther N. than the gable of the cellarium and the
main sewer runs below it along the axial line. It was
unvaulted. The entrance was in the S. wall. In
the floor of the S. aisle there is a tank in three com-
partments, built for the most part of tiles and finished
off with rounded curbs of plaster. This tank is
presumably an insertion.
Melrose is the only Scottish abbey in which remains
of the conversi cloister can be seen. This cloister
has already been mentioned (p. 285) as lying on the
W. side of the W. range and separated from it by
an alley. Its back or S. wall runs W. in continuation
of the N. wall of the church for a distance of 70 ft.
beyond the 12th-century W. gable, and there turns
1 At Fountains the conversi infirmary is six bays long.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_058 |
No 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
N. The width of the open area was about 40 ft.,
the length from N. to S. is as yet unknown. Near the
S. end may be seen a row of three post-bases, indicat-
ing that at this end there was a loggia of timber posts
supporting a lean-to roof. The loggia was rather
wider than the girth since it included the width of
the alley on its E. side. Towards the end of the 12th
century, however, this loggia was widened to the
N. and was provided with an arcaded front towards
the cloister ; apparently the intention was to continue
the arcade along the W. wall of the alley, but for some
reason this was done and a solid wall was built
instead. On the N. side of the arcade may be seen a
small area of 13th-century tiling. This is at a higher
level than the arcade bases, and it suggests that the
garth had been built over by the date of its inser-
tion. The remains of a cross-wall farther N. leads
to the same conclusion.
The farmery, or infirmary, court and its buildings
-hall, chapel, kitchen, reredorter, etc.-have still to
be located on the E. side of the chapter-house, and
when this is done it will probably be found that the
extension of the chapter-house (supra) involved an
alteration on the whole farmery complex. The
buildings are likely to have been commodious, since
they had to accommodate not only the sick or
stationarii, but also the sempectae, professed monks
of fifty years' standing, and the minuti, those who had
recently been bled. Cistercian monks were bled in
batches four times a year.
THE CAMERA. On the N. of the site of the farmery
court the foundations of a building have been exposed
beside the mill-lade. This is obviously the magna
camera abbatis que est super ripam aque, built by
Abbot Matthew about the middle of the 13th century ;
Matthew was elected in 1241 and deposed at Rievaulx
in 1261, contrary to the wishes of his flock.1 The
camera was oblong on plan, measuring internally
33 ft. from N. to S. by 76 ft. from E. to W. The E.
gable, which still bears traces of a stone bench on the
inner side, shows on its outer side the remains of
three buttresses, one at either end and one in the
centre. The undercroft, therefore, had a vault
supported on a central row of pillars. The S. wall,
which is also buttressed, includes towards the E. end
one jamb of a triple-shafted 13th-century doorway,
the space in front of it being paved with tile quarries.
This indicates that the entrance was protected by a
porch and, if the building was two-storeyed, as is
likely, there was no doubt a chapel above the porch.
Some time after it was built the camera seems to
have been lengthened towards the W.-an alteration
is indicated by the omission of buttresses from the
W. gable, which moreover has a footing of different
character from that of the other walls. A tank with
a cobbled bottom was discovered some little way to
the S.
THE COMMENDATOR'S HOUSE. The last building
that falls to be described stands about 47 yds. W. of
the camera and presents its N. gable to the mill-lade.
This building has an interesting architectural history.
In 1634 it was the tower and manor place of
Melrose, the principal messuage of the barony and
lordship ; 2 in 1618 it is described as the fortalice
and manor place,3 and in 1609 as the " palatium
de Melros ".4 In point of fact the building referred
to in the charters was the house built in 1590 by the
commendator of the time, James Douglas. When
given to the State in 1934, the commendator's house
was examined by the Inspector of Ancient Monu-
ments who found evidence that Douglas had merely
reconstituted one of the monastic buildings for his
own occupation. The place had obviously been, in
the first instance, the palatium 5 of an abbot, and,
as such buildings have rarely survived in Scotland,
the Ministry of Works restored the old fabric for
preservation after the removal of such parts as were
entirely modern. It has now been fitted up as a
museum. Illustrations Figs. 395 and 396.
The early ordinance laid down that both abbot and
prior should sleep in the dorter, but that custom was
soon abandoned ; a separate building was provided,
but the rule was observed in letter although not in
spirit by the provision of a corridor connecting the
lodging with the dorter. Then, as the more important
guests came to be entertained not in the guest-hall
but in the abbot's apartments, his lodging had to be
a building of some size and was accordingly placed
in the most convenient situation-often in one entirely
removed from the dorter. Thus, before the middle
of the 15th century, Prior James Haldenstone had
built at St. Andrews " Pulchrum et spectabile palatium,
infra curiam hospitii Prioris, cum decentioribus oratorio
et camera inibi situatis . . . " .6
The palatium at Melrose shows an unusual ad-
mixture of building-stones suggesting that it has been
constructed largely of material taken from the earlier
church which, it will be remembered, was demolished,
part by part, before the reconstruction made neces-
sary by the calamity of 1385 (p. 267). Some of the
re-used material, however, was brought there in 1590
by the commendator. The primary plan suggests
a 15th-century origin for the building, which may
be tentatively ascribed to Abbot Andrew Hunter
(1444-71). As it stood in the 15th century, the
palatium was oblong on plan, had two storeys, and
was covered with a tiled roof. As it stands today, the
whole S. end is a modern restoration. The masonry
of the original fabric is of rubble up to a height of
about 3 ft. from the ground and from there upwards
as ashlar, reverting to rubble below the wall-head.
The N. gable is intaken at the level of the first floor.
The original windows are small, and are heavily
chamfered like the contemporary doorways. There
1 Melrose Chronicle, 122.
2 R.M.S., 1634-51, No. 64.
3 Ibid., 1609-20, No. 1913.
4 Ibid., No. 139.
5 A palatium is a building which is derived from the free-
standing hall (cf. Mackenzie, The Mediaeval Castle in
Scotland, 137-79).
