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Updated: May 24, 2025
But to return north to Entre Minho-e-Douro, where the oldest and most numerous romanesque churches exist and where three types may be seen. Of these the simplest and probably the oldest is that of an aisleless nave with simple square chancel.
The original plan must have been very like that of Braga, an aisleless transept, a nave and aisles of six bays, and two square towers beyond with a porch between. The two towers are now very plain with large belfry windows near the top, but there are traces here and there of old built-up round-headed openings which show that the walls at least are really old.
It has no tower or projecting bell-cot, but a couple of bells are let into the W. gable. A good Norm. arch, only 6 ft. wide, with zigzag ornament, divides the aisleless nave from the chancel; and other indications of Norm. workmanship are found in the N. porch and in two windows of the nave. The chancel is E.E. and is lighted by lancets.
The plan, indeed, of the church, omitting the Capella do Fundador and the great Capellas Imperfeitas, presents no difficulty as it is only a repetition of the already well-known and national arrangement of nave with aisles, an aisleless transept, with in this case five apsidal chapels to the east.
Though the nave is like that of Santiago, the transepts and choir are much simpler. There the transept is long and has an aisle on each side; here it is short and aisleless. There the choir is deep with a surrounding aisle and radiating chapels, here it is a simple apse flanked by two smaller apses.
The aisleless Norman church, however, had a central tower to the east of the present chancel arch and transepts, as well as a chancel.
#The Ground Plan# is of the double cross form, frequent in buildings of this class. The nave and choir both have aisles, but those of the choir are walled off from it. The main transept is aisleless, but the north and south choir transepts have each an aisle, or small chapel, on the eastern side. Beneath the whole eastern part of the church extends the magnificent crypt.
The church, restored in 1882, retains little of interest. There are piscinas in the chancel and in a small N. chapel, and a small squint in the N. chancel pier. Woolverton, a village 4 m. N. from Frome. The church is a small, aisleless building with a diminutive W. tower and spire. The S. porch has a ribbed stone roof. Wootton Courtney, a small village 4 m. W. from Dunster.
The first abbot, Ranulph, was sent by St. Bernard of Clairvaux himself at the king's special request, and he must have brought with him the plan of the abbey or at least of the church. Nearly all Cistercian churches, which have not been altered, are of two types which resemble each other in being very simple, having no towers and very little ornament of any kind. In the simpler of these forms, the one which prevailed in England, the transept is aisleless, with five or more chapels, usually square, to the east, of which the largest, in the centre, contains the main altar. Such are Fontenay near Monbart and Furness in Lancashire, and even Melrose, though there the church has been rebuilt more or less on the old plan but with a wealth of detail and size of window quite foreign to the original rule. In the other, a more complex type, the transept may have a western aisle, and instead of a plain square chancel there is an apse with surrounding aisle and beyond it a series of four-sided chapels. Pontigny, famous for the shelter it gave to Thomas-
Directly we enter the chapel our eyes are raised to look at the roof which necessitated that stately row of buttresses, but for a time it is hard to think of anything but the splendour of colour and detail in this vast aisleless nave, and we think of what Henry's college might have been had the whole plan been carried out in keeping with this perfect work.
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