The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
"Conisbrough"
Castle
Conisbrough Castle stands above the River Don on a natural limestone and clay hill. The remains consist of an outer bailey bounded by earthworks, an inner bailey of c.1200, and a stone keep, which is the earliest and most significant building remaining on the site. Extensive damage to the gates, bridge, and walls of the castle was recorded in 1537-8; in addition one floor of the keep had by that time probably fallen in. (Renn 1973,155-7; Toy 1966, 105-7.) Conisbrough and its chapel was used by Sir Walter Scott as the setting for his novel Ivanhoe. The keep, built of fine limestone ashlar c.1180-1202 (see below, History, chapel, for the dates) is cylindrical with six trapezoidal projecting buttresses, the whole keep on a splayed base. The sides of the buttresses have alternate courses of plinth and chamfered stone. The diameter of the base is 19 m; the thickness of the walls above the splayed base 4.6 m and the highest point of the surviving keep is 28 m above ground. There is a single main room at all four levels: a vaulted storage chamber and well in the basement, a work and storage area at the entrance (first) level, the hall on the second floor, the chamber on the third floor with a chapel and sacristy lying off it, and the roof level with a wall walk. Each of the second and third floors has a window, fireplace, stone lavabo basin and latrine. The internal floors and roof were rebuilt in the mid 1990s, until then the sculpture on the fireplaces was open to the rain. The Lord’s apartment has a private chapel. This opens off the main chamber, and is contrived in the thickness of the wall and the SE buttress. The chapel is an approximate elongated hexagon, and is vaulted in two bays. A small L-shaped vestry opens off it on the N wall in the first bay. The stonework in the chapel appears to be damp in the vaulting. There is sculpture on the fireplaces on the second and third floors, and in the chapel on the third floor. The N and S walls of the chapel have circular windows in the buttress, these are quatrefoil on the outside.
Parish church
Large church of nave with N and S aisles, chancel, and W tower engaged with the aisles. From the exterior there is little trace of the antiquity of this church, with its Perpendicular tower and clerestory, battlemented nave and south aisle. The W tower may be Romanesque from interior features, and heightened in the 15thc. (Ryder 1982). The restored porch and south doorway, and two windows on the north side, show signs of earlier work. The church was heavily restored in 1866, with minor changes in 1882/3. The faculty for 1866 has only one plan, that for the ‘Proposed Restoration’. Instructions for the work include ‘if funds will allow… take down the wall of the north aisle… and rebuild… making the aisle similar to the south aisle… take down… take away…’ etc. ‘A great portion of [the church] was almost level with the ground’ says James Raine of his visit during this restoration. A restoration in 1913-4 included the restoration of the outer archway on the porch (Borthwick Fac. 1913/49). Romanesque sculptural remains of the chief interest are the chancel arch; a decayed relief reset in the porch; the nave arcades, and the tomb or memorial near the pulpit; there are many minor items as well.
Barn
The chancel of a late 12thc manorial chapel survives in a much altered with further buildings attached to its E and W ends. The buildings are on private property and used largely for farm purposes except for the easternmost section of the chapel, its chancel, where loose sculpture is kept. No medieval masonry is standing beyond the W wall of the chancel (Tomson 1996, 30). The chancel is built largely out of Magnesian limestone and a light-yellow sandstone. The chapel is to the S of a modern house which is on the site of the medieval manor house; both lay within a moated site. An archaeological survey of the chapel was done in 1994; restoration followed and was completed in 1997. For full details, see Tomson 1996. A watercolour of the chapel by Rowland Hibbard may have been prepared for the Rev. Joseph Hunter, c. 1828 (Tomson 1996, 6-7).
The E wall of the chancel, which is 3.85m wide internally, remains. The N wall, facing the modern house and containing a doorway with a lintel, survives, as does a part of the S wall having a window with one-piece head; on the W side the position of the chancel arch is now walled over. The nave area is open on the S side and extends S of the medieval line. It is used for farm storage.
Inset in the chancel wall are a piscina with a drain, and an aumbry. There are remains of 4 or 5 round-headed, splayed windows. The octagonal column in the S wall of the chancel is at the limit of the twelfth-century work, and is likely to have been moved there from the chancel arch; the N column of the arch is probably still in situ against the N wall. The sum of work seen is Transitional, with rather more Gothic than Romanesque features.
As well as standing remains of the building, there is a collection of loose stone kept in the chancel, while a wall butting onto the NE corner of the chancel and running N towards the house contains various reset fragments of sculpture in both faces. There is also a round-headed doorway at Owston Hall, which probably once belonged to the chapel.
