DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1457#0101
ESSAY. 73
the Conquest, and finished by Roger, that
great and powerful bishop of Salisbury under
Henry I. was at old Sarum, and of the same
kind; it stood in the north-west part of the
city, and the foundations are still visible: if
one may form a judgment of the whole by
the ruins that remain, it does not appear
indeed to have been so large as some other of
those above mentioned; but it had a nave
and two porticos or side-aisles, and the east
end of it was semi-circular; its situation, on a
barren chalky hill, exposed to the violence of
the winds, and subject to great scarcity of
water, and that within the precincts of the
castle (whereby frequent disputes and quar-
rels arose between the members of the church
and officers of the castle), gave occasion to
the bishop and clergy in the reign of Henry
Hi. to desert it, and remove to a more con-
venient situation about a mile distant towards
the south-east, where Richard Poore e, at that
time bishop, begun the foundation of the pre-
sent church on the fourth of the calends of
May, 1220, It consists entirely of that style
which is now called (though I think impro-
perly) Gothic; a light, neat, and elegant form
°f building; in which all the arches are (not
round but) pointed, the pillars small and
c Price's Observations on the Cathedral Church of Salis-
DurJ> p. 8, Camden's Britau. coi. 107. note y.
the Conquest, and finished by Roger, that
great and powerful bishop of Salisbury under
Henry I. was at old Sarum, and of the same
kind; it stood in the north-west part of the
city, and the foundations are still visible: if
one may form a judgment of the whole by
the ruins that remain, it does not appear
indeed to have been so large as some other of
those above mentioned; but it had a nave
and two porticos or side-aisles, and the east
end of it was semi-circular; its situation, on a
barren chalky hill, exposed to the violence of
the winds, and subject to great scarcity of
water, and that within the precincts of the
castle (whereby frequent disputes and quar-
rels arose between the members of the church
and officers of the castle), gave occasion to
the bishop and clergy in the reign of Henry
Hi. to desert it, and remove to a more con-
venient situation about a mile distant towards
the south-east, where Richard Poore e, at that
time bishop, begun the foundation of the pre-
sent church on the fourth of the calends of
May, 1220, It consists entirely of that style
which is now called (though I think impro-
perly) Gothic; a light, neat, and elegant form
°f building; in which all the arches are (not
round but) pointed, the pillars small and
c Price's Observations on the Cathedral Church of Salis-
DurJ> p. 8, Camden's Britau. coi. 107. note y.