CHAPTER I

HISTORY OF THE CHURCH

The early history of St. Michael’s Church is very obscure. The fact that Domesday mentions no parish churches proves nothing. There can be little doubt that one at least existed Though we have an earlier record of St. Michael’s it is commonly held that Trinity is the elder foundation.

Of St. Michael’s the first notice we have is when Ranulph, Earl of Chester, in the days of Stephen, about 1150, granted the “Chapel” of St. Michael to Laurence, Prior, and the Convent of St. Mary, “being satisfied by the testimony of divers persons, as well Clergy as Laity, that it was their right.” Fourteen dependent chapels in the neighbourhood or within a few miles went with it and the number of these dependencies is held to show that it was “a primitive Saxon parish and of considerable importance.” In 1192 Ranulph Blundeville, grandson of the former Ranulph, gave tithe of his lands and rents in Coventry and bound his officers under pain of a grievous curse to make due payment.

In the early thirteenth century a dispute arose between Bishop Geoffrey de Muschamp and the Priory as to the right of presentation, the Bishop claiming on the ground of being Abbot as well as Bishop. This was settled in 1241 by the Priory renouncing its claim in consideration of receiving a share of the income but in 1248 an exchange was effected, the Priory giving the advowsons of Ryton and Bubbenhall (not far from Coventry) for St. Michael and its chapels and engaging to provide proper secular priests with competent support. In 1260 the church was appropriated to the monastery together with Holy Trinity and its chapels and although in the arrangement of 1248 twenty-four marks (L16) had been assigned to the vicarage, in 1291 we find the priory receiving fifty marks and paying the vicar eight and a half.

Since 1537 the patronage has with that of Trinity, been exercised by the Crown.

The internal evidence of the date of the building is given in the description of the fabric. Of external evidence in the shape of records or deeds we have very little. Tradition says that there was once a brass tablet in the church bearing the following lines:

William and Adam built the Tower,
Ann and Mary built the Spire;
William and Adam built the Church,
Ann and Mary built the Choir.

Now we know that William and Adam Botoner, who were each Mayor thrice between 1358 and 1385, built the tower, spending upon it L100 a year for twenty-two years, but what foundation there is for the other statements cannot now be determined The tower was in building from 1373 to 1394, and the choir is contemporary with it, the nave was in building from 1432 to 1450, and the spire was begun in 1430. As William was Mayor in 1358 it can hardly have been less than one hundred years after his birth that both nave and spire were begun. It is however, likely that other members of the family (if not he, by bequest) contributed largely to the general building fund

Much of the history of a parish church is concerned with its internal economy but even the records of this are not quite trivial for they enlighten us on many points wherein we are rightly curious. We are, for instance, constantly reminded, as Dr. Gasquet points out in Mediaeval Parish Life, that religious life permeated society in the Middle Ages, particularly in the fifteenth century, through the minor confraternities or gilds.

Thus the Drapers’ Gild made itself responsible not only for the upkeep of the Lady Chapel but also for the lights always burning on the Rood-loft, every Master paying four pence for each “prentys” and every “Jurneman” four pence. The cost of lights formed a serious item in church expenditure, needing the rent of houses and lands for their maintenance. Guy de Tyllbrooke, vicar in the late thirteenth century, gave all his lands and buildings on the south side of the church to maintain a light before the high altar, day and night, for ever, “and all persons who shall convert this gift to any other use directly or indirectly shall incur the malediction of Almighty God, the Blessed Virgin, St. Michael and All Saints.

Royal visits to the church have been noticed in the history of the priory and city, especially that in 1450 which was apparently intended to mark the completion of the church. Reference has also been made to the plays and pageants with which such visitors were entertained The site for the performance of the cycle of Corpus Christi plays was the churchyard on the north of St. Michael’s. Queen Margaret, whose visits were so frequent that the city acquired the fanciful title of “the Queen’s Bower” came over from Kenilworth on the Eve of the Feast in 1456, “at which time she would not be met, but privily to see the play there on the morrow and she saw then all the pageants played save Doomsday, which might not be played for lack of day and she was lodged at Richard Wood’s the Grocer.”

There is evident reference to the dedication of the church in the pageant of the “Nine Orders of Angels” shown before Henry VIII and Queen Catherine in 1510.

The history of the church since the Reformation has been not unlike that of a vast number of others. Fanatic destruction, followed by tasteless and incongruous innovations, and these again by “restorations” sometimes as destructive, sometimes as tasteless, and nearly always feeble; such is their common history. In 1569 even the Register books were destroyed because they contained marks of popery, while from 1576 onward a want of repair is plainly suggested by frequent items of expenditure for catching the stares (starlings) in the church, at one time for a net, at another for “a bowe and bolts and lyme.” In 1611 James I addressed a strongly worded letter to the Mayor and Corporation and the Vicar requiring them to reform the practice of receiving the Holy Sacrament standing or sitting instead of kneeling, “As we our Self in our person do carefully perform it.” Whereupon the Bishop wrote that he “felt persuaded that there were not above seven of any note who did not conform themselves” to the church ordinances; while the Vicar said he “did not know of half seven of any note but do the like.”

