1 R. H. Carpenter, ‘On the Benedictine Abbey of S. Mary, Sherborne, with notes on the restoration of its church’, RIBA Papers (1876-77), p. 137.

2 Smith, Lucy Toulmin, The Itinerary of John Leland 1535–43, 5 vols (London, 1964), 1, p. 152fGoogle Scholar.

3 Willis, Robert, ‘Sherborne Minster’, Archaeological Journal, 22 (1865), pp. 179–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Ibid., p. 188.

5 Ibid.

6 Ibid.

7 Fowler, Joseph, Medieval Sherborne (Dorchester, 1951), p. 271 Google Scholar.

8 Gibb, J. H. P., ‘The Fire of 1437 and the Rebuilding of Sherborne Abbey’, British Archaeological Association Journal, CXXXVIII (1985), pp. 101-24CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Harvey, John, The Perpendicular Style (London, 1978), p. 163 Google Scholar.

9 For the fan vault see Leedy, Walter, Fan Vaulting: a study of Form, Technology and Meaning (London, 1980), pp. 11fGoogle Scholar. & 201-04; also Harvey, op. cit., pp. 162f. & 195. The fan vault will not be discussed in this article.

10 Gem, R. D. H., ‘Documentary Evidence of the Early History of the Buildings of Sherborne Cathedral: 705 to 1122’, Archaeological Journal, 132 (1975), p. 105 Google Scholar. This article is an appendix to Gibb, ‘The Anglo-Saxon Cathedral at Sherborne’, ibid., pp. 71-105.

11 Leland (ed. cit., 1, p. 153) informs us that two kings were buried behind the high altar, but there was no sign of them in the 1540s. Sherborne, School’s Guide to the Neighbourhood of Sherborne and Yeovil (Sherborne, 1925)Google Scholar refers to a brass marking the place of their burial in the ambulatory.

12 At the Council of London it was reaffirmed that heads of sees could not exist in villages: see Gem, op. cit., p. 108.

13 Ibid., 109.

14 Page, W. (ed.), The Victoria History of the Counties of England, Dorset, 11 (London, 1908), p. 65 Google Scholar.

15 The construction of the monastic buildings followed on from that of the church in the mid-twelfth century, with evidence from excavation material indicating a chapter house of c. 1180.

16 Leland, ed. cit., I, p. 153.

17 The eastern bays of the lady chapel and the chapter house were demolished at the Dissolution of the abbey in 1539.

18 Richard K. Morris and Linda Monckton, ‘Gothic Architecture and Worked Stones c. 1170-c. 1650’ in Sherborne Abbey Excavations 1972-76, ed. Laurence Keen and Peter Ellis (in preparation).

19 Ibid.

20 Fowler (op. cit., pp. 164–66) identifies a communication between the Bishop and Dean of Salisbury concerning the number of churches built, but not yet consecrated in the region in c. 1300. The reference to Sherborne in the list of offending churches is taken by Fowler to mean All Hallows. But surviving fragments confirm a date in the third quarter of the fourteenth century for All Hallows, which was in any case not elevated to parish-church status until the fifteenth.

21 See Willis, op. cit., p. 185f.

22 It is generally accepted that the late Anglo-Saxon church (of the mid-eleventh century) had a west-work, of a transept flanking a central western tower: Gibb, op. cit. (1975) and Gem, op. cit., see figs 3 and 13 in particular.

23 Gibb, op. cit. (1975), fig. 2, shows a drawing, after Carter, illustrating these features. By the time Willis engraved his view of the west front the glazing of the west window had been extended downwards to cover up this evidence.

24 Fowler, op. cit., p. 271.

25 Willis describes the remains as late Decorated or early Perpendicular, which might place the chapel between 1340 and 1380: Willis, op. cit., p. 185. It has been assumed in this article that All Hallows followed the reconstruction of the cloister and therefore is c. 1360.

26 Page, ed. cit., p. 67.

27 The present windows are nineteenth-century replacements, but a drawing by Buckler of c. 1828 shows ogee reticulated ones and therefore it can be reasonably assumed that the reproduction is accurate. Buckler Architectural Drawings, BM Add. MS 36361, fol. 169.

28 The West Country’s continued experimentation in Kerne vaults in this way is shown by the complication and sophisticated design of the Penniless Porch in Wells Cathedral precinct, datable to 1451: this combines hexagons, a tierceron, and centrally placed liernes with intermediate cusped lozenges.

29 Some of these are geometric designs, some heraldic, and some small foliage, but all differ in subject matter and style from those in the south nave aisle vault.

30 Fragments of masonry and bosses in the crypt of St John’s church in Bristol show a vault rib associated with a large foliage boss in a fragment from a lierne vault. The profile is identical to that used for the mullion of the Wells Cathedral lady chapel, and the boss is identified as coming from the now demolished church of St Thomas in Bristol.

