DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6886#0173
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
141
tions remaining) according to the new mode, which came into fashion after the
holy war*.
We call this now the Gothic mode of building, as the Italians denominated what-
ever was not after the Roman way, though the Goths were rather destroyers than
builders. I think it should rather be called the Saracen way, for those people wanted
neither arts nor learning : nor can it be denied, that after we in the west lost both,
Ave borrowed again from them, out of their Arabic books, what they with great
* Matthew Paris, who lived in that time, gives the following account.—" Eodem anno rex.....
,c Ecclesiam Sancti Petri Westmouasteriensem jussit ampliari, et dirutis, cum turri, muris partis
c( orientalis, prascepit novos, videlicet decentiores suis sumptibus construi, ct residuo, videlicet
" occidental parti, coaptari." What this writer says respecting the king's being at the sole expence
of this latter work is of undoubted authority. It is confirmed by another old and contemporary
historian, Thomas Wykes, who was a regular canon of the order of St. Augustin in Osney abbey,
near Oxford, in page 661 of his History or Chronicle of England:—" Ecclesiam monasterii West-
" monasteriensis, quam idem rex.....de propriis fisci regalis exitibus.....a fundamentis
" construxerat." It appears from Madox, in his History of the Exchequer, that there was a par-
ticular office of receipt for the money to be employed in erecting this superb structure; and several
large sums appear to be assigned in the king's accounts for that purpose. In 1246(a), he ordered to
til is use two thousand five hundred and ninety-one pounds, due from the widow of one David of
Olford, a Jew. In 1254 (b), his treasurer and the barons of the Exchequer received the royal
injunctions to apply three thousand marks yearly towards forwarding the work. In 1258(c), he
reserved a thousand marks from the profits of the estates of the abbot of Westminster, during the
vacancy after Abbot Crokesley's death : and in 1270, (d) it is certified, that there had been applied
to the same work three thousand seven hundred and fifty-four pounds, paid by a lady, whose name
was Alice Lacy, for eleven years custody of her son's estate. An account of the whole expence is no
Avhere to be found; but it appears from the archives of the church, that in the year 1261 the charges
amounted to somewhat more than twenty-nine thousand six hundred pounds.
(a) Madox, 519.—{b) Rob. Vascon, 38. Hen. III. M. 4.—(c) Cot. Lib. Faustina, A. 3.—{d) Rennet's
Parochial Antiquities.
141
tions remaining) according to the new mode, which came into fashion after the
holy war*.
We call this now the Gothic mode of building, as the Italians denominated what-
ever was not after the Roman way, though the Goths were rather destroyers than
builders. I think it should rather be called the Saracen way, for those people wanted
neither arts nor learning : nor can it be denied, that after we in the west lost both,
Ave borrowed again from them, out of their Arabic books, what they with great
* Matthew Paris, who lived in that time, gives the following account.—" Eodem anno rex.....
,c Ecclesiam Sancti Petri Westmouasteriensem jussit ampliari, et dirutis, cum turri, muris partis
c( orientalis, prascepit novos, videlicet decentiores suis sumptibus construi, ct residuo, videlicet
" occidental parti, coaptari." What this writer says respecting the king's being at the sole expence
of this latter work is of undoubted authority. It is confirmed by another old and contemporary
historian, Thomas Wykes, who was a regular canon of the order of St. Augustin in Osney abbey,
near Oxford, in page 661 of his History or Chronicle of England:—" Ecclesiam monasterii West-
" monasteriensis, quam idem rex.....de propriis fisci regalis exitibus.....a fundamentis
" construxerat." It appears from Madox, in his History of the Exchequer, that there was a par-
ticular office of receipt for the money to be employed in erecting this superb structure; and several
large sums appear to be assigned in the king's accounts for that purpose. In 1246(a), he ordered to
til is use two thousand five hundred and ninety-one pounds, due from the widow of one David of
Olford, a Jew. In 1254 (b), his treasurer and the barons of the Exchequer received the royal
injunctions to apply three thousand marks yearly towards forwarding the work. In 1258(c), he
reserved a thousand marks from the profits of the estates of the abbot of Westminster, during the
vacancy after Abbot Crokesley's death : and in 1270, (d) it is certified, that there had been applied
to the same work three thousand seven hundred and fifty-four pounds, paid by a lady, whose name
was Alice Lacy, for eleven years custody of her son's estate. An account of the whole expence is no
Avhere to be found; but it appears from the archives of the church, that in the year 1261 the charges
amounted to somewhat more than twenty-nine thousand six hundred pounds.
(a) Madox, 519.—{b) Rob. Vascon, 38. Hen. III. M. 4.—(c) Cot. Lib. Faustina, A. 3.—{d) Rennet's
Parochial Antiquities.