Special Issue on English Gothic Art || The Effigy of Bishop Hugh de Northwold in Ely Cathedral

The Effigy of Bishop Hugh de Northwold in Ely CathedralAuthor(s): Marion RobertsSource: The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 130, No. 1019, Special Issue on English Gothic Art (Feb.,1988), pp. 77-84Published by: The Burlington Magazine Publications Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/883311 .

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MARION ROBERTS

The effigy of bishop Hugh de Northwold

in Ely Cathedral

HUGH OF NORTHWOLD was bishop of Ely from 1229 to 1254. One of several children of a wealthy Norfolk family, he professed as a monk of Bury St Edmunds in 1202, was elected abbot there in 1213, and became bishop of Ely in 1229. A capable administrator and civil servant, Northwold

kept busy throughout his career, serving both the pope and the king;I he was not afraid to oppose the latter in the interest of his abbey or see.2 An enthusiastic builder, he left a splendid legacy, the presbytery of Ely Cathedral which housed and glorified the shrines of Ely's long-venerated pre-Conquest saints, Etheldreda, Sexburga, Werburga, and Erminilda. He financed its building largely through his own contributions,3 dedicating it to the Virgin, St Peter, and St Etheldreda in a lavish ceremony in 1252 at which Henry III, Prince Edward, and members of the royal court were present.4 When he died two years later North- wold was buried in the heart of the new building, to the east of the shrine of St Etheldreda. The respect and honour Northwold received in his own lifetime are apparent from the appreciation of the man and his accomplishments written in 1254 by Matthew Paris, a monk of St Alban's (see the Appendix below).5

Northwold's grave was marked by a Purbeck marble slab now lying in the north side of the Presbytery at Ely,6 the most ornately carved Purbeck marble effigy to survive in England from the mid-thirteenth century (Fig.4).7 En- crusted with images and details, this memorial- like the shrine of St Etheldreda - was an integral part of the richly ornamented building in which it lay. While Northwold's

patronage of architecture has been well studied, his effigy slab has not been discussed at length.8

The figure of the bishop, clothed in mass vestments, stands on a lion and dragon (Fig.4). On either side are

4. Bishop Hugh de Northwold, mid-thirteenth century. Purbeck marble memorial slab, height 208 cm. (Presbytery, Ely Cathedral).

1R.M. THOMSON, ed. and trans.: The Chronicle of the Election of Hugh Abbot of Bury St. Edmunds and later Bishop of Ely, Oxford [1974], p.195. See also the Dictionary of National Biography, Vol.XIV, London [1895], pp.648-50. 2MATTHEW PARIS: Chronica Majora (Rolls Series, ed. H. Luard Vol.V), London [1880], p.332. 3•Ibid., p.454. 4Ibid., p.322. 5For an English translation see J.A. GILES, trans.: Matthew Paris's English History

from theyear 1235 to 1273, London [ 1854]. 6J. BENTHAM: The History and Antiquities of the Conventual and Cathedral Church of Ely, Cambridge [1771], p.148, records the effigy as lying on the tomb of Bishop Barnet on the south side of the presbytery under the fifth arch from the east. Later it was placed on a tomb chest on the north side under the fourth arch where it remains today. 1208 cm. long, 86 cm. across the head, 47 cm. across the foot; figure of the bishop, 149 cm.; small figures to the bishop's left: the nun, 38 cm.; the crowned female, 41 cm.; St Etheldreda, 46 cm. including the crown.

For a discussion of English Purbeck marble effigies, see E.S. PRIOR and A. GARDNER: An Account of Medieval Figure-sculpture in England, Cambridge [1912], pp.568-602; A. GARDNER, English Medieval Sculpture, revised ed., Cambridge [1951], pp.152-66; K. BAUGCH: Das mittelalterliche Grabbild, Berlin and New York [1976], pp.81-88. 8Early descriptions include BENTHAM, op.cit. at note 6 above, pp.146-48, and Pl.XV; R. GOUGH, Sepulchral Monuments of Great Britain, London [1786, 1796], Vol.II, p.46-47, and j. HEWITT, who corrected

A.J. Kempe's descriptions in his revised edition of c. STOTHARD: Monumental Effigies of Great Britain, revised ed., London [1876], p.62.

