Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 7.djvu/227

ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS IN IVER CHURCH, BUCKS. 151 within, the arch being filled up more nearly flush with the wall, this is not visible ; but the roll, with the rest of the section, is identical on both sides. It is much to be regretted that the whole is not open ; one would like to know the way in which the inner portion of the jamb was treated, and whether the window was originally glazed or closed with a shutter. The position of the window in the wall is extremely high, and the strino; or set-off" would seem to show that whatever other contemporary windows may have existed, were on the same level. They must have had quite the effect of a clerestory. In this they resemble not a few Norman exam- ples, as Goring in Oxfordshire, Leonard Stanley in Gloucester- shire, and some later ones, as the Decorated insertions in the north wall of the nave at Dorchester, and the Perpendicular windows of Magdalen College Chapel. But certainly in the three last of these cases — I do not remember whether it is so at Goring or not — this peculiarity is connected with the addition of a cloister to that side of the church, which necessarily raised the windows above their ordinary level. And at Goring, even were there no cloister, we might attri- bute the peculiarity (just as at Magdalen) to the ritual necessities of an aisleless choir, could we believe that canopied stalls were ever employed at so early a period. This argu- ment of course cannot apply to a nave ; but it is very possible that some cloister or other subordinate building may have stood against one side of Iver church. If so, love of uniformity might bring the windows on the other side to the same level. This is conspicuously the case at Leonard Stanley, where the cloister to the south of the nave necessitated placing the windows on that side high in the wall, and the same arrangement is unnecessarily followed on the north. The arrangement of the Norman arches cut through this wall is well worth notice, and clearly was very much affected by the fact that they were thus cut through a previously existing structure. They do not form a continuous arcade, but two wide independent arches are opened through the wall, with no pretence at a pillar between them, but simply a large portion of the wall is left with a respond attached on each side. They have clearly been cut throiicjh in the strictest sense, without any interference with the early VOL. VII. X