6 Scotichronicon, lib. vi, cap. lvii.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_059 |
No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
is evidence that penthouse roofs extended from the
side walls and N. gable ; and a gallery or veranda,
from which the first floor was entered, ran along the
E. wall. This gallery returned round the NE. corner
of the building, and was there supported on heavy
struts instead of on posts as elsewhere. At its S.
end, that is at the SE. corner of the building, there
was no doubt a wooden forestair leading to the gallery
and through that to the first floor. On either floor
there were at least two rooms. On the ground floor
two fireplaces with mutilated hoods stand side by
side with room for no more than a stud partition
between them. The original building was 26 ft. in
breadth and about 70 ft. in length over all.
In remodelling the palatium in 1590 Douglas
removed the penthouse roofs and gallery, and added
to the SE. corner of the building a wing containing a
stair in the base and a room and a garret in the super-
structure. He reorganised the ground floor as a
kitchen and cellarage, inserting partitions where
necessary, and also remodelled the first floor and
contrived a third storey. New windows and doors,
which can be identified by their rounded arrises,
were formed without much regard for the original
openings. One window had an inscribed lintel,1 which
has come to rest over the modern entrance in the S.
wall of the wing. The lintel has a recessed panel
with a ribbon enrichment on the border, and contains
the initials of James Douglas and Mary Ker of
Ferniehirst separated by a heart and followed by the
date 1590. A small sunk panel on the right contains
a monogram of the initials A M, which may be those
of the carver but are more likely to stand for Abbas
Melrosensis, Douglas having been commendator at
that time. Beside the entrance a circular " shot-hole "
has been reset in modern masonry ; the E. and N.
walls of the wing each have a gun-loop in situ.
Like its predecessor, the 16th-century stair was of
wood ; this is most unusual at this period for so
important a house. The stair rose to the first floor,
whence the ascent was continued by a turnpike, now
removed, which was supported on a small, rect-
angular, vaulted lobby set out within the re-entrant
angle. Douglas divided the ground floor into four
compartments. those at either end occupying the full
width of the palatium ; the two intermediate com-
partments, which alone are vaulted, having a passage
on their E. side. The passage, from which all four
compartments were entered, was itself entered from
the E. It also communicated with the staircase by
way of the vaulted lobby below the turnpike. The
S. compartment is modern. The two vaulted cellars
remain intact. The N. compartment has been re-
stored as far as possible to the 16th-century arrange-
ment. On the S. it contains a wide-arched fireplace
with a salt-box in one jamb and a spice-cupboard in
the other.
On the first floor there are now three rooms. The
one to the S. is entirely modern. That to the N.,
situated over the kitchen, is the same size as it was
in the 16th century-at which period it had a fire-
place to the S., a recess in the gable opposite, and a
window in each outer wall. To make the central
room, two 16th-century rooms have been thrown into
one ; each had a fireplace at one end and was separ-
ated from its neighbour by a stud partition. In its
E. wall can be traced the two 15th-century doorways
that were entered from the gallery of the palatium.
In the 16th century the one to the N. was provided
with a lamp recess and a window and became a close
garderobe, while the other became a cupboard.
Before the restoration so little was left intact of the
16th-century rooms in the stair wing and on the
second floor that their arrangement is uncertain.
THE MUSEUM. In the museum are preserved the
following pieces of architectural detail, mostly from
the abbey buildings. Illustrations of a selection
will be found in Figs. 83, 84, 265, 372, 374, 393
and 394.
Ground Floor, S. Room. A 13th-century vault-
springer of Quarryhill stone from the claustral build-
ings ; fragments of a 13th-century pillar and respond
capitals of Quarryhill stone ; fragments of a 13th-
century colonnette and capital of Quarryhill stone ;
stones showing varieties of chiselling ; part of a
13th-century three-light window with nook-shafts,
probably from the choir-monks' frater ; 13th-century
keystone and vaulting-ribs from the claustral build-
ings ; fragment of late 12th-century double cone-and-
spindle ornament ; fragments of a 13th-century open
arcade which has had trilobed colonnettes set in a
double row ; fragment of a springer of a vault of the
same arcade ; fragment of early 13th-century arcad-
ing with a quadruple column-cap enriched with leaf-
and-berry ornament ; ribs and jamb mouldings
showing examples of masons' marks ; a corner of a
dressed slab bearing a Roman foliage-pattern, de-
scribed under No. 604.
Ground Floor, N. Room. From the early monastic
site at Old Melrose (No. 592), a carved fragment of
warm-coloured freestone, rounded at one end and
measuring over all 1 ft. 2 in. by 10 1/4 in. with a present
thickness of 5 3/4 in. The front alone is roughly dressed
and on it is carved a volute, or spiral of five turns,
below which there is a " neck ", originally about 9 in.
wide but now reduced to 3 1/2 in. This fragment may
be part of the top of a disc-faced cross.
Staircase. A grotesque sculpture, locally known
as " Tookam ", found in a garden wall at Melrose. A
double lion supporter removed from the lower end
of a 15th-century effigy-tomb.
First Floor, S. Room. Specimens of lead water-
pipes ; a late 12th-century capital of a nook-shaft
carved with wind-swept foliage ; a 12th-century
mask-corbel of red sandstone from Old Melrose
(No. 592) ; a late 12th-century capital of a nook-shaft
carved with water-leaf foliage ; a 12th-century
burial-canister of lead found in the chapter-house ;
1 Wade, A History of St. Mary's Abbey, Melrose, 251.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
two circular and two rectangular cressets ; specimens
of tiles.
