The very informative, if deeply depressing to anyone concerned with preserving the historic urban environment, blog Demolition Exeter: A Century of Destruction in an English Cathedral City ceased adding to its content in 2018 when the author moved from the city. The final post can be seen at End of a Blog. The blog records the destruction in the twentieth century of much of the centre of one of the most historic cities in England. In popular perception this is probably credited to the Luftwaffe and the ‘Baedeker Raid’ of 1942. The blog demonstrates the equal culpability of the city council both before and after WWII. It is worth looking at to realise how much was lost that could, and should, have been preserved, or indeed restored after the bombing in 1942.
I recently came upon a post on the site which looks at an earlier loss in the city, that of the fourteenth century reredos of the high altar in the cathedral and which also attempts to give a reconstruction of what must have been a spectacular feature.
The post can be seen at Exeter Cathedral: Bishop Stapledon's Lost Reredos
It is very interesting but so dispiriting in the loss that it records. Beyond the cathedral in Exeter Bishop Stapledon’s other enduring monument is, of course, Exeter College in Oxford.
Reading the rest of the blog you realise why Exeter High Street was awarded the palm of victory in the “Worst High Street in the Country” survey some years back.
Seems to me the worst of the damage to Exeter was done in the early 1800s. Besides demolishing the reredo in the cathedral, the manic authorities demolished the ancient Saxon (and large part Roman I think) city walls, all to make it slightly easier for carts to enter the city.
ReplyDeleteThose same walls had flummoxed even William the Conqueror and his army of occupation, when the townsfolk declined to pay the extra tax he had demanded, and it was only after protracted negotiations that the city gates were opened to him.
One of the giant gatehouses set in the walls was also the origin of the saying "living on a shoestring", because it was used as a debtor's prison, and the inmates would lower, on a length of string, shoes into which they hoped charitable passers by would cast coins.
Still, at least the splendid corbel carvings in the cathedral were spared, not least by puritan iconoclasts in the 1600s. I wrote a long article on these in my blog, at https://highranges.com although I must confess I have yet to find a single person who seems the least bit convinced by my theory as to their identities, despite the fact that the carving I claim is of William Rufus has different coloured eyes, as he was recorded to have. (I forgot to mention that in the article!)
Regards
John R Ramsden