Second cathedral has a short-perch layout. It is Early Medieval.

            Abstract.  The foundation of the second cathedral found under the choir in 1854 was presumed to be Norman. Its dimensions are very close to a metric of 15 feet or its multiples which show it is Early Medieval (Anglo-Saxon). If Norman, the dimensions would accord with an 18 feet rule and it clearly does not. It is now imperative to find when in the long Medieval era it was built. 

    In 1854, a foundation to part of the second cathedral was found under the floor of the choir and presbytery area. A drawing was made by the stonemason John Hamlet dated September 16 1856.[1] This massive choir and apse foundation made from concrete-hard mortar with a little rubble was described and published by Robert Willis in 1861.[2] There are minor differences between the dimensions on Hamlet’s drawing and Willis’s publication (Hamlet’s measurements are slightly larger). The measurements taken by Willis, and appear to be overwritten on Hamlet’s drawing, are taken as being the actual dimensions.

Foundation of second cathedral found 1854, with dimensions.

     Fifty years ago, it was thought Anglo-Saxon (now called Early Medieval) buildings were variable in size and laid out in a scattered arrangement. Careful archaeology of several sites, including the 1970s partial excavation of the site at Catholme, 5.3 miles (8.5 km) northeast of Lichfield, provided early evidence for a change of mind. At least 18 of the post-hole buildings, dated c. 680–700, at Catholme were aligned more-or-less to a regular grid pattern with sides of 4.57 m or 15 modern feet, a unit length known as a short perch. After a comprehensive search a 15-foot (4.57 m) grid has been found in major church buildings[3] in eastern England^[4] constructed between the years 600–800. There is then a gap in evidence, partly explained by a lack of buildings surviving, followed by the short perch reappearing again between 950 and 1020 in the layout of farmsteads, manor houses and settlements. This unit of measurement finally disappears from the archaeological record. It is now understood a short perch gridding is a signature in eastern England, for Early Medieval (Anglo-Saxon) planning in the years 600 to 1020.^[5]

Catholme showing alignment to a short perch grid. Thanks to J. Blair⁴.

 

By the 12th-century, a long perch gridding, 5.48 m or 18 modern feet, was brought in from France, probably by the Normans, and many of the great buildings at the end of the 11th-century and into the 12th-century appear to be laid out with a module of 18 ft.^[6]

St Pancras, Canterbury, 7th-century showing its dimensions on a short perch grid and the remains of the early church.

 

 

Short perch dimensions are obvious and evident in the foundation of the second cathedral. Five linear short perch measurements can be discerned, namely choir-apse length, internal choir width, cross distance between drum columns, cross distance between abutments/pillars on the choir west wall, and distance between the choir west wall and beginning (chord) of the apse.[7] Very significantly, no long perch (18 ft) length can be seen in the layout of the foundation. The only long perch measurement in this part of the cathedral is the bench wall-to-bench wall width (not the same as its foundation width) of the current choir and aisles, 63 ft 8 in, which is a little more than 3.5 long perches (not perfect), dated 13th-century.

 

Short perch (denoted sp) gridding of the great apse foundation. The grid is drawn with 15 feet squares.

 

 

It is crucial an upper wall must be included in this scaling of the foundation, but nothing of a wall was mentioned in the 1856 drawing and the 1861 publication, so its width can only be calculated. Foundation plans often differed from wall plans[8], but the converse could also be true, so all possibilities for the width of the wall must be considered. It is now an exercise of what fits best with thin walls being disregarded.

 

Best fit short perch dimensions for a possible wall.

The best fit is a width of 3 ft 11 in. This is the same width as the wall of the rectangular chamber abutted to the apse (constructed later and left off the drawing above), which must be highly significant. If a 3 feet 11 in. wide wall was built on the 5 ft wide semicircular section of the apse in the middle of the foundation wall, then the length from the choir west wall to the apse wall was 75 ft or 5 short perches. If this width of wall was built on the lateral walls of the apse, but was off centre, then the apse width was 60 ft 1 in. or 4 short perches. The gap on the outside of 1 ft 9 in. could have been for a step-plinth or more likely for thickened wall type buttresses including pilaster buttresses. It is plausible the original wall was 3 ft 9 in. wide when laid out, or one quarter of a short perch, and then with a plaster layer added with a mortar, it gave a width of 3 ft 11 in. If so, with the apse foundation wall being 5 ft wide it means the foundation was one third of a short perch and the wall was one quarter of a short perch.[9] No arrangement of walling, other than a 3 feet 11ins. dimension, fits the foundation. The core finding is the choir-apse building is calculated to have had walls 5 short perches long and 4 short perches wide.

Five possible short perch dimensions have been identified in the foundation and three more with a possible upper wall calculated to be 3 ft 11 in. (1.2 m) wide. The precepts of Blair for short perch gridded church and claustral buildings being earlier than 1020, strongly infers the foundation must be pre-1020 and pre-Conquest and therefore Early Medieval and not Norman.

