Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 3.djvu/417

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

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[ we compare these plans of the crypt at sxham with the plans of the crypt under tb jwest end of the ruined basilica at Pompeii I in Lance's 'Haua und Halle,' Leipzig, 1885, wr shall see that the crypt at Hexham is fo -raally identical with the crypt under the basilica. In every respect the resemblance is m< st striking. The two staircases, or rather se ;s of stairs, which lead down into the crypt at Hexham are exactly in the same position as the two sets of stairs which lead down in~x> the Pompeian crypt. In both cases the steps begin at the north-east and south-east corners of the respective crypts. In both cases the stairs are divided into sets of steps ; in other words, there are three or four steps and then a landing. In both crypts there is a mysterious hole in the vaulted roof by which a communication was established between the crypt below and the tribunal ! above. Moreover, the same hole in the roof (is to be seen in the crypts at Ripon and Repton. The crypt at Pompeii has two " cellar windows " in its west wall.

JThe crypt at Hexharn had a window in its west wall, and the steps leading down to that window, or rather to the aperture which jformed the window, are now used for the approach to this subterranean room. The crypt at Repton has a similar " cellar win- dow," and the outside steps were discovered last year. The crypt at Hexham is about 10^ feet below the floor of the tribunal ; at Pompeii it is 11 feet.

I It is certain, therefore, that the crypt at Hexham, which contains Roman masonry, originally formed a subterranean room be- neath the tribunal at the west end of a iRoman basilica. When the basilica or church it Hexham was rebuilt in the twelfth or thirteenth century, the crypt was preserved, is it was at Ripon, the reason of its pre- servation being that it would still be of use In judicial processes, such as the ordeal by ire. It is very interesting to observe that at rlexham the new or Christian basilica sprang mtu rally from the ruins of the pagan Basilica. Though the tribunal and its sub- acent crypt no longer stood at the west end f the new basilica, the pillars of the eastern

alf of the new basilica stood on the site of he old pillars. But in such a case it is really uite impossible to distinguish between

pagan " and " Christian," for there was no Teach either of architectural or historical ontinuity. I merely use the words because he distinction is popular and convenient.

On this new evidence, therefore, I again uggest that the Augustinian canons of lexham were of the house and lineage of

a bod) r of Augustales, The " Augustaldensis ecclcsia " of our earliest documents cannot be set aside as a mere freak, or as a forgery, On the contrary, it points out the way to a reconstruction of monastic history.

S. 0. ADDY.

THE ORDER OF ST. JOHN OF JERUSALEM IN SCOTLAND (9 th S. iii. 328). If CLYNE-MONK is not already aware of it, there is something interesting in vol. ii. (1844-5) of the 'Spottis- woode Miscellany,' edited by James Maid- men t, notably on a " Charter by Mary, Queen of Scots, with consent of the Three Estates, in favour of James Sandilands, Lord St. John, of the Possessions of the Templars and Hospitaliers, 24 January, 1563."

RICHD. LAWSON.

Urmston.

See Keith's ' Scottish Bishops, with an Ac- count of the Religious Houses in Scotland,' by John Spottiswoode (Edin., 1824), p. 435, &c. ; Glasgow Archaeological Society, ' Torphichen and the Knights of St. John,' by J. Edwards, February, 1897 ; * Castellated and Domestic Architecture of Scotland,' vol. v. p. 131 ; ' Ecclesiastical Architecture of Scotland,' vol. iii. p. 139; 'The Persecution of the Knights Templars,' by Anthony Oneal Haye (Edin., T. G. Stevenson, 1865), pp. 112-90.

T. R.

KING CHARLES I. (9 th S. iii. 25). The following notes illustrate the same view as that held by Prebendary Felling, as quoted by W. C. B., as to Romish influence in destroying Charles I. :

' If this manifesto had been known to the French refugee, who, in a libel published in Holland in 1691, with the title of 'Memoirs of the Life of James the Second,' declared, and maintained, that the condemnation, banishment, and excommuni- cation of Charles the First, were brought about by the Jesuits, and that a Jesuit was the excutioner of that prince ; he without doubt, would not have failed to join to the details with which he supports this anecdote, those passages in the work of the Cordeliers, which discover the intelligence estab- lished between Cromwell and the Irish under the influence of the Jesuits."' A Tour to London,' by M. Grosley, F.R.S., translated from the French by Dr. Nugent (Dublin, 1772), vol. ii. p. 37.

Prynne ('True and Perfect Narrative,' p. 46) states that

the Jesuits in France, at a general meeting there, presently resolved to bring him to Justice and take off his head, by the power of their friends n the army."

The Governor of a Romish college in Flanders stated to Mr. Atkins that there were thirty of them in London, who, by instructions from Cardinal Mazarin, sat in council, and debated whether the king