Some account of domestic architecture in England, from the Conquest to the end of the thirteenth century

Front matter

f i4.-ss^lc[ccl o r-

s.

V>

Preface

given in the following pages. The notices of French remains were prepared by Mr. Parker during a tour in the west of France, in the summer of 1850, in company with M. G. Bouet, the artist of Caen, from whose drawings the engravings are taken. M. Viollet Le-Duc of Paris, and M. de Caumont of Caen, have also given much valuable assistance. He has also to thank Mr. 0. Jewitt for many useful notes and suggestions.

April y 1851.

ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION.

This work has been quite out of print for several years, and has been kept back with the intention of making considerable additions to it ; but since I have had to pass my winters in Rome, my time has been so much occupied by the Archaeology of Rome itself that I have not been able to put my notes together, and almost despair of doing so. If my life, and health, and means should be spared, there is ample material for another volume, and by the advice of several friends interested in the subject the present edition is merely an exact reprint of the former one, as published by my late friend Mr. Hudson Turner himself, with the exception of an obvious oversight of my own at Old Soar in Kent, which has been corrected.

JOHN HENRY PARKER, C.B.

Rome,

December f 1876.

Introduction

The Eomans in England. — Their villas and houses. — Ordinaryplan of a Eoman house. — Method of building. — The Saxons. — Their style of building ; they probably occupied Eoman houses. — A Saxon hall. — Houses of Winchester and London in the Saxon period. — Decoration of buildings. — Eomanesque style of architecture introduced during the Saxon period. — Drawings in Saxon MSS., their character and value as architectural evidence. — The Greek, or Byzantine school; its influence on Saxon art. — Antiquity of chimneys ; none at Eome in the fourteenth century. — Character of the military buildings of the Saxons. — The castles of Coningsburgh and Bamborough later than the Saxon period. — Arundel, the only castle said to have been standing in the time of the Confessor. — iN’orman castles. — Domestic architecture of the IN’ormans. — Stone quarries. — Use of plaster. — Bricks and tile's. — Brick-making, its antiquity in England. — Masons and other workmen. — Glazing. — Iron works in England. — Architectural designs of the middle ages, how made. — Working moulds of masons, &c. p. i. — xxxii,

CHAPTER I. Twelfth Centuey

GeneealEemaeks. — Imperfect character of existing remains of the twelfth century. — Materials for the history of Domestic architecture ; their nature. — General plan of houses at this date. — Halls.— Other apartments of ordinary houses. — Bed-chamber, kitchen, larder, &c. — King’s houses at Clarendon and other

b

Contents

places. — Hall, always the chief feature of a Norman house. — Alexander Necham, his description of a house. — Plan of Norman halls. — Their roofs. — Situation of otlier apartments relatively to the hall. — Kitchens. — Cooking in the open air. — Bayeux tapestry.— Remains of a Norman house at Appleton, Berks. — Pences, walls, &c. — Some Norman houses built in the form of a parallelogram, and of two stories. — Boothby Pagnell, Lincolnshire. — Christ-church, Hants. — Jews* House at Lincoln. — Moyses’ Hall, BurySt. Edmund’s. — Staircases internal and external. — External Norman stair at Canterbury. — Houses at Southampton. — Building materials. — Use of lead for roofs. — English lead exported to Erauce. — Style of Norman roofs. — Metal work ; hinges, locks, nail-heads, &c. — Gloucester celebrated for its iron manufactures. -—External decoration of buildings. — Windows. — Glazing.— Eire-places.— Kitchens open in the roof. — Hostelry of the prior of Lewes. — Internal walls plastered. — 'Furniture of houses ; tapes^ try, &c. — Floors, generally of wood. — ^Character of London houses in the twelfth century. — -Assize of 1189 regulating buildings in London. — -Assize of the year 1212 relating to the same subject. — ^Majority of London houses chiefly of wood and thatched. — Wages of workmen.— Cook-shops on Thames side. —Chimneys not mentioned in the London Assizes. — Cameras privatas. p, I — 2%