First Floor, Central Room. A 15th-century corbel
carved with the head of a laughing monk ; a 13th-
century floriated disc-head of a free-standing cross ;
a fragment of a 13th-century grave-slab bearing
traces of a floriated cross-head ; 13th-century roofing-
tiles ; a miniature 13th-century grave-slab from the
churchyard bearing a cross with a calvary and a
floriated head and having on the right of the shaft
a sword with depressed quillons and a fan-shaped
pommel ; 14th-century vaulting bosses carved as
follows : a rose (two), a cowled head held to represent
Sir Michael Scot of Balwearie, the Scottish wizard
who flourished towards the close of the 13th-century,
the head of a king and the head of a queen ; frag-
ments of the choir-monks' cloister arcade, dating
from the late 12th century, having capitals carved
with scallops and water-leaf foliage, double shafts,
one of them circular and the other one octagonal, and
bases with an early form of water-holding section,
similar in character to those still in situ in the conversi
cloister (p. 287) ; a mutilated 15th-century figure of
St. John the Baptist ; a fragment of a 15th-century
figure of a saint ; sections of vaulting-ribs ; pieces
of an archway enriched with 13th-century dog-tooth
ornament ; a collection of 13th-century floor-tiles
from the chapter-house ; a fragment of a 15th-
century figure showing apparelled vestments ; a
15th-century crocket ; a mutilated head from a tomb ;
a 15th-century carving of a Cistercian rose ; a 15th-
century head of a saint ; a 15th-century carving of a
hand ; a fragment of another hand, early 15th cen-
tury ; a piece of 13th-century sculpture, considerably
mutilated, representing a seated king with a youth
resting against either knee, one of them supporting
a lap-dog, while another dog is seen in the back-
ground ; a fragment of a cornice bearing traces of
colour ; a fragment of a mid 15th-century retable
representing St. Jerome in the guise of a master
sculptor ; an apex stone of the late 12th century
carved with a triquetra knot ; part of a carved shield
bearing the arms of Abbot Andrew Hunter (1444-71),
presumably from the mid-buttress immediately W.
of the S. transept and E. of the figure of St. Andrew
(cf. p. 276) ; a mutilated miniature sculpture of the
Virgin and Child ; fragments of St. Waltheof's
shrine or feretory dating from 1240 (cf. p. 283 n.) ;
parts of 13th-century trilobed colonnettes ; parts of
the base of a late-mediaeval tomb bearing quatre-
foiled panels containing small uncarved shields ; a
portion of a tomb-cover of Frosterely marble ;
keystone of a 15th-century window-arch carved with
the figure of a prophet and having a vaulting-shaft
attached ; a 15th-century crocketed finial from a
niche canopy ; a 15th-century vaulting-boss carved
with a rose-and-leaf design ; seven other 15th-
century vaulting-bosses carved respectively with a
Christ head within a foliaceous wreath, a shield with
the Royal Arms, probably of the early 16th century,
foliage (two), a " Green Man " i.e. a human mask
with foliage at the eyes and mouth, a flower-head, and
a Cistercian rose ; a rampart lion and foliaceous
spray from a 14th-century tomb ; a piece of late
12th-century arcading enriched with a bold leaf-
pattern ; a vaulting-boss representing St. Columba
and his dove ; a 15th-century boss ornamented with
the clam-shells of St. James the Greater ; a lintel
from the demolished Black Bull Inn,1 probably hewn
from one of the abbey stones, having a love-knot
carved at the left-hand side and beside it a panel,
divided in two and containing the initials I N in the
upper half and I D in the lower one, while a mono-
gram of the sacred initials I H S occupies the centre
of the stone with a pelta-shaped panel to its left
containing the date 1573 and above it YE 2 DAY OF
MAY ; a 13th-century boss carved with fighting
dragons ; a 15th-century stop carved with foliage ;
a fragment of a 9th-century cross bearing a panel
filled with interlaced work ; an early 15th-century
head of a moor from the N. transept clearstorey ; a
mutilated 15th-century tarasque, or fabulous beast ;
a collection of roofing-tiles.
First Floor, N. Room. A late mediaeval vat of
bell-metal ; two late mediaeval cooking-pots of bell-
metal ; the works of the clock erected in 1762 on the
gable of the S. transept.
TOMBSTONES IN THE ABBEY CHURCH.
(1) N. aisle of nave. This 17th-century memorial
includes a shield charged : On a chevron, three
mullets, in base a stag's head erased for Ker. On
the dexter side the shield is flanked by an angel and
on the sinister side by a " deid bell " surmounting a
skull. Below the shield runs an inscription HEIR
LYIS THE RACE OF YE HOUS OF ZAIR.2
(2) Third S. chapel. A Renaissance memorial
with a strap-worked pediment containing an armorial
panel. The shield is charged : A cross-flory between
four escallops, for Fletcher. On the dexter side there
is a monogram of the initials M D F, for David
Fletcher M(agister Artium), who became minister of
Melrose in 1641 and bishop of Argyll in 1662. The
year in which he died, 1665, is carved on the sinister
side of the shield. In the centre of the memorial
there is a panel inscribed
SANCTORVM TVMVLVM SI FAS VIO/LARE QVERELIS /
HVNC QVICVNQVE VIDENT FLE/TIBVS ORA LAVENT /
NAMQVE EST ABREPTVS PRAESVL / PIVS ATQVE FIDELIS /
PASTOR CVI VIGILANS DE GRE/GE CVRA FVIT /
MVNERE SIC FVNCT[VS] GE[NERE PRAE]/CLARVS
VT[R]OQVE /
ECCLESIAE ET PO[P]VLO [COMMODA] / MAGNA
T[VLI]T /
ET NVNC CVM CH[RIS]T[O FRVITVR] / MERCEDE
[LABORVM] /
IN TERRIS EIVS FAMA [COLENDA MANET.]
(" If the graves of holy men may be disturbed by
1 This inn formerly stood near the SE. corner of Abbey Street, facing the cross of Melrose. 2. I.e. Yair.
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No. 567 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 567
lamentations, let whosoever see this tomb wash their
cheeks with tears. For a dutiful and loyal pro-
tector has been snatched away, a pastor who had
watchful care over his flock. Doing his duty thus
with distinction in both walks of life, he brought great
benefits to church and people. And now with Christ
he enjoys the reward of his labours, and his fame re-
mains to be celebrated on earth ".) The admonition
MEMENTO MORI (" Remember death "), together with
a skull and cross-bones, is carved at the foot of the
memorial.
(3) Fourth S. chapel. An inscribed panel reading
HIC IACET DOMINVS / IACOBVS PRINGALL/VS A GALLO-
SHIELS / EQVES QVI OBIIT / VIGESIMO DIE AV/GVSTI
AN(NO) DOM(INI) / 1635 AETATIS SVAE / 60. (" Here
lies Sir James Pringle of Galashiels, knight, who died
on the 20th day of August in the year of the Lord
1635 aged 60.")
