Page:The Saxon Cathedral at Canterbury and The Saxon Saints Buried Therein.djvu/46

THE SAXON CATHEDRAL AT CANTERBURY

From about the year A.D. 410, when the Romans finally left Britain, until the coming of St. Austin in A.D. 597, the country became devastated, being overrun by pagan Saxons, Angles and Jutes, fire and sword utterly destroying the civilization introduced by the Romans; the professors of Christianity were driven, as mentioned above, into the fastnesses of Wales, and the buildings devoted to Religion became derelict and in ruins.

Such was the condition of affairs in ecclesiastical matters when St. Austin and his forty companions arrived from Rome and, as related by Bede, became possessed of the ruined Church in the precinct of the King's Palace at Canterbury.

The history must now be continued from Edmer's account as contained in de Reliquiis S. Audoeni, etc., preserved in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; and that by Gervase, de combustione in Decem Scriptores, which account is manifestly drawn from the former.

But first, it is necessary to draw attention to what Professor Willis, in his admirable Architectural History of Canterbury Cathedral points out, namely, that it was the gradual acquirement of relics and the accumulation of sainted Archbishops that led to the building and enlargement of this Cathedral in the course of many centuries to its present complicated plan; and that the early writers on its building and history used language which shows that they considered provision for the repose of the Saints to be one of the principal objects for which the building was erected.

To show how true these remarks of Professor Willis are, it is only needful to bring Edmer's description of the Saxon Cathedral into line with what has already been said about the Romano-British building, and to do this it is necessary to suppose that the first thing St. Austin did on obtaining possession of the old building, was to enlarge it by extending its nave towards the east for another four or five bays, and, 16