CHAPTER II. Existing Remains

Oakham castle, Rutlandshire. — The King’s house, Southampton.— Minster, Isle of Thanet. — Christ-church, Hants. — Manor-house at Appleton. — Sutton Courtney, Berks. — St. Mary’s Guild, and Jews’ houses, Lincoln. — ^Staircase, Canterbury. — Warnford, Hants. — Fountains abbey. — Priory, Dover. — Moyses’ Hall, Bury St. Edmund’s. — ^Hostelry of the prior of Lewes, Southwark. — Boothby Pagnell, Lincolnshire. — Barnack, Northamptonshire.— School of Pythagoras, Cambridge. — Notes on remains of Early Domestic Architecture in France. p. 28—56

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III. Thirteenth Century

General Remarks. — Hall at "Wincliester. — Reign of Henry III. remarkable for the progress of arcbitectnre.—Conditioii of Norman castles in the thirteenth century. — Plan of manor-houses at this date.-^House built for Edward I. at Woolmer, Hants. — Description of house at Toddington, by M. Paris. — Meaning of term Solatium. — Longthorpe. — Stoke-Say castle. — West Deane, Sussex. — Aydon castle. — Little Wenham Hall. — Two halls at Westminster, temp. Henry III. — Temporary buildings erected at Westminster for the coronation of Edward I. — Private hospitality in this century. — Kitchens.— Wardrobes. — Influence of feudal manners on Domestic architecture. — Building materials. — Wood extensively used. — Manor-house of timber engraved on a personal seal. — Extensive use of plaster. — Roofs of the thirteenth century. — Windows. — Glass and glazing. — ^Digression on the history of glass-making in England. — No glass made in England until the fifteenth century. — Wooden lattices, fenestrals, &c. — Eire-places and chimneys. — Mantels. — Staircases, external and internal. — Internal decoration of houses. — -Wainscote.— Polychrome.— Artists of the time of Henry III. ; their style. — ^Their names. — Spurs. — Screens, &c. — Tapestry not used in private dwellings in the thirteenth century.— Elooring. — Tiles. — Baths. — Camerse PrivataD. — Conduits and drains. — Houses in towns. — Parisian houses. — Other foreign examples. — Eurniture. — Carpets.— General state of England in the thirteenth century. — State of towns. — London and Winchester compared. — Travelling.— Hackneymen. — Inns. — State of trade in England.— Agriculture.— Remarks on horticulture. p. 57—147

CHAPTER ly.

Thirteenth Century. Existing Remains.

Aydon castle, Northumberland. — Godniersham, Kent.— Little Wenham Hall, Sufiblk. — Longthorpe, near Peterborough.- — Charney Basset, Berks.— Master’s House, St. John’s Hospital,

CONTENTS.

Northampton.-Stoke-Say castle, Shropshire. — Coggs, Oxfordshire,— Cottesford, Oxfordshire. — Parsonage house. West Tarring, Sussex. — Archdeacon’s house, Peterborough. — -Crowhurst, Sussex. — Bishop’s palace, Wells. — Wood croft castle, Northamptonshire.— Old rectory house, West Deane, Sussex. — Acton Burnell, Shropshire. — Somerton castle, Lincolnshire. — Old Soar, Kent. — The King’s Hall at Winchester. — The Priory, Winchester.— Strangers’ Hall, Winchester. — House at Oakham, known as Plore’s House. — Thame, Oxfordshire, — Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, — Middleton Cheney, Oxfordshire. — Sutton Courtney, Berkshire. p. 148 — 180

CHAPTEB V.

Histoeical Illusteations :

Extracts from the Liberate Eolls of Henry III., 1229 — 1259, relating to the following places.

Bridgenorth. — Brigstock. — Brill. — Bristol. — Canterbury. — Clarendon. — Cliff. — Clipstone. — Corfe Castle. — Dover. — Dublin.