(4) Fourth S. chapel. A memorial bearing a rude
effigy of James Pringle's father accompanied by the
inscription [HEIR] LIES ANE HONORA[BIL] MAN ANDRO /
[PRIN]GIL F[EVAR] OF G[ALLOSH]EILS / [QUH]A DECESIT
28 OF FEBRVARE AN(NO) / DOM(INI) / 1585.
(5) Fifth S. chapel. A recumbent slab with an
inscription reading HEIR LIES OF GVD MEMORIE DAME
MARRGARET KER / FIRST WYFE TO IAMES PRINGIL OF
WODHOVS AND / EFTER HIS DECEIS MAREIT SIR DAVID
HOME OF / WODDERBVRNE KNYCHT QVHA DECEISSIT
THE 24 OF / FEBRVARE ANNO DO(MINI) 1589.
(6) Fifth S. chapel. Another recumbent slab with
an inscription HEIR LYES ANE HO/NORA[BIL VO]MAN
CRISTIN LVNDIE / SPOVS TO IAM[ES PRINGIL OF]
QVHYTBANK SCHO DECEIS/SIT 19 IVLY 1602 /
LAMENT FOR / SYN AND STYL THOV MVRN /
FOR TO THE CL/AY [ALL] VE MAN TVRN.
(7) Sixth S. chapel. A weatherworn slab bearing
an incised effigy of the deceased bordered by an
inscription in Gothic lettering which reads HIC IACET
HONORA/BILIS VIR GEORGI[VS] HALIB[V]RTON IN . . . .
[OBIIT 1 OCTOBER ANNO DNI MDXXXVIII] (" Here lies
an honorable man George Haliburton in . . . who
died 1 October in the year of the Lord 1538.")
(8) At the S. end of the 13th-century Galilee there
are two burials, one of which has a coped cover
without an inscription.
TOMBSTONES IN THE CHURCHYARD.
1. A small headstone with a rounded top bearing
the inscription HEIR LYES / IOHN MILS / SEVEN
CHI/LDREN N I / C M 1693.
2. A small cubical stone enriched at the corners
with carvings of an hour-glass, a beetle, a cherub's
head and a skull. One side is inscribe THEY AL /
DEPARTIT / BE TWIXT / another side supplies FEB
AND / IVNNI / 1670. This block stands beside the
stone last described, and its inscription may refer
to the children mentioned thereon. It is likewise at
the foot of a recumbent slab on which the inscription
is illegible but for the words DIED DEC / 5 1705.
3. A small headstone with a curved top carved on
one side with a skull, a rose, an hour-glass, and
cross-bones, all contained within a cabled border
looped at the upper corners ; the other side is
inscribed HERE LIE/S ANDROU HEITO/N WHO DIED IN
(sic) THE / 10 OF IUNE 1684 AGE/63 HEIR LYES IOHN /
HEITON WHO DIED / THE 24 OF AVG/UST 1696 HIS
AGE 64. This stone is enclosed in a frame work of
much later date.
4. A small headstone of 1701 ; of the inscription
no useful reading can be given.
5. A headstone with a shaped top bearing the
initials I M and the date 1686.
6. A small headstone having on one side a skull
and cross-bones framed by pilasters, cornice, and
pediment, the other side being inscribed HEIR LYS
ALEXAN/DER BVNY SONE TO / THOMAS BUNY ME/ASON
IN NEUSTID / WHO DIED IN MAY THE 3 HIS AGE 15
16 [2 OR 9]6.
7. A headstone with a curved top which seems to
be dated 1681 ; the inscription is so heavily covered
with lichen as to be illegible.
8. A headstone with rounded top commemorating
ISOBEL BOUIE. The date is buried, but the lettering
seems to belong to the 17th century.
9. A small headstone commemorating [A]GNES
MEINE, who died in 1678.
10. A small headstone commemorating ROBERT
MEIN, a mason, and his wife whose name is illegible.
One or other died in 170[?].
11. A small headstone with rounded top com-
meorating the children of ANDRO WI/LSON MEASON /
[IN] NEVSTEID ; their names are ill cut and partly
illegible, but were probably JANET, ANDROW, and
ANN. The inscription ends THIS / DONE ANNO / 1701.
12. A small headstone with rounded top com-
memorating IAMES REID, a gardener in Melrose, who
died in 1700.
13. A grave-slab, now broken into three fragments
and inscribed [?HEIR] LYIS / [AN]DROV M[EI]N MEA/SON
IN NEVSTEID / SVMTIME / CALD VAS WHO DECEISIT IN
ANO 162[?4] AND OF HIS . . . The latter part of the
inscription, from CALD, is cut round the margin.
The square and compasses formerly seen on this
stone1 have been obliterated.
14. A narrow grave-slab decorated with a plain
moulding and bearing at its head a moulded panel
enclosing what may have been a skull and an hour-
glass. The inscription is illegible but seems to be
in 17th-century lettering. The stone is of interest
as it perpetuates a mediaeval type.
NOTE ON JOHN MOROW. John Morow is of interest
as being one of the very few Scottish mediaeval
master-masons to sign his work, for there can be
little doubt that he carried out at least the bay of the
S. transept on which his mason's mark and coat of
arms appear. The compasses, the mason's mark,
and the invocation of St. John, the patron saint of
Scottish masons, all go to show that he was a practical
1 Vernon, History of Freemasonry in Roxburgh, Peebles and Selkirkshire, 11.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_062 |
No. 568 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 569
mason. The fleur-de-lys on his shield points to his
French extraction. The fabrics said to be under his
care (p. 280) are those of the diocese of St. Andrews,
a metropolitan see with its cathedral and Augustinian
priory : Glasgow cathedral : Melrose, a Cistercian
abbey : Paisley, a Cluniac abbey : Nithsdale, a
deanery of Glasgow : the diocese of Galloway, with
its cathedral and Premonstratensian priory. With
such an extensive practice John Morow must have
been pre-eminent in his calling, and yet there is
nothing known of the man of his family. It may
be noted, however, that a certain Thomas Morow
was abbot of Paisley from about 1418 to 1440. This
abbot's surname is sometimes given as Murray and
it is possibly the case that the master-mason's father
was a Scot named Murray since many Scotsmen,
including at least one painter and one sculptor,
resided in France at the turn of the 14th and 15th
centuries.1 In 1548 a certain Walter Morro was a
member of the convent at Kelso.2 The identification
of John Morow with John Murray of Falahill, who
died before 1477,3 rests on very slender grounds.
