Note 135 — HISTORY OF THE CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF WELLS. (continued 2)

I must here quote Professor Willis, as reported in the Bristol Volume, p. xxviii. "The first thing to be noticed is under date 1286, when a Chapter was called together, and there was laid before them the urgent necessity which appeared from the state of the church, not only that the new structure, which had been a long time begun, should be finished, but that the whole fabric might be repaired and sustained, and such new constructions as were requisite be carried out. In 1286, however, comparing the probable date of the building which I suppose to be called the new structure, it can only be the chapter-house; and the lower part of it, commonly called the crypt, was, as I conclude, then completed.... The structure of the chapter-house consists of two parts, and it is quite evident that the crypt was separated from the upper part by a very considerable interval. I conceive, therefore, that in 1286 the portion of the chapter-house called the crypt was completed." In the Somersetshire Transactions, xii. 19, the Professor adds that "it was agreed that each Canon should pay a tenth of his prebend yearly for five years."

Bishop Godwin says (p. 300) of Bishop William of March, "In this mans time [1293-1302] the chapter-house was built, by the contribution of well-disposed people; a stately and sumptuous worke." Godwin wrote, I suppose, from local tradition, as there is nothing like it in the Canon's history in Anglia Sacra. His date quite falls in with the Professor's extracts.