A Puritanical writer in 1635 thus mentions the changed position of the Communion Table, which had formerly stood away from the east wall: “The Communion Table was altered which cost a great deal of money; and that which is worst of all, three stepps made to go to the Comm’n Table altar fashion God grant it continueth not long.” Even the font, given by John Cross, mayor, in 1394, had to give place in 1645 to something less offensive to Puritan feeling, and in the same year the brass eagle, given in 1359 by William Botoner, was “sold by order of vestry for 5d the lb., 8d” The rehanging of the bells in 1674 led to the destruction of the beautiful groined vault within the tower, and the year 1764 saw the completion of a series of galleries all round the church. Throughout all this destruction and desecration the citizens happily retained their pride in the great steeple, and by constant attention and rebuildings contrived to preserve it when negligence might have caused its ruin. The scrupulous care given to such work is well shown by items in an account for repairs, of date 1580:

Payed to George Aster for poyntynge ye steple L 7 2
Payed for 3 quarter and a halfe of lyme 13
Payed for egges 8
Payed for glovers pecis, woode & tallowe, abowte the lyme 5
Payed for a load sand 71/
Payed for 4 stryke of mawlte and gryndyng 7 81/
Payd for 6 gallons of worte more 2
Payd for gatherynge of slates & oyster shelles 31/
Payd to Cookson for the cradle and 3 other pullesses 5 8

The glovers snippings were for making size, which, with the eggs, malt and wort were used in place of water for tempering the mortar. Lightning seriously damaged the spire in 1655 and 1694, in the former case causing much injury to the nave roof by falling stone. In 1793 Wyatt, the architect responsible for so much destruction of Mediaeval work in various cathedrals, advised that a timber framework to carry the bells should be built up within the tower from the ground and that the tower arch should be bricked up. All this has been changed since 1885, the bells now hang (but are not pealed) in the octagon, the chimes and clock are in the chamber below, the arch is opened and the groining restored

All galleries had been taken down in 1849 and the present seats, giving room for near 2,500 persons, introduced, while the incongruous wall-arcading in the apse was soon after added At the same period many important sepulchral monuments, probably stigmatized as “excrescences,” were taken down and removed to other parts of the church.

Five years after this the exterior of the aisle walls was recased with the same friable sandstone. In 1860 the reredos was erected, the subjects of the panels being the sacrifices of Abel, Noah, Melchisedec, and Abraham, and the Last Supper. To the latest restoration, which included entire recasing of tower and spire, clearstories and chancel, the new sacristy at the south east, and other work, Mr. George Woodcock, a Coventry citizen, gave L10,500, and the sum of L39,500 was raised and expended, the re-opening taking place on 22nd April, 1890.

In 1850 a dispute of considerable public interest with regard to the levying of the church rate between the vicar and the wardens and overseers was decided in the Court of Queen’s Bench. An Act of Parliament of 1780 had empowered the wardens to levy a rate in lieu of tithe for the stipend of the vicar, to produce not less than L280 nor more than L300. The wardens having ever since allowed their powers to remain in abeyance, the vicar claimed the right to make the rate as his predecessors had done. Lord Campbell and three other judges were however unanimous in giving judgement against him.

The latest event in the history of the church is probably the most important. It has now been constituted a pro-cathedral for the proposed Diocese of Warwickshire, and a Capitular body has been formed The statutes were promulgated by the Bishop of Worcester on the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels, 1908. The Chapter now consists of twenty-four members: the Bishop, the Vicar of St. Michael’s (Rev. Prof. J.H.B. Masterman), the Archdeacon of Coventry, the Chancellor of the Diocese, ten priest canons and ten lay canons, with provision for the admission of a future second archdeacon. There are resemblances here to the constitution of the Southwark Chapter, consisting of four clerical and four lay canons, but at Coventry some of the lay canons are elective and for fixed periods. Doubtless the immense increase of population in the county, especially in this part (Birmingham is already a separate diocese), demands further oversight and much strenuous church work, and doubtless, too, the same religious enthusiasm which brought into existence the beautiful structures of Coventry’s golden age will be able to meet the demand and cope with the new problems and aspirations of the present day. But the archaeologist trembles to think what may be done should the attempt be made to transform a building planned on the simplest parish-church lines into the semblance of a cathedral. It cannot be successful, and the original character of the church is but too likely to be sacrificed in the attempt.

