III.—The Roof-bosses in Canterbury Cathedral

C.J.P. Cave

doi:10.1017/S026134090001362X

III.—The Roof-bosses in Canterbury Cathedral

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 July 2011

C.J.P. Cave

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The heraldry of the bosses in the cloisters at Canterbury has been very fully dealt with by our Fellow Mr. Ralph Griffin in Archaeologia, lxvi, 447 ff.; under his direction photographs were taken of every severy and of a great number of the separate bosses, both the heraldic and the non-heraldic. About 120 out of some 800 were reproduced in Archaeologia and a complete set of the prints is in our library. The heraldic bosses in the Chichele porch were described by the same author in Archaeologia, lxxi, 125, where photographs are given of the twenty-nine shields ot arms that appear on the vaulting.

Type: Research Article
Information: Archaeologia , Volume 84 , 1935 , pp. 41 - 61

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S026134090001362X [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1935

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^{page 42 note 1} ‘Conventual Buildings of the Monastery of Christ Church in Canterbury,’ Archaeologia Cantiana, vii, 75.

^{page 42 note 2} Examples may be found in the entrance to the chapter-house at Bristol Cathedral, in the south quire aisle at Christ Church, Oxford, in the north nave aisle at Peterborough, and in the crypt at Gloucester.

^{page 42 note 3} Archaeologia Cantiana, vii, 51.

^{page 43 note 1} La Cathédrale de Sens, Lucien Begule, p. 6.

^{page 43 note 2} See Willis, Architectural History of Canterbury Cathedral, pp. 32 ff.

^{page 43 note 3} Archaeologia, lxxxiii, 48.

^{page 46 note 1} ‘The Roof Bosses in Chichester Cathedral,’ Sussex Archaeological Collections, lxxi, 1 et seq.

^{page 48 note 1} Woodruff and Danks, Memorials of Canterbury Cathedral, p. 156, suggest that the beast is an ass, that this was meant to typify Samson's slaying the Philistines with the jaw-bone of that animal, and that it was a veiled allusion to the battle of Poitiers, but I can see no resemblance to an ass in the animal on the boss.

^{page 49 note 1} Third Annual Report of the Friends of Canterbury Cathedral, p. 28 et seq., where these three bosses are illustrated.

^{page 50 note 1} Woodruff and Danks, Memorials of Canterbury Cathedral, p. 366.

^{page 50 note 2} Willement, loc. cit., p. 28.

^{page 50 note 3} See detailed list, pp. 53 et seq.

^{page 50 note 4} Willis, Architectural History of Canterbury Cathedral, pp. 120 et seq.

^{page 53 note 1} Archaeologia, Ixxvi, 169.

^{page 53 note 2} Ralph Griffin, F.S.A., ‘The Heraldry of the Chicheley Porch’, in Archaeologia, lxxi, 129.

^{page 53 note 3} Our Fellow Mr. Ralph Griffin has given me these particulars.

^{page 54 note 1} See H. C. Andrews, F.S.A., in Notes and Queries, clxiv, 172.

^{page 54 note 2} Ecclesiastical Heraldry, p. 461. See also Ralph Griffin, F.S.A., ‘The Heraldry of the Cloisters of the Cathedral Church of Christ at Canterbury’, Archaeologia, lxvi, 465.

^{page 54 note 3} Archaeologia, lxvi, 487.

^{page 54 note 4} Willement, loc. cit., pp. 17, 19; see also R. Scarlet's MSS. Harl. 1366, quoted by Willement, p. 156.

^{page 54 note 5} Willement gives the swords as in saltire.

^{page 55 note 1} See also Archaeologia, lxvi, 511.

^{page 55 note 2} The bosses marked i in the aisles are those over the arches between the aisles and the nave; those marked ii are over the windows.

^{page 56 note 1} See Archaeologia, lxvi, 489.

^{page 56 note 2} See Archaeologia, lxvi, 476.

^{page 56 note 3} It is curious that examples of coats of arms with augmentations given to two famous admirals, Nelson and Exmouth, and probably the two very worst heraldic devices ever designed, should both appear in the cathedral in consequence of members of each admiral's family being a canon of Canterbury.

^{page 57 note 1} See Archaeologia, lxvi, 473.

^{page 57 note 2} Ibid., 488.

^{page 59 note 1} The Complete Peerage, v, 176.

^{page 59 note 2} Woodward and Burnett, Heraldry, ii, 417.

^{page 61 note 1} Woodward and Burnett, Heraldry, ii, p. 438.

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