Cardiff : St Mary’s Church

Even in the short time I have been in Wales – not yet five years, I have seen massive change in Cardiff and not, in my opinion, for the better. Rather than valuing the city’s history with projects that conserve and restore life to the heritage buildings, the city council seems intent on letting developers swamp Cardiff’s lovely old buildings with tall and ugly tower blocks. And don’t even get me started on the (surely now) outdated trend of façadism – there are at least two such construction projects underway in the central city as I write this – such lazy architectural design!

The reason for today’s rant is that I almost missed seeing what remains of St Mary’s Church because of yet another inner city construction project. The church itself is long gone – and I do mean long – due to the severe damage it suffered in the Great Flood of 1607, the church was abandoned in 1701. But the ghost of the church remains as an outline of pale stones on the side of the building that now stands where it once stood.

John Speed's 1610 map of Cardiff, Wikimedia Commons;
St Mary's is at bottom right

St Mary’s began life as a Benedictine priory way back in 1107, but its riverside location (prior to the River Taff being diverted in 1850) meant it was always susceptible to flooding and, apparently, bodies were frequently washed out of its graveyard.

In 1878, the site of St Mary’s was used for the construction of a theatre, the NewTheatre Royal, but that once grand building has seen many subsequent reincarnations, even for a time being a cinema showing pornographic films – I can’t imagine what the Benedictines would have thought of that. The building is currently a Wetherspoon’s pub, the Prince of Wales.    

I don’t know how visible the outline of St Mary’s will be once the current construction project, part of the Central Square development, is finished but, if the wide expanses of bland concrete underfoot and the wind-tunnel-creating skyscrapers overhead are anything to go by, I doubt the developers would have even considered a nod to Cardiff’s historic past, so I’m glad I managed to pay homage to the old St Mary’s Church before it disappears.

England: Off to Battle

We’d had heavy rain in the night and more was threatening but we didn’t let that put us off – we headed off to Battle, armed with coats and brollies, prepared to battle the elements if necessary.

Detail from JMW Turner's c.1794 painting Battle Abbey, from English Heritage booklet

Battle Abbey is supposedly built on the site where the Battle of Hastings was fought on 14 October 1066. William, Duke of Normandy, and Harold, the Saxon Earl of Essex and current King of England, both claimed the English throne, so William invaded with his army. Less than 24 hours later, Harold was dead, William had earned the nickname the Conqueror, and the future of England was forever changed.

Though no material remains of the battle (arrowheads, swords, armour) have ever been found on the site, construction of the Abbey began in the same year, to commemorate the battle and on the site nominated by newly crowned King William. You would assume then that he and the locals remembered quite well where they’d so recently fought so the lack of military archaeological finds is something of a mystery.

Visitors enter this historic place, now administered by English Heritage, through the huge and mighty impressive gatehouse, built in 1338 to replace an earlier construction. The building has some interesting characters lurking in corners (see photo below) and now houses a discovery centre and museum, with archaeological remains and background information about the site.

We walked the path that circuits the battlefield. Though it's now just fields (plus a 19th-century pond and a series of medieval fish ponds), the well-placed signboards provide explanations of what happened where on that fateful day and help you build up a mental picture of the events, with the assistance of images from the Bayeux Tapestry.

The end of the battlefield walk brought us to the ruins of the Abbey buildings. The Abbey housed a large community of Benedictine monks and was one of the wealthiest religious houses in England until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1538. Henry VIII gifted the property to Sir Anthony Browne, his master of horse and good friend. Browne sold the country estate to the Webster family in 1721, and ownership remained in their family for the following 250 years, except for the period from 1857 to 1901, when the Duke and Duchess of Cleveland were the owners. The state acquired the property from the Websters in 1976.

Reconstruction of Battle Abbey in its heyday, from English Heritage booklet

When Browne took ownership in 1538, the abbey church and parts of the cloister were demolished, leaving us with mere footprints in the well-trodden earth. The west range of the Abbey cloister had already been adapted from its original purpose to become the Great Hall, the residence for the abbot, a fact which ensured its survival after the Dissolution – this substantial building became the later owners’ country house. It is now used as a school – bad news for the visitor as you can’t see inside the buildings but great to see that the building is being well maintained and used.

Along the side of the former Great Hall you can see where the cloisters once were and nearby is the site of the abbey church, where the High Altar was supposedly built over the exact site where Harold were killed – a plaque marks the spot. All that remains of the church is the late-13th-century crypt.

Most interesting to explore are the south and east areas of the abbey: to the south are the undercrofts of the range where guests were once housed, and to the east is the dormitory range where the monks used to sleep and spend their down time. There you can find the novices’ chamber, the dormitories and the monks’ common room. The vaulting in the ground-floor rooms is particularly remarkable.

