Thirteenth-Century Glass of the Salisbury Chapter House

• Published in: Gesta (Fort Tryon Park, N.Y.) N.Y.), 1998-01, Vol.37 (2), p.142-149
• Main Author: Blum, Pamela Z.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Cathedrals; Churches; Glass; Glass art; Grisaille; Heraldry; Payments; Shields; Stained glass; Windows
• ISSN: 0016-920X; 2169-3099
• DOI: 10.2307/767253

This article deals with the history of the thirteenth-century grisaille and figural glass and the heraldic shields originally in the windows of the chapter house at Salisbury. The fabric accounts begin to record the removal of this glass during the reign of Elizabeth I. The relatively infrequent references to resetting the old glass and the rapid progress in mounting new glass suggest that, beginning in 1558, the reglazing involved primarily clear (or Normandy) quarries. A separate gathering of folios in the accounts datable to the year 1582 specifies the running feet of "nue glasse" installed in every bay of the chapter house. However inoffensive to iconoclasts the grisaille patterns of those windows may have been, the records indicate that by 1643, when hostilities during the Civil Wars reached Salisbury, large amounts of new glass had been installed at the expense of the old. Drawings made in 1802 by John Carter as artist to the Society of Antiquaries of London provided a visual survey of every ornamental and architectural detail in the building. As a resource, the drawings proved as important as the fabric accounts. Carter's sketches include the designs of all glass that had survived in each window, but do not indicate how much remained in each bay. Those drawings, together with an early seventeenth-century manuscript that recorded the heraldic shields then extant in the chapter house windows, permit us to speculate about the original number and placement of the shields. This article will also specify the current locations of all of the chapter house glass known to have survived.