Abergavenny Priory

   Our final port-of-call on what was a busy day of sight-seeing was Abergavenny - a lovely market town in Mid-Wales. The priory church is full of good things: a good set of late Medieval choir stalls, a plethora of tombs (Medieval and later) and a remarkable sculpture, in wood, of the sleeping Jesse.  It is about life-size and would have formed the base of a monumental sculptural group culminating in a figure of Christ - a 'Tree of Jesse'.  It is a rare and fortunate survivor.  Of the church the crossing, transepts and chancel (with chapels) are Medieval; the nave is Victorian replacement for the replacement of the Medieval structure.  The nave is not too bad, rather G F Bodley in style. Like the priory at Kidwelly that we visited last year it was founded, along with a castle, by a Norman aristocrat (in this case Hamelin de Bohun) as part of Norman invasion and settlement of Wales.

Holiday IV St Cuthbert, Wells

     At the other end of the High St from the cathedral is the Parish Church of St Cuthbert.  As you can see it has a spectacular 122ft high tower.   A tower that alone justifies this separate post.  A Somerset tower too, like those on the cathedral.  Something of a regional specialty; the signs of  a school of local well-trained skilful stone masons. In fact St Cuthbert's was thoroughly re-modelled in the Late Middle Ages, so that from the exterior it looks thoroughly Perpendicular.  The spacious, multi-vista'd  interior with transepts and side chapels however displays the work of an earlier building period: the nave arcades.  Early English in origin, they were (fantastically enough) partially taken down as part of the re-modelling, heightened by some 11ft and then rebuilt, capped with a new clerestory and a spectacular wooden roof.  There is another excellent roof in the southern side chapel.  There are in addition the remains of two mighty medieval reredoses on the east wall of both north and south transepts.  Both lucky survivors even in a mutilated state.  It is a shame then that none of the modern fittings are worthy of the architecture.