In this range, you can also see the remains of the latrines, and I learnt a new word for latrine from a signboard near the ablution block: reredorter. This block was built in the mid 13th century and it was not just a hole in the ground. Monks could access the loos directly from their dormitory, there was a paved main drain which discharged down the valley – wouldn’t want to live down there! – and the large arches in the bottom part of the building allowed easy access for cleaning. A sophisticated set up!

From the property’s more recent use as a great house and estate, there are also a small icehouse, a dairy and a walled garden to be explored. And there is a good café on site - we lunched there before heading out for a wander around the town of Battle, which, of course, owes its existence to the abbey. Traders, craftsmen and merchants were needed to supply the needs of the monks and maintain the buildings, and St Mary’s Church was established by Abbot Ralph around 1115 to serve the local community. 

Battle’s main street is full of lovely, very old historic buildings, and we enjoyed mooching round the Almonry Museum, with its rather eclectic mix of local bits and bobs, and the pretty adjoining garden around a half-timbered building which had superb carved heads adorning its walls.

Whether or not it was the weather, Battle Abbey certainly had a sense of the dramatic and atmospheric about it, and Battle township was a lovely place for a wander. I’ll definitely be back.

England: Pevensey, East Sussex

My last stop in the UK (except for a couple of days in London before I left) was visiting my friend Jill in East Sussex, another part of the country I hadn’t been to before, so we spent our days out exploring the beautiful countryside in that neck of the woods.

Pevensey is a small settlement about one mile inland from Pevensey Bay – it was once on the edge of a tidal lagoon and marshes but the shoreline has moved rather a lot over the centuries. The bay was the first landing point for William the Conqueror when he invaded England in 1066 but the Romans had invaded this place long before Willie pulled his boat ashore.

The Roman fort – and the Norman castle built inside its walls – was the main reason we visited Pevensey. Dating from around 290AD and in constant use until the Romans withdrew from Britain around 410AD, the Roman fort of Anderita was one of a chain of ten built along the southern British coastline to protect against Saxon pirate raids.

Built to the shape of the peninsula jutting into the lagoon, the walls are not as rectangular as most Roman forts, but they are still in remarkably good condition. The main entrance, through a western gateway flanked by tall towers, is particularly imposing.

The Roman walls

Aerial view, taken from one of the signboards

Inside these protective walls, the Normans built their own defences – a large castle which has a long and colourful history of warfare and defence. Four times it was besieged and survived. In 1088 and 1147, starvation rather than damage to the castle forced the defenders to surrender, in 1264-5 supporters of Henry III held out against the forces of Simon de Montfort, and in 1399 those loyal to Henry Bolingbroke held out against the supporters of Richard II.

From the top of the castle walls looking back to the Roman fort walls

The Norman Castle

Although largely obsolete by the 16th century, the Elizabethans installed light artillery defences at the castle during the threat from the Spanish Armada in 1588. And, as recently as 1940, pill boxes were concealed in the walls to defend the south coast against potential invasion by German troops, and both British and Canadian troops were stationed in the castle.

On the right is the postern gate, the rear entrance to the castle leading down to the harbour

The castle is well sign-boarded and has a small exhibition room, with clear well-illustrated explanations of the castle’s construction and history. Given the castle’s violent past, it’s no surprise to see a large cannon in the inner bailey – well, a late-16th-century demi-culverin gun, to be more precise  – and a large stack of trebuchets, the big round stones used in slingshot machines. The stone foundations of the wooden chapel are also easy to see, and the font still sits in place in what would have been the nave.

After exploring the castle, up the towers and down the dungeon, we circled the outside of the Roman fort and wandered around the streets on either side. To the east is the tiny village of Pevensey, and to the right is Westham (the HAMlet WEST of the castle, hence the name). Each has its own church and historic buildings. The Anglican Church of St Nicholas in Pevensey dates from the early 13th century and is a splendid example of early English Gothic architecture, with fine medieval stained glass windows above the High Altar. I was particularly taken with the tall Victorian spiral staircase in the bell tower. In Westham, St Mary’s Church may well be the first Norman church in England, with the earliest parts of its construction dating from the late 11th century.

Church of St Nicholas

St Mary's Church

As well as the church, Pevensey also boasts The Courthouse, the smallest town hall in England, many ancient domestic buildings and The Old Mint House. As the name implies, coins were once minted in this 650-year-old 28-room building but it has a long and colourful history which also includes the visits of kings and tales of hauntings. The Smugglers Inn, built in 1527, is also supposed to be visited by a young lady ghost.

The Old Mint House

Westham also has its share of historic buildings, with both the timber-framed Oak House and the Old Dial House dating from 1500 and both are Grade II listed. Several properties in both of these towns were for sale, so if you fancy a small slice of historic England for yourself – and you have plenty of money – now’s your chance.

Left, the Oak House and, right, Smugglers Inn