Evereswell. — Feckenham. — Freemantle. — Geddington. — Gillingham. — Gloucester. — Guildford. — Havering. — Hereford. — Hertford. — Kennington. ■ — Litchfield. — London, (tower). — Ely House. — • Ludgershall. - — Marlborough. — Newcastle. — Northampton. — Nottingham. — Oxford. — Eochester. — Sherbourn. — Silverstone.— Westminster,- — Winchester. — W indsor. — Woodstock,

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES OF FOREIGN EXAMPLES.

General remarks. — Treves. - — Laon. — Eatisbon. — Gondorf.

— Metz. — Toulouse, — Laon. — Bree. — Coucy. — Carden. — Tours. — Angers. Fontevrault, (kitchen.) — Perigueux. — St.

Einilion.^ — Mont. St. Michel. — Beauvais. p. 264 — 274

APPENDIX OF DOCUMENTS, p. 275— 287.

LIST OF PLATES.

Page

Hall of Oakham Castle, Rutland, interior , Frontispiece.

House with external staircase. — - Cooking in the open air.

From the Bayeux Tapestry . . . .5

Appleton, Berks, doorway of the hall . . . .6

Examples of roofs, tiles, and shingles ; taken from manuscripts,

two plates . . . . . .8

Battlements, from MSS. . . . . . ib.

Iron-work on doors, from MSS., two plates , . .10

Coloured exteriors of houses, from MSS. and Bayeux tapestry . 11

Eire-place, Colchester castle, Essex . . . .12

Eire-place, Boothby Pagnell, Lincolnshire. — Fire-place, Rochester castle, Kent ....

.

ib.

Examples of furniture, beds, cradle, seat, and drapery ;

from MSS.

Furniture: seats, footstools, and curtains; from

MSS., and

Bayeux tapestry, three plates

.

Hall of Oakham castle, south-east view .

.

Ground-plan ....

.

ib.

Windows and principal doorway

.

Capitals of pillars and south-east corbel

.

ib.

Hipknobs, springstone, and section

.

ib.

Town wall, Southampton. Plan of house adjoining

.

Interior and exterior of the same .

. .

ib.

House at Minster, Isle of Thanet

Christ-church, Hampshire, house at

.

Part of St. Mary’s Guild, Lincoln

The Jews’ House, Lincoln ib.

Staircase, leading to the Registry at Canterbury

.

Plan of house at Warnford, Hants

.

ib.

LIST OF PLATES.

Eefectory of the priory, Dover, exterior

Interior .......

Ground-plan ......

Moyses’ Hall, Bury St. Edmund’s, window, exterior and interior Lower story of the hostelry of the prior of Lewes, Southwark . Boothby Pagnell, Lincolnshire, manor-house, two plates Barnack, Northamptonshire, manor-house Baking. — Melting metals. — Cooking. Illustrations from MSS.

in Bodleian Library . . .

Seal, representing a manor-house of the thirteenth century {text) Fire-place, Abingdon abbey, Berks ....

Fire-place in the kitchen, abbey of Beauport, Brittany. — Fireplace of wood and plaster, Carden on the Moselle, Germany ......

Furniture. — Table in the chapter-house, Salisbury. — Table in the kitchen of the Strangers’ Hall, Winchester . Illustrations of furniture, from illuminated MSS.

Back of the Coronation chair, Westminster abbey Pottery, domestic utensils, &c. ; from MSS. in the Bodleian Library .......

Illustrations from MSS., well, granary, &c.

Illustrations from painted glass, Bourges. — Trades and occupations .......

Aydon castle, Northumberland ; general external view .

View within the walls .....

Court, with external staircase ....

Angle of court ......

Chimney, and part of front .....

Three windows ......

Fire-place, window, and drain ....

Fire-place and plan ......

Plans of ground floor and upper story Court-lodge, Godmersham, Kent ....