77



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foliage-covered columns which support crocketed pinnacles and a cinquefoil arched canopy. Above the canopy are four, now very damaged, angels. Two can be made out to be swinging censers, and two carry the bishop's soul upward in a cloth. Along the sides of the slab are small figures in niches. The three male figures to the bishop's right represent, in descending order, a king, bishop and a monk, while the three female figures to his left are a crowned abbess, a queen and a nun (Figs. 10-15). Across the foot of the slab is a narrative relief of the martyrdom of St Edmund (Fig.9).

The style of the figures, large and small, is conservative. The regular pattern of narrow pleats and V-shaped folds of Northwold's chasuble must have had greater depth and cast stronger shadows before the damage they have sustained (Fig.8). They create formal patterns more rigid than the curving, interlocking folds of the nearly contemporary effigies of Bishop Kilkenny (died 1256) at Ely (Fig.5) and of Archbishop de Gray (died 1255) at York (Fig.6). Nor

does their stiff regularity have any of the vigour of the soft, silky, looping folds of the earlier effigy of Bishop Robert Bingham (died 1246) in Salisbury Cathedral (Fig.7). The stylistic source for all these drapery patterns can be found among the many figures of bishops on the west front of Wells Cathedral. Some of the Wells bishops wear chasubles with exaggerated patterns of V-shaped folds while others are rendered more gracefully.9 The garments of the six small figures in niches also recall the style of sculpture at Wells: the looping narrow folds over the thin limbs of the king, the rigid V-shaped folds of the chasuble of the bishop/ abbot, the mantle of the first queen falling in simple gentle folds, the tunic of the second queen belted at the waist and cut off at the ankle. 10 For the mid-1250s these drapery patterns are old-fashioned. None of the figures on the Northwold slab show any indication of the change to the broad-fold drapery style that altered the appearance of Purbeck marble effigies in the 1260s."I The crisp metallic style of the angels in the north transept at Westminster

9See L.S. COLCHESTER: The West Front of Wells Cathedral, 5th ed., Wells [1976], Pls.F, G, K. L; and W.H. ST. JOHN HOPE and W.R. LETHABY: 'The Imagery and

Sculptures on the West Front of Wells Cathedral Church', Archaeologia, LIX

[1904], PI.XL. "'For fcmale figures at Wells, see COLCHESTER, op.cit. at note 9 above, Pls.C and

H. The pose of the second queen (Fig. 14), is similar to the slightly later effigy at Romsey who holds her garments in one hand, and the fastening of her cloak in the other: see D. SHEARLOCK: Romsey Abbey (Pitkin Guides), London, p.2. I SeeM. ROBERTS: 'The Tomb of Giles de Bridport in Salisbury Cathedral', The Art Bulletin, LXV [1983], pp.568-69.

78




Abbey influenced the nearly contemporary effigy of Walter de Gray at York, but not that of Northwold.

Much of the tomb slab's imagery is as conventional as its style. Angels swinging censers and angels carrying a small figure representing the soul of the deceased in a cloth are typical of funeral imagery found on many thir-

teenth-century memorials. According to Panofsky, censing angels evoke the performance of the Mass of the Dead in heaven in anticipation of the adventus animae.12 Most tomb slabs depict one or the other of these images; Northwold's memorial has both.

Thirteenth-century effigies of English bishops are in-

variably vested for the Mass, the right hand raised in

blessing, the left hand holding a pastoral staff.'3 A pillow was usually placed under the head, but few effigies of this

period were shown as lying in death. Bishops were made to appear vigorous, standing on or striding over the forces of evil. Northwold treads on a lion and a dragon, an allusion to Psalm 91:131 4 - an appropriate symbolism for a bishop described by Matthew Paris as a man who fought admirably for the Church for forty years.