 

Resemblance to Brixworth Church.

Rodwell, who investigated again the foundation in the choir aisles in 1992 and 1994, was certain churches, both distantly separated and locally grouped, could have similarities of proportion, or absolute measurement, as to leave little doubt master-plans existed in pre-Conquest England.^[10] It therefore should not be surprising to find churches near to Lichfield with similarities of proportion.

Repton church on a short perch grid. Thanks to J. Blair^4.

 

Brixworth Church, Northamptonshire, closely fits the short perch module^[11] and its dimensions are very similar to the second cathedral.

Brixworth Church and short perch grid. Thanks to J. Blair⁴.

    The width of the choir-apse (around 63 ft, but not certain) is the same as the width of Brixworth church (63‑4 ft). The cross distances between the columns of the inner apse at Lichfield and the width of the nave at Brixworth are both c. 9.1 m (30 ft), two short perches wide. The distance between the inside edge of the piers at Brixworth is the same as the estimated distance of the assumed piers inside the current nave columns at Lichfield.^[12] The bay before the sanctuary (choir or presbytery) at Brixworth was c. 30 ft square and the first two bays in the inner apse at Lichfield also measured 30 ft square and is presumed to be the choir or presbytery area. It is thought at Brixworth there was a transverse wall with triple openings (a larger central choir-arch and two lateral door-size openings) separating the nave from the choir bay. This arrangement might have occurred at Lichfield.^[13] If the two pier bases were drum columns it accounts for the column fragments found in 1994. The length of the choir, apse, and ambulatory at Brixworth is approximately 21 m (69 ft). This is tentative because the thickness and position of the original outer ambulatory wall is unknown. It is not very different from the 22.8 m (75 ft) length for the choir-apse. Distance between the nave and choir columns at Lichfield is almost 75 ft or 5 short perches. Brixworth has a narrow ambulatory, described as a ring crypt, external to the apse and 7 ft 6 in. (half short perch) wide in the current passage. The narrow ambulatory in the Lichfield apse was 6 or 7 ft wide. Both passages (now external at Brixworth) had barrel vaulted roofs (suggested at Lichfield). The original apse roof at Brixworth is unknown. The early semicircular apse at Brixworth lacked buttresses.^[14] There is no evidence of buttresses or pilaster bases on the external face of the apse at Lichfield. Both foundations at Lichfield and Brixworth are around 1.5 m wide.^[15] The wall thickness at Brixworth is close to the estimated thickness of a wall at Lichfield. Plaster was evident at Brixworth and Willis thought it could have been added externally to the apse at Lichfield.^[16] Both churches contain sandstones (Brixworth has an assortment of stone).

 

Comparison of the apse and choir at Brixworth Northamptonshire, with the choir-apse foundation at Lichfield. All units are in feet.

 

In summary, many elements of the second cathedral have proportions and features like those found at Brixworth.  If the correlation is more than coincidence, it associates the second cathedral with a group of Mercian basilica-shaped churches with similar proportions, though not necessarily the same date of build. Basilica-like churches include Brixworth, Cirencester, Deerhurst and Wing.^[17] All had walls over 3 ft thick and three with an apse wall close to 4 ft thick. All could have been late-8th or 9th-century buildings,^[18] and belonged to the Mercian kingdom.

The upshot of this comparison is a date for building Brixworth Church was fixed precisely after an extensive investigation, 1977–2010, with carbon dating of charcoal found in the mortar. This church was built in the late-8th or early-9th-century.^[19] This was the time of King Offa, 757 x 796, or the very beginning of the reign of Coenwulf, 796 x 821. Consequently, this raises the hypothesis, was the second cathedral built in a Carolingian basilical style; an archbasilica for Offa’s archbishop and an emulation of Charlemagne’s basilica-style church of Saint-Denis, Paris, dedicated in 775?^[20] The hypothesis Offa built a new church at Lichfield is not new.^[21] It is the author’s view that if the second cathedral was Early Medieval, therefore the most obvious date would be around 770. It would establish Offa’s ecclesiastical centre and heart of his kingdom was at Lichfield and another centre (his administrative?) was at Brixworth.

 

Lichfield Cathedral history is very insecure regarding dates. The lack of documentary evidence due to the ransacking of the cathedral library with its fabric accounts in the Civil War, 1643, and a Victorian obsession with monumental Norman cathedrals means the current narrative of the second cathedral being Norman or Anglo-Norman is biased. The short perch dimensions of the foundation and the best-fit upper wall ought to be seriously accepted as strong pointers to an Early Medieval origin. Its layout and size correspondence with Brixworth Church ought to add to this conclusion. A simple carbon dating of the mortar of the foundation would remove all doubt.