Little Wenham Hall, Suffolk; general view

Ditto and ground-plan .....

Windows and entrance to chapel ....

Masonry, coping, &c. .....

Lougthorpe, near Peterborough .....

Page ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

152 ib. ib. ib.

LIST OP PLATES.

House at Charney, Berks ; west front ....

Ground-plan ......

Interior of Solar ......

Chapel, exterior and interior ....

Fire-place and plan of south wing ....

Master’s house, St. John’s Hospital, Northampton ; plan

Hoof and drain . ....

Stoke-Say castle, Shropshire; front of the hall from court-yard Ground-plan ......

Interior of the hall ...••< Tower, from the exterior ....

Fire-place in the Solar ....

Chimney and windows of hall and tower Coggs, Oxfordshire, manor-house ; window, exterior and interior .......

Cottesford, Oxfordshire ; old manor-house Ground-plan

Window and drain ......

West Deane, Sussex, old rectory -house . . . .

Acton Burnell castle, Shropshire ; south-west view and plan Hall and plan ......

Interior of window, and of north-west angle and tower Window of hall ; interior of door and window, north side . Bemains of the barn, called the Parliament house . Somerton castle, Lincolnshire ; view of south-east tower Interior of north-east tower, with ground-plan General ground-plan, {text') . . . ,

Old Soar, Plaxtole, Kent . . . . ,

Ground-plan .....

King’s Hall at Winchester; window at west end, and plan o the hall .......

Elevation of one bay ; exterior and interior Details ......

Deanery, Winchester, entrance, with plan

Strangers’ Hall, Winchester ; two views

Flore’s House at Oakham, Rutland, doorway and drain .

Barn, Raunds, Northamptonshire

Sections of mouldings of thirteenth-century buildings .

Page ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

ib.

. ib.

. 177 . 178

. ib.

. 180

. ib.

LIST OF PLATES.

Page

FiiENcn Examples.

Coucy, window in the keep of the castle of .

.

. 267

painting on the head and jambs of the window

Tours, arcade on a corner house at .

. ib.

. 268

window of a house, rue Ste. Croix

. ib.

front of a house, rue Briconnet

. ib.

■ windows of a house, rue de Rapin

. ib.

Angers, window in the hospital of St. John .

. 270

window in the Hospice at

. ib.

house in the rue des Penitentes

. ib.

Eontevrault, kitchen of the abbey of, and plan

. 272

section of kitchen

. ib.

St. Einilion, window of a house at

. ib.

Perigueux, front of a house at

. ib.

Mont St. Michel, window of the library at

. 274

Dol, part of the front of a house at

. ib.

Beauvais, house at .

. ib.

INTRODUCTION.

As the following account of the progress of doniestic architecture in England commences only with the twelfth century, some notice of the subject during earlier periods may be reasonably expected ; yet almost all that can be said of it anterior to that century must be founded chiefly on conjecture.

Neither the language nor the civilization of the Romans appear to have made any great impression on the ancient population of England, and when the forces of the empire were finally withdrawn the nation relapsed into its primitive barbarism. The feeble school of native workmen who had been instructed in some few of the arts in which their southern conquerors excelled, never produced any thing better than rude imitations of the models by which they wrought. The works of the Roman settlers themselves, to judge by those which have survived, were of a coarse and debased character. Most of the sculptures, mosaics, bronzes, and pottery which belong to the period of the Roman occupation of Britain, and are presumed to be the work of Roman colonists, are inferior in character and execution to remains of the same period which have been discovered in Gaul and other provinces of the empire ^ Nor is this

“ The finer bronzes, and other works anielled-bronze figure discovered in Siisof art, which have been found in this sex, and presented, by Lord Asliburncountry, are supposed to have been im- ham, to the British Museum, ported. Such for instance as the en-

C

INTRODUCTION.

surprising if it be remembered that the Roman troops who occupied the British islands were chiefly foreign auxiliaries, and that neither the climate nor the wealth of the country were such as to induce any extensive settlement of the more polished subjects of the Caesars. A few merchants who had come from Belgium and Gaul, a few veterans who had become colonists, a few of the chief native inhabitants who had received the honour of citizenship and some tincture of southern civilization, together with the army, formed all that could be strictly termed the Roman, in contradistinction to the aboriginal, population.