Effigies of bishops and abbots were placed within architectural niches, suitable, with their church-like forms, to surround ecclesiastics who were likened to the structure of the Church.15 In the first half of the thirteenth century, architectural niches for the display of figure sculpture were

given monumental treatment on the west front of Wells

Cathedral. By mid-century Purbeck marblers were placing ecclesiastical effigies into elaborately arched and lobed

canopies, sometimes, as here, flanked by crenellated towers, and supported by columns with carved capitals and bases. The amount of detail on the Northwold memorial, however, sets it apart from contemporary effigies. Some effigies of

bishops are surrounded by foliage decorating the periphery of the slab; sometimes sprays of leaves curl up over the colonnettes that support the canopy.'16 On the Northwold memorial the columns are wound around with elaborate stiff-leafed foliage, and birds- more easily seen in Stothard's

rendering (Fig. 16) than in the photograph (Fig.4) - are

perched in the vines on the column to the left. 1 These

elegantly wrapped colonnettes seem more appropriate to

12E. PANOFSKY: Tomb Sculpture, New York [1964], p.61. The angel on the upper corner to the left of Northwold's effigy is now almost undiscernable. For images of souls carried to heaven, see ibid., Figs.237, 240, 241. See also j. ADHEMAR: 'Les Tombeaux de la Collection Gaignibres', Gazette des Beaux-Arts, LXXXIV [1974], p.12, No.7. A tomb-slab in Ely Cathedral is a well-known twelfth century example: see G. ZARNECKI: Later English Romanesque Sculpture, 1140-1210, London [1953], Fig.41. 13Northwold wears an alb, a stole, a dalmatic or tunicle (bishops wear both garments but only one is shown on the Northwold effigy, compare Fig.2 with

Fig.10), a chasuble, an amice, a mitre with infulae, a maniple, gloves, and buskins. His right hand is raised in blessing, and in addition to the pastoral staff he holds another object, the identity of which is not clear. It has more substance than the vexillum or scarf that sometimes hangs from the staff as on the effigy of

Archbishop de Gray at York (Fig.6). HEWITT, op.cit. at note 8 above, p.62, described the object as a book, the textus or Gospels. However, the small figures of a bishop and abbess on the tomb hold books in a different way (Figs. 11, 13). 14'He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High, who abides in the shadow of the Almighty, will say to the lord, "My refuge and my fortress". . . . For he will give his angels charge of you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, . . . You will tread on the lion and the adder, the young lion and the serpent you will trample under foot.'

The beasts on the Northwold effigy were damaged, and difficult to make out as early as Stothard's drawing (Fig.16). The lion chews on the end of the pastoral staff, clawing at it with a front paw and at the head of the dragon with its rear foot. The winged dragon attacks the lion and the staff, coiling its tail on the

adjacent column. Winged dragons appear under the feet of the effigies of Bishop Robert Bingham (died 1246) in Salisbury Cathedral, and Archbishop Walter de Gray (died 1255) in York Minster (Figs.7, 6). A lion appears under the feet of Bishop Giles de Bridport (died 1262) in Salisbury Cathedral: see ROBERTS, loc.cit. at note

11, above, p.572, Fig.26. See also the discussion of animals in H.A.

TUMMERS: Early Secular Effigies in England, Leiden [1980], pp.40-44. 5Before 1130, Honorius of Autun equated the columns of the church with

bishops 'who bear up the organization of the Church by their righteous life': see

j. HARVEY: The Mediaeval Architect, London [1972], p.226. For examples of twelfth-century effigies see PRIOR and GARDNER, op.cit. at note 7 above, pp.573- 75, Figs.646-48. '6For example, the twelfth-century effigy of Bishop Roger in Salisbury Cathedral, illustrated in GARDNER, op.cit. at note 7 above, p.153, Fig.286. For the increasing use of foliage during the thirteenth century, see ibid., Figs.294, 308 and 309.

17Inhabited vine scrolls were popular motifs in English manuscript illumination from the late tenth and eleventh centuries, and in sculpture in the twelfth

century: see G. ZARNECKI: The Early Sculpture of Ely Cathedral, London [1958], for illustrations. The few fragments from the shrine of St Etheldreda which are preserved at Ely include Purbeck marble bases richly ornamented with foliage. Perhaps such details from the shrine were a source of inspiration for the carver of Northwold's tomb-slab.

