roxburgh-1956-vol-2/-05_009

Transcription

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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