Much progress in the arts was incompatible with such a state of society, and the science of architecture above all was not likely to be exercised with great effect. The fortifications of the Romans in this country were, it is true, on that grand and massive scale which everywhere marked their military defences, as enduring remains amply shew; but the temples and public edifices of the Romano-British cities, although constructed on the unvarying conventional principles which distinguished the best examples of Latian art, were inferior in size and splendour to those of any other province of the empire. Under these circumstances it is improbable that domestic architecture, which even in Italy had not attained a great degree of excellence before the last days of the Republic, should have been carried to any considerable pitch of refinement or magnificence by the Roman settlers in England.

We know, however, from remains of domestic habitations of Roman times which have been discovered in this country, that the villas and town houses of the Roman colonists were generally built upon the same plan which prevailed in Italy. In this respect the Roman practice was as un-

INTRODUCTION.

Ill changing as the Chinese ; the same principles of construction were observed on the banks of the Severn and the Thames, as on those of the Tiber or the Po. It is veryprobable that in England the influence of climate may have modifled some of the details of the Roman house : although well adapted to the climate of Italy the open atrium^ with a rain-cistern, or impluviimi in its centre, was not equally suited to the damp atmosphere of Britain, and here therefore that apartment may have been covered in, although its proportions relatively to the rest of the house were preserved^.

The various parts of a Roman house have been so frequently described, that it is unnecessary in this place to enter into any great detail respecting them. It may be observed, however, that until the discovery of the remains of Pompeii the general arrangement of the apartments was imperfectly understood, notwithstanding the letters of Cicero and Pliny, and the instructions of Vitruvius. Judging from those remains, aided by the writers just named, an ordinary Roman house does not appear to have been either a comfortable or a well-arranged building. The size of the cubicula, or bedchambers, was usually sacrificed to the atrium, and they were therefore of comparatively small dimensions; they derived their light internally from that apartment, and rarely from windows in the external wall ; at least such was the plan adopted in Italy : but, if, as has been suggested, the atrium was entirely roofed, in buildings constructed in this country, external windows may have been more common. On this point unfortunately we have no evidence; the remains of Roman buildings dis-

^ No impluvium was found in the remarkable ruins at Bignor, in Sussex. Archaeologia, vol. xviii. pp. 203 — 218.

c 2

IV

INTRODUCTION.

covered in England scarcely enable us to trace their ground-plan, much less to give any opinion as to their elevations, with the exception of the materials composing the walls and roofs.

The atrium was generally the only sitting-room for the family, and was ordinarily the kitchen also"*. Thus the chief features of the ordinary Roman house were a large hall, attached to which were one or more small chambers for sleeping. To these the bath remains to be added, for even in the smallest buildings of which the vestiges have been laid bare, a hypocaust has usually been found: the presence of this apparatus does not, it is true, actually prove that it was attached to a bath, but the fair inference is that such was generally the case. The skill displayed by the Romans in the arrangement of the flues, connected with the hypocaust, by which their apartments were heated, scarcely prepares us to believe that they were unacquainted with the use of chimneys ; yet the balance of opinion among the best modern writers on the subject is in favour of such a conclusion ^

According to the taste and wealth of the owner, a house may have had more rooms or have been constructed on a greater scale, and even with an upper story ; but it has too long been the fashion to assume that every villa was built according to the descriptions of Cicero and Pliny, to imagine that those numerous apartments which were necessary to the convenience or fastidiousness of

c Hence in middle-age Latinity atrium covered in the villa at Bignor : “ no part came to signify a kitchen. See Du Cange, of any chimney or funnel by which the sub voce. smoke might have been conveyed away,

** The authorities in favour of chimneys remained.” Mr. Lysons in Archaeologia, are collected by Becker, Gallus, Sc. ii. ut supra.