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9. Detail of Fig.4, showing Martyrdom of St Edmund.

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enamel or engraved metal than Purbeck marble. Also reminiscent of metalwork is the standing filigree- appar- ently perforated by a drill - on the canopy over the bishop's head (Fig.4). The proliferation of minute ornament can be seen on a smaller scale in the niches on either side of the

effigy. The figure of a king only 46 cm high stands in an elaborate cinquefoil arch supported on one side by double columns with capitals (Fig.10). The arch is moulded, crowned with foliage, and flanked by smaller gabled niches on columns with capitals. Considering the technical difficulty in working Purbeck marble, this delicate carving is an

impressive display of the marbler's craft'18 - almost as if the carver wished the stone to take on the appearance of other materials. One wonders if the finished work might have been painted and gilded. 19

The intricate carving on Northwold's memorial must be viewed in the larger context of the presbytery in which it lay. The memorial exhibits on a small scale the same

lavish ornamentation as the interior, where nearly all the architectural elements, bases, capitals, brackets, arch

mouldings, spandrels, and vault bosses, are embellished with carved details- foliage, dogtooth, crockets and sunken trefoils or quatrefoils.20 The few fragments that may be remains of the shrine of St Etheldreda are so richly ornamented with sprays of foliage that it can be assumed that the Purbeck marble base for the golden shrine was sump- tuously decorated.21 And this shrine was only one of several

adorning the new presbytery. The visual effect of all these

opulent works must have been overwhelming. Unlike so

many tombs that were constructed when needed and often

placed with no thought for the surrounding architecture, Northwold's memorial was an integral part of the new

building. The small figures in niches flanking the effigy are not at

all common in the mid-thirteenth century.22 Of the three male figures to the left, only one can be certainly identified

"8Purbeck marble is not a true crystalline marble, but a conglomerate of shell and limestone that can take a high polish. The Metrical Life of St Hugh written c. 1225, contains a lyrical passage on the beauty of Purbeck marble, and the

difficulty in carving it: see HARVEY, op.cit. at note 15 above, p.237. For a discussion of the use of Purbeck marble for effigies, see PRIOR and GARDNER,

op.cit. at note 7 above, pp.565-602. '9The depression in the mitre, as on the crown and gloves of the effigy of King

John at Worcester, suggests that a fake jewel might have been part of the decoration. For a discussion of polychromy on effigy slabs, see PRIOR and GARDNER, op.cit.

at note 7 above, pp.600-02. 20See N. PEVSNER: The Buildings of England, Cambridgeshire, 2nd ed., Harmondsworth [1970], pp.353-55. 21 SeeT.D. ATKINSON in The Victoria History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely, ed. R.B. PUGH, Vol.IV, London [1953], pp.71-72.

80




13. Detail of Fig.4, a crowned abbess. Height 46 cm.

14. Detail of Fig.4, a queen. Height 41 cm. 15. Detail of Fig.4, a nun. Height 38 cm.

as a saint. This is the king at the top, the largest and most

important figure in the most ornate setting (Fig. 10), wearing a disproportionately large crown over exuberant curls of hair.23 One hand holds the chain that fastens his cloak, a common gesture of lords and ladies; the other holds three arrows upright. A dragon-like creature looks up from beneath his feet. The arrows identify the king as St Edmund, royal patron of Bury St Edmunds Abbey where Hugh was abbot before he was elected bishop of Ely.24

Below the king, in a somewhat smaller and less ornate niche, stands a bishop or mitred abbot in mass vestments (Fig. 11). He holds a rectangular object, perhaps a book, in his left hand, and in his right, a pastoral staff with a

flowering crook that curves delicately over the frame of the niche. Both the niche and figure below are very broken

(Fig. 12). The figure represents a monk standing in a cross-

legged pose with his cowl up over the back of his head. He is holding a scroll.25 Near his right shoulder is the coiled form of a beaked bird-like creature.

