The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
Lancashire (now)
Parish church
On approaching Ormskirk it would appear the town centre has two churches. This is not the case, instead the medieval parish church of the town has the unique attribute of having a separate tower and spire. The spire is based upon a smaller tower built into the S aisle, probably 14thc. The enormously wide W tower was built after 1542. The church was heavily classified in the 18thc and the current arcades of the interior are 19thc, replacing classical columns. The arcade of the chancel is partly 13thc, and the N wall of the chancel contains a Romanesque window.
Parish church
Overton sits rather isolated at the end of the peninsula of Morecombe. The church is confusing, for a relatively enormous N 'transept' of 1830 (added to provide extra seating), disorientates the perception of the building. An apse (discovered in 1902 during restoration by Austin and Paley) and the original Norman fenstration were destroyed in 1771. The only Romanesque, and indeed medieval, fabric remaining is the impressive S doorway.
Parish church, formerly chapel
Caton church, in the settlement of Brookhouse, is typical for North Lancashire in that the only medieval part of its structure is the Perpendicular west tower; the rest is by E. G. Paley, 1865-7. Formerly in the porch door, the remants of a Romanesque portal have been built into the exterior west wall of the north aisle.
Castle
The keep of Lancaster Castle is a four-storey tower, which is 20 m high (albeit the upper storey may have been heightened or added at a later date) and has shallow pilaster-like buttresses at the corners and at the centre of each side. The outer walls are approximately 3 m thick. There is a spine wall running E-W which divides the keep internally.
The original main entrance of the keep was via a long set of stone stairs to the 1st floor on the S side, still extant until the 18thc. This elevation is now hidden by the Debtors' Wing of 1796. The W side of the keep is also hidden by the building of the new Shire Hall and Crown Court, begun after 1796. The 1796 prison for male felons is built on the N side of the keep. These additions were all designed by Thomas Harrison, albeit the Shire Hall and Crown Court were finished by Joseph Gandy.
Adrian's (also referred to as Emperor Hadrian's) tower, in the S-W corner of the Castle, has 13th-c style masonry internally, but was entirely refaced externally at the end of the 18thc.
The imposing gatehouse was built by Henry IV after 1399. It has been suggested that the lower levels of the gatehouse contain earlier work from the early 13thc. However, nothing relevant in terms of Romanesque sculpture was observed. The same is true of the Well Tower to the E of the gatehouse, which was largely built in the 15thc. Some structural timbers were dated by Oxford Archaeology North using dendrochronology to a primary phase after 1265, and later refurbishment or building to the late 14thc or early 15thc. Any evidence of earlier building from the 13thc in the lower levels did not include any Romanesque sculpture.
Castle
The remains of Clitheroe Castle consist today of the Norman keep standing on rocky outcrop dominating the town. The keep is one of the smallest in the country, measuring no more than 10.8m on each side externally and 5.2m internally. It is square with small, flat, pilaster-like corner turrets, one of which contains a spiral staircase. It consists of a single room on three floors, with an extra intra-mural chamber on the 1st floor. The original roof or floor timbers is lost. The main entrance was on the NW elevation at 1st floor level. Entry must have been by an external, wooden staircase. The substantial stepped buttresses are part of the 1848 restoration work.
On the elevations, all apertures are either simple slits - some enlarged at a later date - or round-headed doors which appear to have been rebuilt and renewed or what appear to be breaches in the wall (particularly at ground floor level). It may be that the door apertures on 1st floor level are in their original position, however the jambs and arches appeared to contain rebuilt or newer fabric.
There was no sign of any moulding or decorative work on the extant jambs, lintels or sills.
The museum, occupying the 16thc Steward's House, was visited and checked for any ex situ fragments of stone but none were seen.
Parish church, formerly chapel
Woodplumpton, from approach, seems like an entirely post-medieval church. The S aisle was apparently built in 1748 in a rather English Baroque manner. The crennelation however suggests it was a refacing of a Late Perpendicular wall. Inside its medieval origins are clearer. There are two arcades, no chancel arch, similar to nearby St Michael on Wyre. The capitals on the S are extremely crude and may be post-Reformation. The end wall of the N aisle is in a different stone and suggests this was the first medieval expansion. There is an early 20thc vestry built on the E end of the N side of the N aisle. Set into what was originally the N aisle outer wall, are some Romanesque fragments found c. 1900.
Parish church, formerly chapel
The medieval church was demolished except for the tower in 1823. There are no surviving images of the church of Broughton, but it seems to have been plain, late Gothic like the surviving tower, with through arcades and no chancel arch, typical of the area. Some fragments of this church are in the chancel S wall. The body of the church was replaced by a commissioners-type single-roofed, ashlar-faced box with lancets. A chancel was added 1905-6 by Austin and Paley.
Cistercian House, former
Sawley Abbey is on the Ribble four miles NE of Clitheroe and about 13 miles WSW Skipton. Pendle Hill lowers to the S; the Forest of Bowland rises to the N. The site is low, with the dale nipped by the hills; the climate is mild but wet, more suited to beef and dairy than a monastic diet of cereals and vegetables. It was a small Cistercian abbey of the standard layout, and is now in the care of English Heritage (Coppack, Hayfield and Williams 2002). The precinct can still be traced on the ground, and encompasses the small village of Sawley as well as the ruins. The ruins of the principal buildings of the abbey are enclosed by a high stone wall but are kept open daily. Plan in Coppack, Hayfield and Williams 2002, fig. 4, p. 30 and Fergusson 1984, fig. 23.
The ruins have had almost all useful or carved stone removed. There are three mentions of sculptured stone derived from the abbey and at other sites. Firstly, Morris (1911, 442) says that ‘in the lane outside the grounds are two arches, apparently re-erected; in the masonry round about them are built many carved stones, e.g. A Virgin and Child, the Percy locket and crescent…’; two arches with reset pieces are seen arching over a road in photos in the Bingley Collection in Leeds University History department; a similar arch, with reset carvings on both faces, is now set as a gateway to a field on the E side of the village street just north of the abbey enclosure: there are no Romanesque pieces in this arch (Leach and Pevsner 2009, 684). Secondly, pieces of carved stone are said to be reset in houses in the village, but none were spotted; lastly, some ‘architectural pieces’ are reported in the wall of a barn at Middop Hall, 2½ miles S of Gisburn (Pevsner 1967, 367, with reference to Ministry of Housing and Local Government as source); no enquiries were made for these pieces.
Since coursed stonework has mostly been robbed, Romanesque sculptural remains in situ are chiefly at the bases of archways; there are two loose capitals of the period.
Parish church, formerly hospital chapel
Stydd is a small collection of buildings - the church, cottages, a farm and an 18thc Roman Catholic church - a very short walk from Ribchester. The church is a single-celled building, with an Early English S doorway, and an E window with intersecting tracery. The N wall has two small lancets, while the S wall has a very tall narrow one. The W wall has a Y-tracery window, and a blocked opening high up. The monastic buildings seem to have been to the N of the church, but excavations have not proved conclusive. There are now some sheds erected over the area.