Excurs. i. Two open fire-places were dis-

INTRODUCTION.

V the wealthy ordinarily formed parts of the house of every Roman who could afford to possess a suburban retreat. We may reasonably assume that such was not the case on the continent, and the description here given is submitted as generally accurate with respect to the numerous rural habitations which at the beginning of the fifth century were scattered over Britain, from the hills of Perthshire to the coast of Kent. If the Roman villa was in any part of the country distinguished by greater splendour, it w^as in the milder climate of the south-western counties, where ground-plans have been traced, on sunny slopes, of edifices which seem to have been built with long porticos, almost rivalling that of Pliny at Laurentinum, and paved with mosaics almost equal to those of Italy ®.

Of domestic habitations within towns during the Roman dominion in this country, we know very little ; to some of them what has been said of the country residences is, of course, applicable, so far as general arrangement is concerned. Ground not being so valuable as in Rome and other cities of the continent, we may conclude the houses were generally built without an upper story, a contrivance which appears to have been originally suggested by the difficulty of accommodating an increased population within a limited area. Of the meaner class of houses, as shops for instance, we are left to form an idea from an inspection of the remains of such buildings at Pompeii,

The Roman method of building in England appears to have been fully as substantial as that observed in Italy ; wherever the remains of their edifices are laid bare by the

® The supposed cryptoporticus at Big- Lysons to the age of Titus, were superior nor was of the entire length of two hun- in design and execution to any other dred and twenty-seven feet. The mo- examples known to exist in this country, saics found there, attributed by Mr. Archaeologia, vol. xviii. pp. 203 — 208.

VI

INTRODUCTION.

plough, or by excavating, the foundations are invariably of the most solid materials ; concrete, stone and tile. Some of the best quarries known at the present day were known and worked in the fourth century of our sera, and not merely for constructions in their immediate vicinity. The great roads constructed by the Romans throughout this island rendered the transport of materials from distant points more easy then than it was, probably, in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, when those roads had fallen into decay ; and the geologist now often recognises in the ruins of Roman villas situated in districts not devoid of quarries, stone of a superior quality, which must have been brought by land or water fifty or a hundred miles. The edifices of the towns they founded were equally well built, and endured through the succeeding periods of British anarchy, Saxon conquest, and Danish spoliation. In the tenth and eleventh centuries the ruins of Verulamium furnished materials for the construction of the church and abbey of St. Alban’s ; and recent discoveries prove that source to be not yet exhausted. When the Saxon power was at its zenith, massive buildings of Roman days, yet standing in the chief towns of England, were significantly distinguished in the Saxon dialect from constructions of a later date ; as the quarter called the Aldwark in York, and the suburb called the Southwark at London.

We may reasonably assume that when the Romans finally abandoned England as a colony, every building throughout the country, except the huts of the native peasantry and labourers, exhibited in a greater or less degree the peculiar features of their style of architecture. Nor does there appear to be any good reason for supposing that this condition of things was immediately

INTRODUCTION.

Vll changed. Their retirement was not sudden but gradual ; and the state of the continent was not such as to induce the emigration of any great numbers of the Eomano-British population, although they found themselves deprived of the protection of the forces of the empire. The history of the period between the withdrawal of the Eoman legions and the arrival of the Saxons is, however, a mass of fable and contradictions, amidst which we search in vain for glimpses of truth; one fact alone is certain, that it was a period of internal discord, and, therefore, unfavourable either to the progress or the preservation of the arts. Yet it cannot be doubted that when the Saxons landed in England they found its population dwelling in towns still possessing all the chief features of Eoman construction, both civil and military. Those features could not have been immediately and wholly effaced, destructive as was the struggle which took place before the supremacy of the new comers was established. Whatever was destroyed was destroyed in warfare, that ended it would be puerile to suppose that the Saxons pulled down every thing that remained for the sake of rebuilding after their own fashion.