Of the three female figures in the niches on the right, all with delicate features and gentle faces, two seem to represent

saints. The topmost, in a setting as large and ornate as that of King Edmund, is a crowned abbess (Fig.13), wearing a

generous hood over her flowing hair and a cloak fastened by a brooch. The rectangular object in her right hand may be a book, the projection on its upper left corner representing the spine or binding.26 Her other hand holds a staff with a flowering crook, the shank of which is trans- formed at its base into a lance which she drives into the back of a creature howling in pain and clawing the foliage below. This creature and the queen's garments and attributes suggest that she is St Etheldreda, royal foundress and first abbess of the monastery of Ely, who is also depicted in a boss in the fifth bay of the presbytery (Fig. 17).27 Although the face of the figure in the boss is veiled, and no evil creature appears beneath her feet, she wears a crown, carries a flowering staff similar to that on the Northwold tomb, and holds a book with the same projection at one corner. The second figure of a queen (Fig.14), wears a large crown and a hood over flowing hair, and holds the chain fastening her mantle. The head of a goat emerges from the base of the arch nearby. Beneath her feet a bird-

22Similar figures can be found in northern France and Flanders in the twelfth

century, but are not common in England and France until the later thirteenth and fourteenth centuries: BAUCH, op.cit. at note 7 above, Pls.42-44. Small figures in niches as part of elaborate architectural canopies are a common feature of later tomb-slabs: see ADHEMAR, 0loc.cit. at note 12 above, Nos.312, 334 and 449. 23Both crown and hair recall those of the Magi in the Carrow Psalter, Walters Art Gallery, MS 34, and in the painting at Winterbourne Dauntsey Church, Wiltshire: see E.W. TRISTRAM: English Medieval Wall Painting. The Thirteenth

Century, London [1950], Vol.II, P1.69. 24For other representations of St Edmund, see TRISTRAM, op.cit. at note 23 above, Pls.82a, 210, 212, 213, sup.57a and p.170; and E. MILLAR: The Luttrell

Psalter, London [1932], p.27, Pl.5c. 25A portion of a scroll may be resting across the top of the monk's foot. The nun on the opposite side of the slab holds a scroll; the two figures would have complemented each other. The heads of both figures were covered. 26The vault of the chapter house of Christ Church, Oxford, included an image of StJohn holding a book with the same projection at one corner: see TRISTRAM, op.cit. at note 23 above, P1.87 and 90. An open book with a projecting spine is visible on the Seal of the Prior and Convent of Ely, illustrated in ZARNECKI, op.cit. at note 17 above, Fig. 1. 27For the iconography of St Etheldreda, see w. BRAUNFELS, ed.: Lexikon der Christlichen Ikonographie, Vol.VI, Freiburg im Breisgau [1974], cols.170-71.

81




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like creature with claws raises its curling beak to chew on the hem of her garments. The presence of this beast under- foot suggests that she is a saint, probably one of the other female saints whose shrines graced the presbytery. The third figure is a nun comparable in size to the monk on the opposite side of the slab (Fig.15). With her head covered she holds her mantle and points to a scroll. At the outer edge of the canopy the figure of a goat substitutes for a capital.

Another reference to Bury St Edmunds is found at the foot of the slab where the story of St Edmund's martyrdom is carved in relief (Fig.9).28 Stripped to the waist, tied by his wrists to a tree, and with four arrows in his back, Edmund endures his suffering in a graceful cross-legged pose. To the right, behind a tree, two vigorous bowmen aim more arrows. At one corner an executioner has struck off the saint's head which drops into the outstretched arms of his falling body, and at the other sits a dog-like

creature, probably meant to be the wolf which, according to legend, guarded the saint's head.

The imagery surrounding the effigy of Bishop Northwold is a blend of the spiritual and the temporal presented in a hierarchical structure. Across the foot of the slab the saintly Edmund ends his worldly existence in torment and death at the hands of evil men. Above, Northwold is shown as a living embodiment of the Church, dominant over evil. Sur- rounding and supporting him are members of the monastic order, even the least of whom is steadfast against the threat of devilish creatures. Leading the company are saints shown conquering the beasts of the devil. The flowered columns, the canopy, and the towers envelop the effigy in a shimmer of ornament, evoking a heavenly realm reminiscent of Matthew Paris's palatia caelesta, which, he said, Northwold had prepared for himself. From above, angels descend to welcome the soul of the bishop which is carried upward by their companions to join the company of heaven.

