Abstract
Nearly all the churches of the Old English kingdom were demolished and rebuilt in the Romanesque style by the conquering Normans. This phase of intensive rebuilding was made possible by the enormous wealth expropriated from the defeated Anglo-Saxon population. Between the late twelfth and early sixteenth centuries there followed a more extended period of church-building in the new Gothic style imported from France. English Gothic went through three phases of structural and stylistic innovation: Early English, Decorated, and Perpendicular. Its golden age spanned the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, as the church reached the zenith of its power and wealth. This was the era of ‘high farming’, when direct cultivation of monastic estates led to a peak in the prosperity of religious houses.
We wretched people have destroyed the work of saints, so that we may provide praise for ourselves. That age of most blessed men did not know how to build pretentious buildings, but they did know how to offer themselves to God under any sort of roof. … We on the other hand, neglecting our souls, strive to pile up stones.
Wulfstan of Worcester, last of the Anglo-Saxon bishops, lamenting the rise of the great church in the late eleventh century (Draper 2006: 44).
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Barras, R. (2016). Gothic Ascendant. In: A Wealth of Buildings: Marking the Rhythm of English History. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-31921-0_4
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