Parish church
The church is built of boulders with stone dressings; these are mixed fabric throughout. It has, at least in part, a round, walled site. There is a chancel, an aisled and clerestoried nave, S porch and W tower. In origin it is a 12thc. building (see SE corner of nave). There is an unusual free-standing pillar piscina in the chancel. The N arcade appears not to have any Romanesque work. It has medieval decoration identified by David Park, 'comprising chevrons on the arches and a just-discernible head on the E respond' (Pevsner and Neave, p. 395).
Redundant parish church
Kirk Sandall is about 3 miles NE of Doncaster; the site is not to be confused with Sandal Magna, near Wakefield. The compact medieval church, of Magnesian limestone and cobbles, lies alongside a canal and the river Don. There are fields nearby but the approach is through an industrial estate and the site of the former Pilkington glassworks, which itself had replaced the old village (Holland 1999, 94-5).
The church has a small chancel with a larger 16thc N chapel and a two-bay nave with late 12thc to early 13thc arcades; the S porch is Victorian, from a restoration in the 1860s. The satisfying pyramidal roof on the tower over the W bay of the S aisle replaced the upper stage of a pinnacled tower of c. 1828 in 1935-1937; at the same time a vestry was added to the N aisle (Pevsner 1967, 292-3).
There is a mixed fabric of cobbles, limestone rubble and ashlar even in the later 12thc work. The grave-slab against the W wall in the N aisle is said to have the remains of a floriated cross but that is too damp and efflorescing to discern (Barnes 2001, 3). Remains relevant to this Corpus are the S doorway, a slit window at each end of the S aisle, the two arcades, a piscina and a plain cylindrical font.
Parish church
Thorne is two miles due E of Fishlake and ten miles NE of Doncaster. The church is in a large churchyard, in an urban setting on three sides, and on the N there are the substantial remains of a motte and bailey castle called Peel Hill.
The church is built of creamy Magnesian limestone, both rubble and ashlar, and has had many parts rebuilt or added. It consists of an embattled W tower and nave enclosed in aisles and has a two-storey S porch. The chancel has N chapel and vestry, and S chapel. The scars of earlier roofs of both chancel and nave are visible.
Among the surviving Romanesque features, three round-headed windows remain in the walls of the chancel. The four-bay nave arcades are pointed and appear to be of the early 13thc, but the bases and capitals of the piers could be earlier. The E capitals are bonded into a wall and could mark the eastward extent of the nave of a preceding church, perhaps the ‘chapel’ mentioned in 1147.
Two round-headed doorways are recorded below but their features make them difficult to date. The window facings, although similar to remnants at several other churches recorded in the S of the Riding, are probably impossible to date. The arcades were recorded as they are likely to be of the same date as the doorways.
Parish church
Fishlake is now a satellite village of Doncaster, but in the 12thc. it was a small settlement in the vast area of fen around the Humber. Drainage works from the 17thc. onwards mean that the River Don no longer threatens to undermine the church as it did in times past, and a high dyke now overlooks it.
St Cuthbert’s is spacious, with a W tower, nave and aisles and chancel, with a mainly Perpendicular fenestration. It is almost entirely late Gothic, but retains its Romanesque nave doorway, which is recognised by Pevsner as 'perhaps the most lavishly decorated in Yorkshire'. There is also a plain S doorway to the chancel but no other visible 12thc. remains. During re-roofing work on the S aisle some time after 2001, the lowest parts of a row of window openings in the S wall of the nave could be seen; these could have been Romanesque, and recalled the situation at Hatfield (West Yorkshire).
Parish church
Largely Perpendicular in external appearance: nave, aisles, porch, tower but Decorated E window in S aisle, and Early English chancel; Victorian alterations, including Neo-Norman windows in N aisle. The church is built of local magnesian limestone. The SW and NW nave quoins of the earlier stone church can be seen where the Perpendicular aisles were added, and the nave seen from the S recalls the proportions of the nave at High Melton.
Romanesque work can be viewed only in the interior: there is a N arcade dated by Pevsner (1967, 253) to c.1200; the S arcade is very similar but has pointed arches.
Parish church
Darrington is a small village, 3 miles SE of Pontefract, now divided by the main A1 road. The large church stands prominently on its hill. Built of magnesian limestone and local red sandstone, it consists of a nave, chancel, W tower, S aisle, N aisle and a chapel. It was restored in 1880, but lower parts of the tower may be Norman (Pevsner 1967,175), and the tower arch retains some relevant work.
Public sculpture
Towards the south end of Braithwell High Street (B6376), on a traffic island just in Holywell Lane (B6427), the stump of a worn shaft of Magnesian limestone on an octagonal base and square plinth stands at the junction of four roads (the other roads are Maltby Lane, the continuation of the B6376, and Ashton Lane). The monument is Grade II listed. It is surrounded by railings so it was not possible to measure, or to assess the plane of each face and what might have been lost by breakage and wear. It is not mentioned in Pevsner (1967).