31 Monckton, Linda, ‘The Myth of William Canynges and the Late Medieval Rebuilding of St Mary Redcliffe’ in ‘Almost the Richest City’: Bristol in the Middle Ages, Conference Transactions of British Archaeological Association, XIX (Leeds, 1997), pp. 57–68 Google Scholar.

32 Weaver, F. W. (ed.), Somerset Medieval Wills 1501-1530 (with some Somerset wills proved at Lambeth), Somerset Record Society, 19 (1903), p. 287fGoogle Scholar.

33 Alexander, J. and Binski, P. (eds), Age of Chivalry: Art in Plantagenet England 1200-1400 (London, 1987) catalogue entry 91, p. 228 Google Scholar.

34 Ibid.

35 Gibb, J. H. P, ‘Sherborne Abbey — Addendum to “the fire of 1437”’, British Archaeological Association Journal, CXLI (1988), p. 164 Google Scholar: Gibb says that the design of the roof appears to be a copy of the medieval one since its current form reflects the design of the roof illustrated by Carter in 1792.

36 Gibb (ibid.) has already published on the corbel heads on which the vault rests, and these were also dated to the late fourteenth century with their distinctive beards and head-gear.

37 See St Martin’s Chapel, whose ogee reticulated windows could be as early as 1320s and the two west windows of the north choir aisle, undated but probably after 1350: see Draper, Peter, ‘The Sequence and Dating of the Decorated Work at Wells’ in Medieval Art and Architecture at Wells and Glastonbury, Conference Transactions of British Archaeological Association, IV (Leeds, 1981) p. 22 Google Scholar.

38 An exact parallel for the mullion can also be found in the north transept of Milton Abbey, Dorset. This transept remodelling also provides a precedent for the introduction of major or ‘super’ mullions cutting through the reticulated pattern of the tracery. Currently published information on this transept (see H. Gordon Slade, ‘Milton Abbey’, Proceedings of the Royal Archaeological Institute (1983), pp. 61-65) dates the north transept to the abbacy of Middleton in c. 1500. Research and analysis by the author has suggested that this transept should be dated instead to c. 1400: Monckton, Linda, ‘Late Gothic Architecture in South West England’ (PhD, University of Warwick, May 1999), pp. 160-67Google Scholar. Although it is not possible to account for this re-dating in this article, it is likely that the Milton Abbey work was known to the masons of Sherborne during the latter’s transept remodelling.

39 For a transcription of the licence see Willis, op. cit., pp. 195 & 198.

40 Stafford’s arms are the only ones to appear on the vault, one being placed in the centre of each bay.

41 Leland, ed. cit., 1, p. 152.

42 Ail the details of the debate will not be gone into here but the relevant publications are Gibb, op. cit. (1985), Gibb, op. cit. (1988) and Harvey, op. cit. My thanks to Jim Gibb for showing me the correspondence relating to this discussion: letters from Harvey to Gibb 24.02.86, 24.04.86, 08.05.86 and 18.07.86.

43 For Harvey’s interpretation see Harvey, op. cit., pp. 162 & 165.

44 Ibid., p. 165.

45 Gibb, op. cit. (1985), pp. 113-16.

46 Although some restoration of stone was carried out in the mid-nineteenth century, this was an area that was untouched by Carpenter’s successor, Slater: Gibb, op. cit. (1985), p. 109.

47 These aisles were then later remodelled with the insertion of larger windows and new vaulting in the sixteenth century under Bishop Fox.

48 Leland, ed. cit., 1, p. 152.

49 Monckton, op. cit. (1997), pp. 63-65.

50 See above p. 101.

51 Monckton, op. cit. (1997), pp. 61-63.

52 See Harvey, op. cit., and Gibb, op. cit. (1985) and op. cit. (1988) for a fuller discussion of the relationship between these details and Winchester.

53 Harvey, op. cit., p. 162f.

54 Harvey, John, English Mediaeval Architects. A biographical Dictionary down to 1540 (Gloucester, 1984), p. 152 Google Scholar: Harvey records that he was already master mason by 1411/12.

55 Dawe, P. N. for the late Fowler, Joseph, ‘Sherborne Almshouse building Accounts 1440-44’, Somerset and Dorset Notes and Queries, XXXIX, part 290 (1969), pp. 74–78 Google Scholar and xxix, part 292 (1970), pp. 112f. & 131-32.

56 Backhouse, Janet, The Sherborne Missal (London, 1999), p. 5 Google Scholar.

57 Ibid., p. 44f and illustration 56.

58 From Bishop Nevill’s Ordinance: see Willis, op. cit., p. 188.

59 Willis (op. cit., p. 195) suggests that the parishioners were already annoyed at being banished from the nave of the church for services. The abbey presumably wanted to hold on to the rites of baptism rather than separate their control from the parishioners completely, although in 1450 Bishop Beauchamp confirmed that the status of All Hallows should rise to that of parish church (see J. H. P. Gibb, ‘Battle of the Fonts’ (privately published, n.d)).