Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 1.djvu/49

Rh I never met with one of a later date exhibiting any of the peculiar characters mentioned above. We find a similar style on parts of existing buildings which are evidently of a very early date, and which therefore, as it appears to me, we are justified in attributing to the same age as the manuscript, in the same way that we should ascribe an unknown effigy to the age in which its costume is found to prevail in similar illuminations. It remains for further examination to shew how far we ought to refer every example of this style to the same age. The dates of early buildings appear to have been often fixed too arbitrarily. I would merely cite, as an instance, the church of Waltham abbey. This is considered as early Norman, and ascribed to the date of about 1120, because Henry I. and his two wives are recorded as special benefactors to the monastery. In the two most authentic accounts of the early history of Waltham abbey, both written apparently late in the reign of Henry II., the Vita Haroldi and the tract De Inventione Sanctæ Crucis Walthamensis (the latter of which brings the history up to the time at which it was written), we have a particular and curious account of Harold's church, which was very spacious and massive, and which agrees perfectly with what now remains; and these same documents give us every reason to believe that no remarkable alterations had been made in the building up to the time at which these histories were written, that is, up to the period of transition. This is very easily accounted for, because the acknowledged character of Harold's building would preserve it from dilapidation, and the jealousy with which it was looked upon by the Normans (as we are informed in the documents) caused it to be treated with neglect. It may be observed also, that Harold's church was most probably built by architects brought over from Normandy, and would therefore have a decidedly Norman character. I will merely add that a copy of Prudentius in the British Museum, written apparently about the middle of the eleventh century (or very soon after), MS. Cotton. Titus D. XVI., contains one or two rows of columns of which the shafts are ornamented in precisely the same style as those which still remain in Waltham abbey. T. WRIGHT.