The eulogy written by Matthew Paris offers a more down-to-earth view of Northwold. Matthew valued the bishop's spiritual qualities, but was also much impressed with his hospitality at table. Almsgiving and other charit- able acts take second place to the list of Northwold's many building projects, and Matthew's description implies that the bishop was well liked by his contemporaries, as well as admired for his personality, character, and passion for building (see the Appendix below). The imagery on the tomb, for all its spiritual allusions, is not without a worldly message. The figures of King Edmund and St Etheldreda ally the bishop with the saints, but they are also reminders that Northwold was the head of an important abbey and an important cathedral, and thus in service to royalty. Hugh de Northwold rose among the ranks of the church from monk to abbot to bishop, a procession from lesser to greater depicted by the figures in the niches. All of these, monk and nun, bishop or abbot and abbess, king and queen, can be interpreted as references to the important Benedictine establishments of Bury St Edmunds and Ely Cathedral. The central figure enshrined in this sculptured monastic world was Bishop Northwold, described by Matthew as the flower of monks, the abbot of abbots, and the bishop of bishops (see the Appendix below).

The relief on the foot of the effigy suggests that the slab was meant to be seen from all sides, unhampered by a free-standing canopy over the effigy in the manner of Archbishop de Gray's tomb at York or the tomb of Bishop Giles de Bridport at Salisbury. The slab may have been raised on a tomb chest as it is today, although it has usually been assumed that it lay directly on the pavement.29 Its exact location, however, has been a matter of debate.

It is recorded that Northwold was buried at the feet of St Etheldreda, that is, somewhere to the east of her shrine.3?

21For the iconography of the Martyrdom of St Edmund, see ibid., cols. 107-08: and TRISTRAM, op.cit. at note 21 above, pp.530-31, P1.137. The Martyrdom was depicted at Ely, in a lunette in the first chapel of the south transept: ibid., pp.541-42, P1.213. The relief on the tomb-slab seems more pictorial than sculp- tural: compare, for example, the illuminations of Cambridge Trinity College, MS B. 11.4, illustrated in N.J. MORGAN: Early Gothic Manuscripts I, 1190-1250, New York [1982], Figs. 171-74. 29P. DRAPER: 'Bishop Northwold and the Cult of Saint Etheldreda', Medieval Art & Architecture at Ely Cathedral (The British Archaeological Association Conference Transactions for the year 1976), Leeds [1979], p.13, suggests that the wedge shape of the slab (like a coffin lid) whtch

was shown on a plan by Browne Willis indicates that Northwold's monument was a gravestone, not a tomb. However, the shape does not necessarily mean that the slab was flat on the pavement. See,

for example, the twelfth-century tomb at Exeter illustrated in PRIOR and GARDNER, op.cit. at note 7 above, Fig.648. 30BENTHAM, op.cit. at note 6 above, p.148, cites British Library, Harleian MS 258 D.J. STEWART: On the Architectural History of Ely Cathedral, London [1848], p.134, quotes Lambeth manuscripts that he said were used by Wharton in Anglia Sacra: 'Hugo de Norwude versus orientem, juxtaferetrum sce Etheldrede (jacet ad pedes sce Etheldrede, corjacetjuxta boias(?) 1254'. H. WHARTON, Anglia Sacra, London [1691], Vol.1, p.636 states: 'sepultus est in Ecclesia Eliensi versus orientem juxta

feretrum S. Etheldredae'. The words 'juxtaferetrum' are ambiguous. Was the tomb near the shrine, or near the area around the shrine? See DRAPER, loc.cit. at note 29 above, p.15, on the problem of medieval terminology for tombs, shrines and feretories.