---

[1] John Hamlet’s ‘General plan shewing the position of old foundation as discovered during progress of excavations for hot air flues’ is held in the Staffordshire Record Office LD 289/16. The drawing has a few revisions with pen overlaying pencil. Willis’s notes are kept in Cambridge, Cambridge University Library, MS 5042, with the title ‘Architectural drawings and notes of Lichfield Cathedral 1861 64’. Willis saw only the south east part of the apse. The greatest amount of the foundation wall was observed by Rawson and Hamlet in 1856 and 1860. Map reference for the apse is SK1159 0978 and the chamber is SK1157 0977.

[2] R. Willis, ‘On foundations of early buildings recently discovered in Lichfield,’ The Archaeological Journal, (1861), 18, 1–24.

[3] It has also been found in smaller churches, but often for one dimension, length or width, only.

[4] Kent, Northumbria, Mercia and East Anglia. Perhaps, rarely in Wessex.

[5] J. Blair, ‘Grid planning in Anglo-Saxon settlements: the short perch and the four perch module’, in H. Hamerow ed., Anglo-Saxon studies in Archaeology and History, 18 (Oxford 2013), 54 and J. Blair, Building Anglo-Saxon England (Princeton and Oxford 2018), 71, 149.

[6] H. Braun, An introduction to English Medieval architecture 2nd ed. (London 1968), 71.

[7] The measurement from the outside edge of the round apse foundation at mid-line to the inside edge of the choir west wall is 75 ft 1.5 in. equal to 5 short perches. The internal apse width was 52 ft 3 in., 3 inches short of 3.5 perches. The choir or presbytery fits a 12 short perch grid and the apse fits an 8 short perch grid. The distance between the two (presumed) rows of drum columns forming an inner apse has to be 30 ft or 2 short perches. This same 2 perch distance is evident between the abutments on the west wall of the choir-apse shown on Hamlet’s drawing, perhaps supporting a chancel triple-opening with the middle arch 2 short perches wide and lateral openings each close to half a perch in width. The distance between the choir west wall and the west edge of the internal pillar shown on Hamlet’s drawing (third choir pillar, bay 3 to 4) is 45 ft or 3 short perches. This distance delineates where the choir or presbytery ends and the apse-sanctuary begins. It is the point where the straight lateral sides of the choir change to the semicircular section of the apse.

[8] Pre-Conquest walls are seldom as much as 3 ft in thickness and are more often nearer 2 ft 6 in.; whereas Norman walls are seldom less than 3 ft thick. However, there are exceptional Anglo-Saxon walls. The earlier semicircular apse at Deerhurst, Gloucestershire, was 3 ft 9in. wide. South Elmham had nave walls uniformly 3 ft 10 in. thick. Brixworth, Northamptonshire, had walls between 3 ft 4 in. and 3 feet 10 ins. thick. Six miles (9.6 km) away at Northampton, a Saxon palace or a monastic complex, built c. 825–850, had walls 3 ft 11in. thick. Walls barely 4 ft thick were found at Wenlock Priory and considered to be late Anglo-Saxon.

[9] This correlation applies to the apse foundation, but not the foundation under the choir which varies in width. The south foundation is wider than the north foundation and is probably because the ground slopes southwards.

[10] W. Rodwell, ‘Anglo-Saxon church building: aspects of design and construction’, in L. A. S. Butler and R. K. Morris eds., The Anglo-Saxon Church. Research Report 60, The Council for British Archaeology (1986), 157.

[11] See note 4, J. Blair, (2013), 26.

[12] The distance between the inner faces of the Romanesque column foundations under the floor of the nave were slightly narrower than the present columns.  

[13] There are two pier bases on the choir west wall drawn on Hamlet’s 1856 drawing

[14] C. F. Watkins, The basilica or palatial hall of Justice and sacred temple; its nature, origin and purport; and a description of the basilican church of Brixworth (London 1867), 51.

[15] D. Parsons and D. S. Sutherland, The Anglo-Saxon Church of All Saints, Brixworth; Northamptonshire: Survey, excavation and analysis, 1972—2010 (Oxford 2013).

[16] H. M. Taylor, Anglo-Saxon architecture: vol III (Cambridge 1978) 1063. Taylor had little doubt that most Anglo-Saxon churches were plastered inside and outside

[17] E. Fernie, The architecture of the Anglo-Saxons (New York 1983), 64–5.

[18] E. Gilbert, ‘Brixworth and the English Basilica’ in Art Bulletin, (1965) vol 47, 1, 14. Gilbert concluded English basilicas were erected between 730 and 867.

[19] See note 7, Parsons and Sutherland 2013

[20] Gilbert 1965, 1, suggested Brixworth church was contemporary with Fulrad’s Saint-Denis church.

[21] S. Shaw, The history and antiquities of Staffordshire: vol I (London 1798), 234; J. Jackson, History of the City and Cathedral of Lichfield (London 1805), 73–74 and T. Harwood, The history and antiquities of the church and city of Lichfield (London 1806), 7.