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New Discoveries from St Peter's Church, Dunstable?

While investigating material associated with the church of St Peter in Dunstable, Bedfordshire (originally an Augustinian Priory Church), I found that there were a number of plaster casts of sculpture from the church held by the Victoria and Albert museum. As much of the carving at Dunstable is in poor condition, I hoped that the plaster casts would add a little more visual evidence to support further analysis of the now very weathered and damaged surviving carvings.

In the V&A, casts of a number of capitals and voussoirs from the west doorway were found, as expected. Although the carvings were already a little weathered when the casts were made and the casts themselves are not perfect, they do indeed add something more to the very limited physical evidence now at Dunstable. Many details of the originals, now lost, have been preserved in the casts.

But, far more exciting, alongside the expected casts were five additional casts of sculpture also catalogued as being from Dunstable, but of which there is now no evidence at the church. The casts are of four capitals and one voussoir fragment. Similarities in style and execution of three of the capital casts to the surviving capitals on both the north and west doorways at Dunstable were immediately apparent. The dimensions of these three casts also corresponded very closely to the original capitals still in situ on the north doorway.

The north doorway, which had been blocked some time after the Dissolution, was uncovered in the 1870s as part of a major restoration campaign (begun in 1851). An article in the Gentleman’s Magazine recording the first meeting of the Bedfordshire Archaeological Society notes that the intention of the restorers (under the direction of the architect George Somers Clark) at Dunstable was to ‘restore and not to destroy anything’(1.), but there was, as might be expected, a fair amount of replacement of older material and invention of new material in Romanesque style.

The restoration process was always rather halting and there were frequent campaigns to raise money from the occasionally reluctant parishioners. The church was in fact closed for eleven years and it wasn’t until 1876 that work was begun on the north aisle, which had been in danger of collapse for some time. It was in this year that the north doorway was rediscovered. The Leighton Buzzard Observer of 1878 notes that ‘an ancient doorway, with elaborately carved capitals, was discovered, to the great surprise of the present generation’ and reports later that the capitals were ‘most carefully restored’ (2.).

The restorers completely rebuilt the north doorway, and all features apart from four capitals (first order left and right capitals and second and third order right capitals) date from the restoration. The present doorway has three orders. The third order right capital has its east face obscured by an insert and the second and third order left capitals are missing altogether and have been replaced by plain, square blocks. In the case of the third order right capital, the intention was probably to restore the carving in situ. The north doorway capitals are secular in theme and although they have been tidied up a little by the restorers they have not lost much of their liveliness or character.

The first order capitals are half-round and presumably in their original position. The north doorway is sealed shut so it is not possible to view the inner face of the first order capitals. The left capital is carved with several dogs pursuing a bounding hare. The right capital has a leaping deer on the east face and a dragon on the north face.

The second order right capital has a splendid hunting scene and the third order right capital has a Byzantine Blossom or Octopus Leaf within a scroll. The sculptor who worked on these capitals also worked on the capitals of the west front, and the recently discovered casts at the Victoria and Albert Museum are clearly the work of the same hand, and share the secular themes of two of the north doorway capitals.

The first of these cast capitals shows two fighting men, one bearded and one clean-shaven. The figures confront across the angle and the bearded man strikes at the clean-shaven youth who defends himself with a round shield, while raising his own sword. Each wears a short tunic, loosely belted at the hips and with fitted long sleeves. The features of the bearded figure are indistinct, but those of the more youthful-looking figure are very clear.

The second cast capital shows a man fighting a dragon. The figure is nude. He contorts his body backward toward the dragon, with sword raised, gripping the muzzle of the beast which gazes across its back at him. The head of the nude figure is of the same large proportions as the figures on the capital with fighting men, but his features and the details of his body are indistinct. The damage to the figure is clearly to the original rather than the plaster copy.

The third cast capital is a type of tree with curling, reeded stems embellished with beading which terminate in three-lobed leaves. A large berry or bunch of grapes grows from the top of the tree at the angle. This capital is the only one which was obviously taken in situ as part of the shaft supporting the capital was included in the cast.

All three casts have an average height of 0.28 m including the necking and the depth of each side averages 0.21 m. There are only the slightest variations in dimensions between the casts. These dimensions correspond exactly with those of the carvings still in situ on the north doorway.

There is also a fourth cast capital of slightly different dimensions and carved on three faces with birds, but this is not included here as it does not relate so closely to the other casts or carvings still in situ. The remaining cast is an arch moulding, carved with interlocking ovals. Each oval is composed of a row of nailhead between two rolls. It is possible that this fragment may have come from the arch of the original north doorway.

The casts of the capitals carved with figures have, as already mentioned, a marked resemblance to the capitals still in situ on the north and west doorways. The figures all share the same large, uptilted, rounded faces with carefully delineated undrilled eyes; flowing tunics, with fine folds on the arms; large hands and feet and short bodies. The carvings are also remarkable for their energy and their command of the space which contains them.

As mentioned above, the restored north doorway has three orders, and two capitals are missing. There are three plaster casts which correspond in dimensions to those in situ. Whether these casts are of capitals which were all from an original north doorway with more than three orders or whether they came from somewhere else cannot be certain. Casts were not made of all capitals, or possibly some casts have been lost. In view of the fact that many of Dunstable Priory’s precious artefacts have been mistreated or lost in the past, the disappearance of a number of original carvings is hardly a surprise. The plaster casts’ accession numbers all include the date 1916 but this only indicates their arrival in the museum and not their date of creation (and if the casts were taken from the original north doorway it is likely that they were made just after the doorway was uncovered in 1876) and so far the V&A records have not yielded any further information about the casts.

Details of costume, feature and composition preserved on the casts are useful in building a more detailed picture of the appearance of the doorway and the themes of the carvings may also shed more light on the influences on and development of late Romanesque sculpture. It had previously been thought that the carvings at Dunstable date from the 1190s but now a date of c.1160-70 is usually considered to be more accurate.