82




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The latter originally stood in the centre of the retrochoir to the east of the high altar, a location suggested by two large carved bosses that decorate the centre of the vaults in bays 5 and 4 from the east, representing St Etheldreda (Fig. 17), and the Coronation of the Virgin. The area around the shrine was enclosed by railings to create a protected environment, the feretory, designed to control pilgrims visiting the shrine. How much space was allocated for this purpose is not certain. Atkinson placed Northwold's tomb within the feretory, but there is no archaeological evidence for his assumption.31 To the east of the feretory lay a procession path, which in the thirteenth century occupied, according to Peter Draper, the third bay from the east, leaving the two eastern bays for the shrines of the lesser saints.32 There is reason to suggest that Northwold's tomb was not within the feretory, but to the east of the procession path.

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Willis with a description of Ely Cathedral that Willis published in 1718.33 In 1722 John Stevens quoted this description in his supplement to Dugdale's Monasticon Anglicanum, and published a plan of Ely Cathedral without stating who made the plan or supplied information for it (Fig. 19).34 In 1729 Willis visited Ely and published his own plan of the cathedral in 1730.5 Both plans list tombs in the eastern arm of the cathedral, and correspond- in all cases except for the tombs of Bishop Northwold and Sir William Thorpe,36 though curiously neither indicates the original site of the shrine of St Etheldreda. The relationship of Thorpe's tomb to that of Northwold, however, is consistent on both plans, and offers an interesting suggestion for the original location ofNorthwold's tomb.

While Willis placed Northwold's tomb between the third and fourth bay from the east, Stevens's plan located it in the western half of the second bay.37 Both plans show the tomb of Sir William Thorpe (died c.1398) to the west of Northwold's tomb.38 Thorpe requested that he be buried

31 See the plan in ATKINSON, op.cit. at note 21 above, p.66. 32DRAPER, loc.cit. at note 29 above, pp.13-15. 33B. WILLIS: An History of the Mitred Parliamentary Abbies and Conventual Cathedral Churches, London [1718-19], p.266. 34j. STEVENs: The History of the Antient Abbeys, Monasteries, Hospitals, Cathedral and Collegiate Churches, being two Additional volumes to Sir William Dugdale's Monasticon Anglicanum, Vol.I, London [1722], pp.398-99. 35B. WILLIS, A Survey of the Cathedrals of York, Durham, Carlisle, Chester, Man, Litchfield. . ., Vol.II, London [1730], p.332. The plan is printed in DRAPER,

op.cit. at note 29 above, P1.II. 36STEVENS, op.cit. at note 34 above, pp.398-99 stated that the tombs of bishops Balsham, Walpole, Orford, and Keton lie in a row before the high altar 'which

formerly extended two pillars more eastward than the present altar'. Stevens's plan therefore indicates the high altar between the fourth pillars from the east, while Willis placed it between the fifth pillars. 37The legend on Stevens's plan reads, 'Broken marble perhaps for Bp. Hugh Nousold'. 38Again the legend on Stevens's plan suggests an on-site description: 'gravestone said to be Bp. Hugh Balshams (but he was buried before the high altar) but the brass effigies here seemed to have had a sword so that probably it was Sir William Thorp of Lollnorth who built the presbytery.' This last statement about Thorpe does not make sense as Stevens states on p.398 that 'Hugh Norwold' built the presbytery.

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near the shrine of St Etheldreda, and Draper argued that there was not enough evidence to place Thorpe's tomb in a prominent position such as the centre of the feretory.39 However, Thorpe's tomb consisted of a gravestone and an elaborate brass, and while its original location is by no means certain, a brass flush with the pavement could have been placed in an area of traffic and therefore, perhaps, in the procession path in the third bay.

If Northwold's tomb was indeed east of Thorpe's tomb as both plans indicate, it might have been as far to the east as Steven's plan suggests. This location would place the bishop's effigy close to a third sculptured boss, smaller than those of the Virgin Mary and St Etheldreda, and located, not on the ridge rib in the centre of the vault, but a little to the south at the juncture of tiercerons. The boss

represents a beardless monk with a cowl over his head, holding keys in his right hand and a model of a church in his veiled left hand (Fig. 18). The identity of this boss and its position have never been explained satisfactorily.

