The market place town of Selby is dominated by the former Abbey, now the town’s parish church but initially developed to serve a Benedictine monastery. It is a single of those people rare cathedral-sized survivors of the Dissolution that have arrive down to us by means of parochial use mostly intact when the huge greater part had been remaining in ruins or disappeared entirely. Consequently Selby is an architectural gem and reminder of what we have lost in other places.
The monastic intricate itself has solely vanished, what stays is the full abbey church (unusually complete, much more frequently these kinds of fantastic buildings were being only partially preserved, if at all). Substantially of the Norman making continues to be, the nave staying a superior instance of Romanesque architecture, while the choir is a wonderful training in Embellished Gothic from the 14th century with an attractive east window whose glass closely follows the first layout. The 3 towers include wonderful dignity to the making, on the other hand these are mainly early 20th century additions, necessitated by other episodes in the abbey’s heritage less lucky than it really is getting spared by the Dissolution.
The church’s fortunes took a turn for the worst in 1690 when the upper half of the Norman central tower collapsed, demolishing the south transept as it fell which remained in ruins until finally much more recently. The top of the tower was later on rebuilt in Georgian model but this was taken off by the conclude of the Victorian interval for the duration of a complete restoration of the creating (no question a replacement was meant but not immediately realised).
Catastrophe then struck in 1906 when a main fireplace engulfed the making (starting in the organ-chamber off the north transept) and wrecked all the home furnishings of the choir and the high ceilings of nave, choir and transept, leaving the church in a pitiful ruined condition. Remarkably the town rallied behind restoration and the full church was repaired and back in full use inside of 3 many years of the calamity.
Extra amazing nevertheless was extra transformation of the exterior that followed underneath architect John Oldrid Scott who ultimately rebuilt the upper phase of the central tower and the south transept (both equally truncated given that 1690) in 1912. Finally in 1935 the west towers have been lifted to their current top (they have been under no circumstances completed in medieval situations) giving us the majestic triple-towered church we see these days for the very first time in its background, and a church remodeled additional effectively and considerably in the house of a few yrs than everyone generally may possibly realise from its homogeneous physical appearance nowadays.
Stepping into the excellent church currently a single is often aware that so significantly has been restored in the early 20th century, but the function has been superbly done and some previous characteristics this sort of as the wooden font-cover survived the blaze. Other features were much less blessed, the 14th century glass in the east window endured badly and what we see right now is a watchful duplicate of the original (a handful of fragments of the primary can be observed in the north choir aisle nearby). In the course of the church the higher ceilings are adorned with gloriously gilded bosses that enliven the interior, most once more are copies of the burned originals but correctly echo the medieval spirit.
Selby Abbey is just one of the fantastic church buildings of England and are unable to are unsuccessful to impress the customer. It is typically open up to website visitors and I found the locals quite welcoming. I hope to return once again some working day.
www.selbyabbey.org.uk/
For a much more entertainingly written while extremely useful summary of the Abbey’s architecture see underneath:-
stainedglassattitudes.wordpress.com/2015/09/17/selby-the-…
Posted by Aidan McRae Thomson on 2022-01-21 16:45:00
Tagged: , Selby , Abbey , church , Yorkshire , inside , woodwork , pulpit
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