Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 9.djvu/209

 SEPULCHRAL MONUMENTS IN OXFuKI) CATHEDRAL. 151 regrettetl, ncitliei* confined to this Catliedral, nor to any one particular era, for we shall find that an ancient church is hardly ever taken down for the })urpose of reconstruction, but fragments of Sepulchral JMemorials, some of a very early period, arc discovered worked up in the walls, whilst various palimpsest brasses will prove the want of reverential feeling, sometimes even anciently dis2)layed, towards memorials of that description. The ancient sculptured monuments in the Cathedral, and to a brief description of which I shall chiefly confine myself, are three in number, and are those of a Prior of St. Frideswide, of ap])arently the early part of the reign of Edward the Third ; of the Lady Montacute, a monument of the latter part of the reign of Edward the Third ; and of a Knight of the reign of Henry the Fourth. These are disposed or placed under the arches which divide the north chapel from the north aisle of the choir. Of the Watch Chamber, misnamed the Shrine of St. Frideswide, it does not fall within my province to treat. I shall have to offer, however, a few remarks on the slab with the matrices for two incised brass figures, of which it has been despoiled. The monument of the Prior, the most ancient now existing in the Cathedral, consists of a plain high tomb with a recum- bent effigy, surmounted b}'' a canopy. The latter is a rich specimen of architectural design in the fourteenth century ; the sides, the north and south, present a front of three pointed arches cinquefoiled within, the heads springing from clustered shafts, the caps of which are sculptured with vine- leaves and surmounted by three crocketted pediments with intervening and flanking pinnacles, which latter form the finish to small lozenge-shaped or angular-faced buttresses, which are carried from the base of the tomb upwards. The hollow mouldings of the arches and pediments are enriched with the ball-flower disposed at intervals. At each angle of the canopy, but placed diagonally, is a small niche for a statuette, but the sculptured figures are much muti- lated. The internal vaulting of the Canopy is in three bays octopartite, the cells being divided by small moulded ribs, with sculptured bosses in the centre of each bay. On a slal), with chamfered edges, on the tomb lies the effigy, with a canopy ogee — arched on the top and sides ; these arches are foliated within and crocketted externally.