Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 9.djvu/252

188 especially the members of the Ralegh, Dinham, Martyn, Audeley, and Calwodelegh families. The monastery was dissolved on Sept. 12, 1538, and on the 4th July following, its site, church, belfry, and cemetery were granted by Henry VIII. to the former usher of the royal chamber, then become Lord John Russell. The royal favourite soon demolished the buildings, "to make hym a fair place" or mansion, as Leland informs us. At various periods fragments of sculpture enriched with painting and gilding have been brought to light, but none perhaps more curious than the upper portion of a recumbent statue, of which Mr. Tucker presented a cast to the Institute on the present occasion. The late Sir Samuel Meyrick said that the flattened conical shape of the Coiffe de Mailles would show that it represented a knight of the latter part of Henry the Third's reign, and that it exhibits a very peculiar mode of fastening the over-lapping part of the Coiffe, by a strap and buckle near the left temple. Dr. Oliver had been inclined to think that the figure might have been the memorial of James Lord Audeley, of Redcastle, Shropshire, one of the first Knights of the Garter, who so gallantly signalised himself at the Battle of Poictiers, 1356, and who directed, by his will, that his body should be buried in the choir of this Dominican church, in Exeter, before the high altar. He survived till April 1, 1386. The character of the costume, however, as will be seen by the annexed representation, indicates an earlier period.

By Mr. —Rubbings made from the embroidered altar cloth which covers the high altar of the church of St. Mary, usually called Maria zur Wiese or the Wiesenkirche (meadow church) at Soest, in Westphalia. This remarkable example of mediæval embroidery is 12ft. 4 in. in length, by 4 ft. in width, not including the frontal or antependium, which is 7$1⁄2$ in. wide, and 9 ft. 4 in. long. The material is a coarse open cloth of flax or hemp, and the embroidery is raised upon it with the needle in a sort of embroidery stitch. It is either of the natural unbleached colour of the material, or has acquired its present colour from age, having