Draper regarded the boss as representing St Peter, to whom the cathedral was dedicated in Norman times, and to whom Northwold dedicated his new presbytery along with the Virgin and St Etheldreda.40 St Peter was repre- sented as a monk holding keys in Anglo-Saxon times, and could be beardless.41 But Draper could not account for the position of the boss off-centre. If the figure on the boss

represents a saint of the importance of St Peter, one of the three dedicatees, the boss would more probably have been placed on the ridge rib in the centre of the vault, like those commemorating the Virgin and St Etheldreda. In the thirteenth century, however, the model of a church and the keys were not exclusively the attributes of St Peter. Among the coloured drawings of English kings in Matthew Paris's Historia Anglorum,42 some kings hold models of churches in veiled hands as though the ecclesiastical foun- dations or the building projects for which they were respon- sible were the most important aspects of their reign; and

on a Purbeck marble effigy with similar features to that of Northwold, carved in the first half of the century, Ailwyn, founder of Ramsey Abbey, holds a ragged staff and keys (Fig.8).43

I should like to suggest that the figure of the monk on the Ely boss is a founder, and as such represents Hugh de

Northwold.44 The figure holds a miniature replica of the

presbytery which, as Matthew Paris states, Northwold had founded and built at his own expense: 'presbiterio nobilissimo, quod afundamentis propriis sumptibus . . . construxerat'. Were not the keys of a founder justifiably his? He is not dressed as a bishop, perhaps because, as Matthew Paris tells us, he retained the dress and the habits of a monk when he was translated from the abbacy of Bury St Edmunds to the bishopric of Ely.45 Smaller than the two other sculptured bosses in the presbytery, and placed slightly off centre, befitting the humility that seems to have been part of the man's character, the boss may tell us where the

bishop was laid to rest. University of Virginia

Appendix

Matthew Paris's account of Hugh de Northwold, from the Chronica Majora, cited at note 2 above, pp.454-55.

Et eodem tempore migravit ab hoc saeculo bonus episcopus Elyensis Hugo, quandoque abbas ecclesiae Sancti Edmundi, qui in utraque ecclesia circiter quadraginta annis Deo laudabiliter militaverat, et immortalis memoriae beneficia feliciter consummaverat. Obiit autem apud manerium suum, quinto idus Augusti. Et transportatum est corpus cum magna merito veneratione, et sepultum apud Ely in sua ecclesia, scilicet in presbiterio nobilissimo, quod a fundamentis propriis sumptibus magnifice nimis opere indissolubili et marmoreo construxerat. Inter alia autem quae fecerat pietatis opera, unam magnam regiam lapideam plumbo coopertam cum pertinentiis construxerat apud Ely, et alibi aedificia magna et nobilia aedificavit nihilominus in clemosinis et aliis caritatis operibus sibi palatia caelesta praeparando. Hic quoque sicut in mensa spirituali, scilicet altari, devotus extitit, et exitus aquarum deducebant oculi ejus, ita in mensa corporalis refectionis dapsilis fuit, jocundus, et serenus. In cujus obitu flos Nigrorum obiit monachorum; quia sicut abbas abbatum in Anglia extiterat, ita et episcopus episcoporum choruscavit.

39DRAPER, loc.cit. at note 29 above, p.14. 40Ibid., p.15. 41 See, among many examples, St Peter depicted on the New Minister Charter, illustrated in E. TEMPLE: Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900-1066, London [1976], Fig.84. 42Reproduced in R. VAUGHAN: Matthew'Paris, Cambridge [1958], Pl.XI.

43 See j. ALEXANDER and P. BINSKI eds.: Age of Chivalry, Art in Plantagenet England, exh.cat., Royal Academy of Arts, London [1987], p.209, No.22, where, however, the identity is doubted. 44ATKINSON, op.cit. at note 21 above, p.72 states that the monk in the boss might be Bishop Northwold or Prior Ralph. 45M. PARIs, Historia Anglorum (Rolls Series, ed. F. MADDEN, Vol.II), London

[1866], p.305: 'qui licet in episcopum translatus, monachi tamen nunquam mores et habitum transmutavit.'

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Special Issue on English Gothic Art || The Effigy of Bishop Hugh de Northwold in Ely Cathedral

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