548341 -- N viii. -- Various dates.
568. Parish Church Tower, Melrose. The
tower of the church that was built in 1810, when the
congregation moved from the abbey, abuts the south
side of the existing 20th-century fabric near its W.
end (Fig. 41). It is square on plan, is built of cream-
coloured droved ashlar, and rises in four stages,
defined by string-courses or cornices, to the base of
the spire. The lowest stage has, on its S. side, a
round-headed recess in which is set a door with a
semicircular fanlight above a lintel which bears the
date MDCCCX. Similar recess on the E. and W.
sides are blind. The second stage also contains three
round-headed recesses, the S. one containing a
window and the other two being blind. This stage
terminates in a moulded cornice, slightly above which
the tower is intaken-the clock-chamber, which
constitutes the third stage, being of smaller dimen-
sions and having its angles recessed so as to leave
the three clock-faces prominent on E., S., and W.
Above another moulded cornice comes an octagonal
bell-chamber, having a round-headed opening on
every face except the one to the N. and louvres in all
except those to NW. and NE. Above a final moulded
cornice there rises an octagonal steeple, first in three
steps and then tapering to a cap surmounted by two
balls and a gilded weathercock. Somewhat below the
mid-point of the steeple there are oval lucarnes, closed
with boarding, on the sides facing the cardinal points,
with blind openings to correspond on the other sides.
542342 -- N viii ( " Church "). -- 23 February 1952.
569. Chieldhelles Chapel. In his history of
Melrose (1743) 4 the Rev. Adam Milne says, " There
are several of the Feuars here. . . . By the bounding
Charter of the Nether Town of Blainslie, it appears
they have had a fine Chapel called Cheildhelles Chapel ;
it has been built of hewn Stone." But the structure
now known by this name is a ruinous building of
rubble, standing on the uplands three-quarters of a
mile NNW. of Upper Blainslie, which possesses no
ecclesiastical features and may well be the remains of
a farm-building. It is oblong on plan, with its major
axis running NNW. and SSE., ; the N. gable,
together with part of the E. wall, has been rebuilt,
the former obliquely to the major axis, so as to make
the length of the E. side 39 ft. 3 in. and of the W.
side 35 ft. 9 in., while the width averages 17 ft. over
walls about 1 ft. 9 1/2 in. thick and still standing about
7 ft. high. The original entrance was in the E. wall,
and was evidently built up when a new entrance was
struck out through the S. gable. Above the later
doorway can be seen a built-up window. Two other
built-up windows can be traced in the W. wall.
The O.S. map marks the site of Chieldhelles
Chapel and its burial-ground on the left bank of the
Milsie Burn, about a quarter of a mile NW. of the
building described above. Here may be seen the
last vestiges of an oblong enclosure, measuring about
15 yds. from NW. to SE. by 12 yds. transversely,
within a boundary-wall, now very much wasted,
which has been from 3 ft. 6 in. to 5 ft. thick. Within
the enclosures there are fragments of one or more
tombstones not earlier than the 18th century, but
there is no traces of a building.
HISTORICAL NOTE. More than one attempt has
been made 5 to identify Chieldhelles Chapel with
" Childeschirche ", the early church dedicated to
St. Cuthbert and situated in the country of his youth ;
but the weight of opinion remains in favour of
Channelkirk in Berwickshire, which, indeed, seems
to be indicated by an entry in the list attributed to
John Wessyngton, prior of Durham from 1416 to
1446, where he includes " Ecclesia de Chyldynkyrk "
among the Cuthbertine churches of Lauderdale.
Be that as it may, this site is one of some
age. Chieldhelles Chapel is obviously the Chapel of
St. Mary standing in the park of Milcheside, which
" Parc " was granted in 1188 to Melrose Abbey by
Richarde de Morville, his wife Avice and his heir
William.6 From the charter of confirmation granted
in the following year,7 it appears that this chapel
stood within an enclosure, ditched around and
entered from the E. ; near by was burn, the Milsie
or Milkside Burn, on which were two fish-ponds,
the upper of which was assigned to the chapel.
Before the Reformation the place was already
ruinous. Thus in a charter of 1546-7, confirmed in
1550, 8 the remains are referred to as " the walls
1 Francisque-Michel, Les Écossais en France, i, 9, etc.
2 Laing Charters, No. 540.
3 Macgregor Chalmers, A Scots Mediaeval Architect, 57.
4 Reprinted in Wade, History of St. Mary's Abbey,
Melrose, 78.
5 Cf. Times Literary Supplement, issues of July and
August, 1942.
6 Melrose Chronicle, 46.
7 Liber de Melros, 96, 97.
8 Laing Charters, N. 569.
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| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_063 |
No. 570 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 571
called ' Chapell wallis or Chieldliellis chapell wallis '."
The place-name given here is significant, as, in the
same document reference is made to " Liells Croce "
near by. The suffix is thus clearly a personal name.
Moreover, the lands of Lyolfstun or Lyleston, which
were situated a little to the N. of Lauder, come on
record in 1232-3 in a charter confirming a grant made
a generation earlier.1 Whatever may be the signific-
ance of the place-name, it does not mean " Holy
Child ".
535451 -- N ii. -- 15 June 1933, 8 May 1947.
570. Hillslap Tower. This is the most complete
of the three towers on Allan Water (cf. also Nos. 571
and 572) and, since it is quite unaltered and can be
accurately dated, it forms a valuable guide to the
chronology of more ruinous structures elsewhere.