Here the question arises, how, or in what style, the Saxons were likely to replace the habitations they destroyed. If we turn to the Sagas, and other early records of the history and manners of the northern races, we find that the dwellings of their kings and chiefs in the countries adjacent to the Baltic consisted only of two apartments, and that sovereigns and their counsellors are described as sleeping in the same room. The habitations of the mass of the people were wooden huts, rarely containing more than one room, in the centre of which the fire was kindled. Such was the style of domestic architecture which the

Vlll

INTRODUCTION.

Saxons would bring with them to this country ; and in that fashion most of their houses were built down to the latest period of their dominion. To this method there was nothing repugnant in houses erected on the Roman plan which they found on their arrival, and we may be pretty certain that wherever in town or country such houses existed in a habitable state, or capable of being made habitable, however rudely, they were occupied by the invaders K The Saxon chieftain would find better accommodation in a large Roman house, with its spacious atrium, than he had been wont to enjoy, and in its essential features the plan of the edifice did not vary from that of the rude habitation of his fatherland; there was still the hall for feasting his numerous retainers, and more chambers for other domestic purposes.

It is sufficiently obvious that buildings either wholly or partially of Roman construction must have gradually diminished in number during the continual wars of the Saxon period ; and it is next to certain that most domestic edifices built during the same time were chiefly of wood, a material which could be more readily obtained and more easily converted than stone. The quarries which had supplied the Roman builders ceased to be worked; the mechanical skill of the new conquerors was scanty, and had it been greater the difficulty and cost of carrying were obstacles not easily surmounted. The Saxon thegne built his ‘‘ hall from the woods on his demesne, by the

^ Mr. Kemble, in his “ Saxons in of London and York, of Gloucester and England,” is of opinion that the Saxons Chester, proved equally attractive to avoided Roman towns. No doubt they their successors in power. The adformed many new rural settlements, vantage of water communication would but the same convenience of situation equally influence Roman and Saxon, which led the Romans to fix on the sites

INTRODUCTION.

IX labour of his bondmen^; it was thatched with reeds or straw, or roofed with wooden shingles. In plan it was little more than its name implied, a capacious apartment which in the day-time was adapted to the patriarchal hospitality of the owner, and formed, at night, a sort of stable for his servants ^ to whose rude accommodation their master’s was not much superior in a small adjoining chamber. There was, as yet, but a slight perception of the decencies of life. The fire was kindled in the centre of the hall ; the smoke made its way out through an opening in the roof immediately above the hearth, or by the door, windows, or eaves of the thatch. The lord and his hearth-men,” a significant appellation given to the most familiar retainers', sat by the same fire at which their repast was cooked, and at night retired to share the same dormitory, which served also as a council -chamber. These hearthcompanions of the Saxon kings and nobles have been compared, by writers of considerable erudition, to the counts of the palace of the Frank sovereigns, and no doubt some analogy existed between the customs of all the northern races which supplanted the Roman power. So late as the

^ See in the Venedotian code, art. 16 ; “ nine buildings which the villains of the king are to erect for him : a hall, a chamber, a buttery, a stable, a dog-house, a barn, a kiln, a privy, and a dormitory.” Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales, p. 37. See also for the worth of the ball, p. 142.

** Persons of higher rank also slept in the hall. “A multitude of warriors watched the hall, as they before had often * Beowulf, 1. 4353.

done; they bared the bench-planks; it was spread all over with beds and bolsters ; some one of the beer- servants, ready and fated to die, bent to his palace rest.” Beowulf, translated by J. M. Kemble, vol. ii. p. 51. Compare the regulations of the king’s hall, in the Welsh Laws, “ The king’s hall is to be apportioned into three parts,” &c. Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales, p. 688.