DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31962#0022
4
INTRODUCTION.
of the distinguished dead Rom a very early period.* A Roman stone-coffin of very massive construc-
tion, having a coped lid, f was laid open at the excavations made in 1828 at a spot near Caesar's
Camp, Ilolwood Hill, in Kent, where are still visible the remains of a small temple, or sacellum, in con-
nection with Roman sepulchres. This coffin was deposited in a grave cut eight feet deep in the chalk
rock. The coped form of the lid was particularly well calculated for carrying off the moisture from
the interior, whether above or under ground. Accrdingly, we find in the coffin in which the body of
William Rufus was deposited, the same form continued which had been adopted by the half-civilized
people of Europe, like the details of their architecture, on the Roman model. The coped shape of
the lid was no doubt very early varied by the flat, (particularly when the defunct was deposited under
the roof of a sacred building, where no moisture was to be repelled^ and the coffin lid could be thus
reduced to the level of the door,) but it remains one mark of the antiquity of sepulchral chests in the
Middle Age. We resume Mr. Stothard's prefatory notes:
" Effigies are rarely to be met with in England before the middle of the thirteenth century; a cir-
cumstance not to be attributed to the causes generally assigned, which were, either that they had been
destroyed, or that the unsettled state of the times did not offer sufficient encouragement for erecting
such memorials: but it rather appears not to have been before become the practice to represent the
deceased. If it had been otherwise, for what reason do we not find effigies over the tombs of William
the Conqueror, his son, William Rufus, or his daughter, Gundrada. Yet, after a time, it is an
undoubted fact that the alteration introduced by the Normans was the addition of the figure of the
person deceased; and then it appeared not in the bold style of the later Norman monuments, but
partaking of the character and low relief of those tombs it was about to supersede. Of these, and of
the few, perhaps, that were executed, Roger Bishop of Sarum is the only specimen in good preserva-
tion. The effigy of Joceline Bishop of Salisbury is infinitely more relieved than that of Roger Bishop
of the same see, which is far from possessing the bold relief we afterwards observe in the figure of King
John. Our sculptors, having arrived at this stage of improvement, continued to execute their effigies
after the same manner, (during which we observe the coffin-shaped slab giving way to a more regular
figure,) till the beginning of the fourteenth century; and it was then that it entirely disappeared, and
that the effigy is represented in full relief To support such a conjecture is no difficult task " * ^ *
as by the appearance of King John's remains, and other instances. " Withburg, a sister to Queen
Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely, when examined, several centuries after her interment, by order of the Abbot
Richard, was found with a cMg/h'oM of silk beneath her head, &c. It is not unlikely that it was usual to
bury the dead in this manner; whence arose the custom of sculpturing our effigies with cushions under
the head. Henry the Second's effigy, at Fontevraud, is thus represented, and agrees with the account
given by Matthew Paris, and other writers, of that monarch's appearance after death, when placed
upon the bier; and Berengaria, Queen of Richard the First, is seen in her effigy holding a book, the
cover embossed with a second representation of herself (which agrees with the effigy), lying upon a
bier, with waxen tapers burning in candlesticks on either side. Yet it is probable the custom of
burying the dead in the dress which marked the habits of their lives was not universal; for, had it
been so, we should find knights in their armour,f which would have explained points that now, pro-
bably, will never be clearly understood.
" It is true that a very voluminous work of this kind has been published by the late Mr. Gough,
* Crenoariapud Romanos non fuitveterisinstituti: terra condebantur; et postquam longinquis bellis obrutos emi
cognovere est institutum, et tamen multse familise priscos servavere ritus. Manutius de leg. Rom.
t See Archseologia, Vol. XXII. Plate xxxii. p. 348.
f The value of armour in an iron age, when the suit descended from sire to son, or was bequeathed as " a rich
legacy/' may account for the omission of this practice.
INTRODUCTION.
of the distinguished dead Rom a very early period.* A Roman stone-coffin of very massive construc-
tion, having a coped lid, f was laid open at the excavations made in 1828 at a spot near Caesar's
Camp, Ilolwood Hill, in Kent, where are still visible the remains of a small temple, or sacellum, in con-
nection with Roman sepulchres. This coffin was deposited in a grave cut eight feet deep in the chalk
rock. The coped form of the lid was particularly well calculated for carrying off the moisture from
the interior, whether above or under ground. Accrdingly, we find in the coffin in which the body of
William Rufus was deposited, the same form continued which had been adopted by the half-civilized
people of Europe, like the details of their architecture, on the Roman model. The coped shape of
the lid was no doubt very early varied by the flat, (particularly when the defunct was deposited under
the roof of a sacred building, where no moisture was to be repelled^ and the coffin lid could be thus
reduced to the level of the door,) but it remains one mark of the antiquity of sepulchral chests in the
Middle Age. We resume Mr. Stothard's prefatory notes:
" Effigies are rarely to be met with in England before the middle of the thirteenth century; a cir-
cumstance not to be attributed to the causes generally assigned, which were, either that they had been
destroyed, or that the unsettled state of the times did not offer sufficient encouragement for erecting
such memorials: but it rather appears not to have been before become the practice to represent the
deceased. If it had been otherwise, for what reason do we not find effigies over the tombs of William
the Conqueror, his son, William Rufus, or his daughter, Gundrada. Yet, after a time, it is an
undoubted fact that the alteration introduced by the Normans was the addition of the figure of the
person deceased; and then it appeared not in the bold style of the later Norman monuments, but
partaking of the character and low relief of those tombs it was about to supersede. Of these, and of
the few, perhaps, that were executed, Roger Bishop of Sarum is the only specimen in good preserva-
tion. The effigy of Joceline Bishop of Salisbury is infinitely more relieved than that of Roger Bishop
of the same see, which is far from possessing the bold relief we afterwards observe in the figure of King
John. Our sculptors, having arrived at this stage of improvement, continued to execute their effigies
after the same manner, (during which we observe the coffin-shaped slab giving way to a more regular
figure,) till the beginning of the fourteenth century; and it was then that it entirely disappeared, and
that the effigy is represented in full relief To support such a conjecture is no difficult task " * ^ *
as by the appearance of King John's remains, and other instances. " Withburg, a sister to Queen
Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely, when examined, several centuries after her interment, by order of the Abbot
Richard, was found with a cMg/h'oM of silk beneath her head, &c. It is not unlikely that it was usual to
bury the dead in this manner; whence arose the custom of sculpturing our effigies with cushions under
the head. Henry the Second's effigy, at Fontevraud, is thus represented, and agrees with the account
given by Matthew Paris, and other writers, of that monarch's appearance after death, when placed
upon the bier; and Berengaria, Queen of Richard the First, is seen in her effigy holding a book, the
cover embossed with a second representation of herself (which agrees with the effigy), lying upon a
bier, with waxen tapers burning in candlesticks on either side. Yet it is probable the custom of
burying the dead in the dress which marked the habits of their lives was not universal; for, had it
been so, we should find knights in their armour,f which would have explained points that now, pro-
bably, will never be clearly understood.
" It is true that a very voluminous work of this kind has been published by the late Mr. Gough,
* Crenoariapud Romanos non fuitveterisinstituti: terra condebantur; et postquam longinquis bellis obrutos emi
cognovere est institutum, et tamen multse familise priscos servavere ritus. Manutius de leg. Rom.
t See Archseologia, Vol. XXII. Plate xxxii. p. 348.
f The value of armour in an iron age, when the suit descended from sire to son, or was bequeathed as " a rich
legacy/' may account for the omission of this practice.