The masonry is rubble with freestone dressings, the
dressings of some windows and doors having mould-
ings unusual in Scotland, while the lintels of many
of the external openings have Tudor hood-moulds-
facts which suggest that the master-mason came from
across the Border. But the tower also possesses
certain local characteristics, which form a distinctive
type of elevation ; for example, the gables are not
crow-stepped but skewed, the wall-head has never
had a parapet, the roofs were not continuous. The
fess checky enrichment of the chimney copes, the
pilastered treatment of one of the windows and the
multi-membered corbel of the turret staircase are,
however, found throughout Scotland. A plan is
given in Fig. 398 and illustrations in Figs. 56 and
205.
On plan the building is L-shaped, the re-entrant
angle opening to the N. The main block to the SE.,
measuring 30 ft. by 22
[illustration inserted]
Fig. 398. Hillslap Tower
(No. 570).
ft., has four storeys, the
uppermost one being
an attic, while the wing
to the NW., which is
the highest part of
the building, contains
the main staircase with
three storeys above and
measures 16 ft. by 11
ft. 6 ins. Within the
re-entrant angle there
is a turret staircase,
advanced on a squinch
arch or trompe to obtain
the necessary room
without encroaching
upon the wing inter-
nally. Immediately be-
low is the entrance set
in the E. wall of the
wing and protected by a gun-loop in the adjoining
wall of the main block. Its lintel, which has a hood-
mould at the top, bears the date 1585 flanked by two
sets of initials, N C for Nicolas Cairncross and E L
for his wife. Below the hood-mould there is a rebate
for an outer door. The door opens at the foot of the
main staircase, now ruinous but evidently of geo-
metric and not of scale-and-platt type. On the left,
or S., side of the stair-foot a door leads into the
vaulted undercroft of the main block, now partly
filled with debris where the vault has collapsed.
This undercroft was a storehouse lit mainly from
the NW. but having also a narrow slit to the SE.
Below the breast of the NW. light, which is now
ruinous, there seems to have been a gun-loop. Three
separate gun-loops, still entire, open respectively to
the NW., NE., and SE. Beside the entrance there
is a large cupboard.
At first-floor level the main stair terminates in a
landing, off which one door opens into the turret-
stair and another leads through into the main block.
There was originally a wooden partition on the NW.
side of the landing shutting off a small closet-which
may, indeed, have been a close garderobe-contrived
above the lower turn of the main stair and entered
from the main block. The first floor of the main
block is a single room. Its fireplace, moulded on
jamb and lintel, is centred in the SE. wall between
two windows, each of the gables as well as the NW.
wall also containing a window. This room was,
therefore, unusually well lit. At is W. corner, beside
the entrance to the closet, there is a small aumbry.
To reach the upper floors it is necessary to return
to the landing and ascend the turret-stair, which, like
the main stair, has no newel. The first room to be
reached lies immediately above the main stair. This
occupies the full extent of the wing, has a fireplace
and close garderobe to the SE., and is lit from NW.
and SW. Next comes the second floor of the main
block, which has evidently been divided into two
rooms each having a fireplace and window in its
gable as well as a window facing SE. At the N. corner
of the E. division there is a garderobe. The middle
chamber of the wing, higher up than the foregoing,
has a fireplace to the SE. and windows to NW. and
SW. The third floor of the main block is the next
level reached, and here there may have been two
rooms as below or one only, either arrangement
being possible. This storey is lit by five windows,
three of them dormers, and is not provided with a
fireplace. The top room of the wing is the highest
chamber in the house. It has a fireplace to the NW.
with a corbelled lintel, the corbels as well as the
jambs being moulded. It has had a window to
NW. and SW., the latter evidently a dormer.
This property was also known as Calfhill ; " Nic.
Carnecors de Calfhill " appearing as a witness to a
charter in 1586.2
513393 -- N iv. -- 15 June 1933.
571. Langshaw Tower. This ruin is situated
on the left bank of Allan Water a quarter of a mile
1 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S., iii, 283 n.
2 R.M.S., 1580-1593, No. 1016.
-- 292 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_064 |
PLATE 89
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 399. Buckholm Tower (No. 573) from S.
Fig. 400. Buckholm Tower (No. 573) from SE. ; an old photograph taken before the dilapidation of the structure.
By courtesy of Mr. Gilbert Dawson.
To face p. 292 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_065 |
PLATE 90
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 401 Abbotsford (No. 582) ; greenhouse.
Fig. 402. Abbotsford (No. 582) from N.
Photo by Valentine, Dundee. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_066 |
PLATE 91
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 403. Abbotsford (No. 582) from SE.
Fig. 404. Abbotsford (No. 582) from E.
Photos by Valentine, Dundee. |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_067 |
PLATE 92
[Pictures inserted]
Fig. 405. Maxton Church (No. 557) ; W. door in
S. side.
Fig. 406. Sprouston Churchyard (No. 970) ; base of
cross in socket-stone.
Fig. 407 Ferniehirst Castle (No. 436) ; chapel door.
Fig. 408. Church, Chesters (No. 929) ; doorway said to
have been brought from Southdean Church (No. 928).
To face p. 293 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_068 |
No. 571 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 572
NE. of Colmslie Tower and 600 yds. NNE. of Hill-
slap Tower, all three lying in a secluded valley amid
the uplands near the Berwickshire border. From its
W. side extends a large walled garden now partly
wilderness. The building clearly shows two periods
of construction. Its earlier portion, lying to the W.
and abutting on the garden, dates from the late 16th
century and is now fragmentary, while the E. part,
an addition of the 17th century, is in better case.
The original house (Fig. 409) was L-shaped on plan
with the re-entrant angle open to the SE. It con-
tained a vaulted ground-floor and at least two upper
storeys, the latter entered from a newel-staircase rising
within the wall-thickness of the re-entrant. Today,
only the NW. angle and the diametrically opposite SE.
angle of the main block stand to any considerable
[illustration inserted]
Fig. 409. Langshaw Tower (No. 571).
height, while the interior is filled with debris covered
with vegetation. The main block has measured
43 ft. 8 in. N. to S. by 21 ft. 8 in. from E. to W.
The wing, which extends in alinement with the N.
gable of the main block, measures 18 ft. 7 in. from
E. to W. and 21 ft. 10 in. from N. to S. The walls
are of uncoursed whin-rubble bedded in clay-mortar
and built without quoins. The upper windows have
had freestone dressings wrought with a quirked
edge-roll. A single oval gun-loop faces E. into the
re-entrant angle.
The 17th-century addition is an oblong block two
storeys and an attic in height, extending E. from the
wing, the junction between the old and new work
being masked on the N. side by a round stair-tower.
The addition measures 21 ft. 10 in. from N. to S.
by 25 ft. from E. to W. and contains a single un-
vaulted room on each floor, the lowest one being the
kitchen. This was entered from the S. through the
present doorway, which has been rebuilt, but at first
the kitchen could also be entered from the N.
through a doorway within the stair-tower, subse-
quently built up. The kitchen has a single large
window to the S. The fireplace is in the E. gable,
and is provided with an oven on one side and a press
on the other. The N. wall contains a sink and a
cupboard in addition to the built-up entrance.
The room on the first floor, which evidently com-
municated with the earlier part of the house, has a
fireplace with a quirked edge-roll on its jambs and
lintel, and a close garderobe, both in the E. gable.
It was lit by two large windows facing S. The attic
floor was lit by dormer windows looking S. and had
a fireplace in the E. gable.
Originally the property of Melrose Abbey, in
1586-7 Langshaw was held in feu by George Hop-
pringle or Pringle.1 In 1606 James Hoppringill of
Wodhous, late of Whitbank, and James, his son and
heir, sold the town and lands of Langshaw to Sir
Gideon Murray of Elibank and Lady Margaret
Pentland, his wife.2 Three years later John, Earl of
Haddington received a charter to the abbey pro-
perties including Langshaw with its mill.3 In 1617
Sir Patrick Murray of Langschaw, knight, son and
heir of Sir Gideon Murray of Elibank, received a
charter to the lands and " lie Maynes de Langschaw "
which John, Earl of Haddington had resigned.4 In
the following year a charter was granted to Sir
Gideon Murray and Lady Margaret Pentland.5 In
1619 Sir Gideon and Sir Patrick sold the place to
Elizabeth Dundas of Arniston, the prospective second
wife of the latter.6 The earlier part of the tower was
probably built by a Pringle, the Murrays being
responsible for the addition. It was occupied until
the 18th century, when part of it was used as a school
for the village of Langshaw Mill.7
516397 -- N iv. -- 15 June 1933.
572. Colmslie Tower. This ruinous 16th-
century tower stands on the right bank of Allan
Water at the E. end of the steading of Colmslie farm.
Oblong on plan, it measures externally 27 ft. 10 in.
from N. to S. by 41 ft. 6 in. from E. to W. and it has
been at least three storeys in height. The lowest
floor, which does not seem to have been vaulted, is
inaccessible, being full of debris. No openings are
traceable at this level. The entrance must therefore
have been upon the floor above, facing N., although
its position cannot be identified precisely as the N.
wall of the tower has been breached. Its lintel,
however, has been preserved, having been inserted
above the entrance to the modern farmhouse close
by. This lintel bears an armorial panel on which the
shield is charged : Within a bordure, a stag's head
couped. Beneath the shield are the initials W C as
well as two sprays of foliage. The lintel appears to
be rather later in date than the tower, into which it
may have been inserted at some date later than 1594
(see infra). The cubical sundial bearing the initials
J M and inserted below this lintel is not earlier than
the 18th century.
1 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S., iii, p. xliv.
2 R.M.S., 1593-1608, No. 1750.
3 Ibid., 1609-20, No. 139.
4 Ibid., No. 1673.
5 Ibid., No. 1854.
6 Ibid., No. 1960.
7 T.H.A.S., 1902, 45.
-- 293 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_069 |
No. 573 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 573
The first floor seems to have been divided into two
rooms, the E. one being the kitchen as it has a fire-
place in the gable with a sink at the back and an oven
in the N. jamb. The kitchen had a single window to
the S., the E. jamb containing an aumbry. In its
NE. corner rose the newel-stair, a recess for a lamp
[illustration inserted]
Fig. 410. Colmslie Tower (No. 572).
being conveniently placed in the N. wall close by.
The W. apartment was evidently a living-room and
had two good windows facing S. Its fireplace is in
the W. gable, the gable and the N. wall both con-
taining recesses for furniture. The second floor has
a single fireplace in the E. gable and may therefore
have been a single room ; on the other hand it may
have been divided into two or more apartments by
a light partition. Each gable contains a small window
and each of the side walls had two larger windows,
three of these windows having had stone seats. All
the rear-arches are segmental. Between the two S.
windows are a mural chamber and a garderobe, the
latter having a flue descending within the thickness
of the S. wall.
The tower is built of rubble roughly brought to
courses, but the quoins have been of freestone. The
windows also have freestone dressings, heavily
chamfered.
The property is said to take its name from a chapel
dedicated to St. Columba which stood in the " Chapel
field " N. of the tower.1 Together with most of the
land in the valley of the Allan, or Elwyn, it was owned
by Melrose Abbey, and before the Reformation was
tenanted by the family of Cairncross. William
Carncors de Cowmislie is mentioned in a charter of
1536 ; 2 he was succeeded before 1556 by his son
Robert, and his grandson William was laird in 1578.
A later Robert Carncors de Cummislie is on record
in 1587,3 and another William in 1594 and 1606.4
About the middle of the 17th century a family of
Pringle was in possession.
513396 -- N iv. -- 15 June 1933.
573. Buckholm Tower. This tower-house,
which dates from the last quarter of the 16th century
and has only recently become ruinous, stands at Old
Buckholm on the W. side of Buckholm Hill, over-
looking Gala Water. It has been attached to a
rectangular barmkin, of which only the SW. corner
now survives although the surviving stretch of the
S. wall of enclosure is sufficiently well preserved to
show the entrance, a wide gateway with semicircular
arch-head, moulded with a quirked edge-roll and
surmounted by a hood-mould. Above the gateway
there has been a bartizan carried on a plain corbel-
course. Inside the W. jamb there is a large bar-hole,
the other jamb showing the three iron crooks on
which the gate was hung. Within the enclosure and
immediately adjoining the entrance there is a ruinous
outbuilding. A plan is given in Fig. 411 and illus-
trations in Figs. 399 and 400.
The tower itself has a main block, three storeys
and an attic in height, measuring 35 ft. from N. to S.
by 23 ft. 2 in. from E. to W., and a short wing,
[illustration inserted]
Fig. 411. Buckholm Tower (No. 573).
measuring 11 ft. 9 in. by 4 ft. 7 in., which projects
E. in alinement with the N. gable and contains the
staircase. The tower projects W. from the barmkin,
1 T.H.A.S., 1902, 44.
2 R.M.S., 1513-46, No. 1647.
3 Ibid., 1580-93, No. 1253.
4 Ibid., 1593-1608, Nos. 251, 1750.
-- 294 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_070 |
No. 573 -- MELROSE PARISH -- No. 575
and in the re-entrant angle formed by its S. gable
with the barmkin wall stands a late two-storyed
addition through which the ground floor of the tower
has now to be entered. The walls of the former are
entire. They are built of whin rubble with pinnings,
the dressings of the doors and windows being of
freestone. Two of the windows have a pilastered
treatment, similar to that seen at Colmslie Tower
(No. 572), while a third has a shaft at each side
returning on the lintel to make an ogival head. The
window-mouldings generally resemble those of
Colmslie Tower, other points of resemblance being
the absence of a parapet and of crow-stepped gables.
Originally the tower could be entered only from
within the barmkin. It had two doorways, the
arrangement of which was rather unusual because the
barmkin occupied a piece of sloping ground. The
built-up lower entrance, which opened directly into
the ground floor, can be seen at the N. end of the E.
wall of the main block, within the re-entrant angle.
Its jambs and lintel are moulded, the lintel having
also a Tudor hood-mould. The upper entrance,
situated in the E. wall of the wing a little below the
level of the first floor, has been reached from a bridge
or arched forestair, beneath which there was room
to pass to the lower entrance, the SE. wing-corner
being chamfered off to make passage easier. This
doorway, which opens directly upon the staircase,
has been altered more than once ; its head has
obviously been raised, and the original lintel, bearing
the date 1582 flanked by the initials I P and N P, has
been removed to Torwoodlee.
The ground floor of the tower, a vaulted storehouse,
must have been without direct access to the super-
structure if, as was probably the case, the built-up
doorway seen inside, beside the original entrance,
opened into a cupboard beneath the stair and not
on to the staircase. The present doorway in the S.
gable and the window in the N. gable are both
secondary. The narrow window-really little more
than a slit-that opens to the W. and the gun-loop
at the W. end of the N. wall are, however, original
features.
The first floor is reached from the upper entrance
by a short flight of stone steps, but from this level
upwards the stair has been of wood. It is subdivided
and the existing wooden partitions are of relatively
late date ; but the present arrangement of two rooms
and a lobby no doubt reproduces generally the original
scheme, with the exception, however, that in the first
instance the wing was no doubt shut off from the
main block by a parpent wall which has been re-
moved. The N. chamber has to the N. a fireplace
formed in what had been a window, and to the W.
a window which has been enlarged at a later date.
The S. room has a fireplace, which likewise seems to
be secondary, in the gable and between two windows,
which were built up and used as cupboards when the
S. addition was made. Two other windows, both of
which have been enlarged, open respectively to E.
and W. ; beside the W. one there is a recess for
furniture.
On the two upper floors the arrangement has been
similar.
In 1547 Buckholm, once the property of Melrose
Abbey, was given by the commendator in liferent
to James Hoppringill of Tynnes, his wife Agnes
Forrester and their son John. In the following year
Robert Hoppringill of Blyndley and others were
charged with treasonably assisting the England and
" keeping " (i.e. holding for them) the house of
Buckholm.1 This reference must be to an earlier
house than the present one, which was presumably
built by John Hoppringill or Pringle in 1582 (supra).
John Hoppringill of Bukholme obtained a tack of the
teinds of Bukholme in 1594.
482378 -- N iii. -- 16 June 1933.
574. Tower, Appletreeleaves. The much-
reduced remains of this small oblong tower stand on
the W. slopes of Blaikie's Hill, NE. of the town of
Galashiels ; the building is of late 16th-century date
and until recently formed part of a farm-steading.
The lowest storey alone has survived ; its N. end still
forms the harness room for a stable which has been
built against its N. gable, while its S. end has been
roofed in as a store for implements. The tower,
when complete, measured 31 ft. 2 in. from N. to S.
by 20 ft. 6 in. from E. to W., the S. gable, which is
the highest part, being no more than 15 ft. in height.
The masonry is of rubble, roughly coursed and
pinned. The only opening to be seen externally is
a wide modern archway, surmounted by a plain panel,
which has been formed in the W. wall ; but inside can
be traced a narrow window in the S. gable. This gable
also shows remains of a corbelled scarcement intended
to carry a mezzanine floor, a feature which suggests
that the ground floor of the tower was originally
vaulted.
This property belonged to Melrose Abbey, and in
the 16th century was feued to a family named Darling.
Robert Darling is on record in 1577, and Peter
Darling some twenty years later ; 3 one or other
presumably built the tower.
494366 -- N iii. -- 16 June 1933.
575. Gattonside House. Gattonside House was
probably built in the second quarter of the 19th
century, and is a good example of the work of that
period. In plan, however, it is essentially a Georgian
house. The lay-out includes an oblong main block
of sunk basement, two upper floors, and an attic,
which lies almost due E. and W. and has lower wings
connected with it by passages on E. and W. The W.
wing was enlarged in 1915. The house is com-
modious, the original part containing, in addition to
1 Pitcairn, Criminal Trials in Scotland, i, pt. 1, 338 *.
2 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S., iii, 350.
3 Melrose Regality Records, S.H.S.,, iii, p. xxix.
-- 295 |
| roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_299 |
[Map inserted]
ROYAL COMMISSION ON THE
ANCIENT AND HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
OF
SCOTLAND.
MAP SHOWING THE POSITION OF THE PRINCIPAL MONUMENTS
IN
ROXBURGHSHIRE.
The numbers on the map are the serial numbers of the monuments in the Inventory. |
|
|