CHAPTER II

THE EXTERIOR OF THE CHURCH

The church is built on a site descending towards the east, so that the chancel floor is more than twelve feet above the present street level. The narrow street on the south, Bayley Lane, gives us a succession of picturesque partial views but no general one, while on the north the rather formal avenue dividing the churchyard obscures much of the structure. On the whole, the most comprehensive prospect is to be had from the north-east, at the lower end of Priory Row. But no general point of view is needed, external or internal, to enable us to understand the plan or arrangement, which is almost as simple in form as a village church.

The typical English church plan consists of a nave with aisles, a long unaisled chancel with square east end, porches or doors on north and south, and a western tower, and this, save for its apsidal east end, but amplified by accretions in the form of chapels belonging to the many Gilds of the city, is the plan of St. Michaels.

In no part, however, do we find the chapels so set as to produce a pseudo-cruciform plan.

Before the latest restoration the walls were entirely of the local red sandstone, very similar in quality and appearance to that of which Chester Cathedral was built, and the extent of its decay, especially on the tower, was as grievous. Hardly a piece of external moulding or carving preserved its original profile or form, and some of the tower buttresses had lost so large a proportion of their substance not far above ground that they appeared to hang to the walls rather than support them. All save the aisles, which were refaced in the sixties, have now been cased with Runcorn Stone nearly the same in colour and much harder in texture.

The special glory of the church is its steeple. No doubt intentionally its height of 300 feet is practically equal to the length of the church. Only one other parish church, Louth in Lincolnshire, has a steeple as high as this, and those of only two English cathedrals, Salisbury and Norwich, exceed it.

There is, however, an essential difference to be noted in the position of these spires, those of the cathedrals at the centre, the crowning point in the composition, those of the parish churches at the west end, springing sheer from the ground While the former have a more intimate relation to the building the latter have an almost independent existence in keeping with the theory which regards them more as symbols of municipal pride and power than as expressions of spiritual aspiration.

But however mixed the motives for their erection, religious forms and symbolism governed the design. Thus we have here three principal divisions tower, octagon, spire, and nine stories or stages in all, six belonging to the tower and octagon, and three to the spire. Then in its dimensions we find that the total height is 300 feet, the plan (exclusive of buttresses) is 30 feet square, while in its proportions the number 30 is interwoven, so to speak, with a simple arithmetical progression of heights in each story. Thus it is 30 feet from the ground to the spring of the lowest five-light windows, 30 feet again to the spring of the single-light windows, 27 feet more to the spring of the grouped windows above, and another 30 to the spring of the belfry windows. Thence it is 15 feet to the cornice below the battlements. The remainder is divided into a series of 20 feet heights, two twenties from cornice to top of parapet of octagon, 20 in each of the two decorated stages of the spire, 20 to centre of the upper spire-lights, three twenties to the finial. If we look at the stories as marked by the string-courses below the windows we find 50 feet given to the door and great window and then 20, 30, and 40 feet stages, reaching to the top of the parapet. The reader will have noticed the interposition of a 27 feet space among the thirties, and the reason for this is worth explaining.

It is now known that the tower could not be built in line with the centre of the proposed new nave because of the existence of a filled-in pit or quarry at its north-west angle. But the builder was rash enough to build the north-west buttresses beyond the edge of the old excavation and resting on the looser material. The consequences might have been foreseen. By the time the building had reached the grouped windows the settlement or sinking was considerable and an effort was made to remedy it, first by reducing the height of this (the weakest story), by one yard and next by starting the courses level once more. Five hundred years later and we find that whereas the sinking is 71/2 inches near the ground level it is only 4 inches at the windows, plainly showing that it had sunk 31/2 inches before the remedy was applied and four inches since. The writer is informed by the architect (Mr. J. Oldrid Scott) that all this angle was so full of rents and cracks that (coupled with the decay of the stone, especially in the buttresses) it was surprising that the whole had not fallen. A curious disregard of what we look on as a natural sentiment is to be noted in this connection, for the builders used a quantity of fine sepulchral slabs from the churchyard as filling for the foundations.

In magnificence of design the tower exceeds that of any other parish church in England, the uppermost story being the richest in detail. The variety of treatment and gradual increase in elaboration of the upper stories is admirable, the larger expanses of wall in the lower giving the necessary effect of stability to the whole. The west door is very insignificant, and might perhaps, with advantage to the composition, have been left out. It has the only four-centred arch in the whole. On each side of the great windows are niches with (restored) figures of saints and benefactors, twelve in all, including Earl Leofric and his famous wife, the Botoners and several kings. Sculpture appears again on the belfry stage. On the west and north sides the niches are in three tiers of three on either hand of the tall louvred windows, but on the south and east sides one tier is absorbed by the stair turret. All these have been renewed, but the remains of some of those which were taken down can now be seen in the crypt, and the one which is best preserved, by a happy coincidence the patron saint, is now placed within the church.

The octagon, which connects so finely the tower and spire, has four two-light windows on the cardinal sides, the other sides having blank panelling of similar design. Its parapet has square pinnacles, intended to carry seated figures. From each of the great tower pinnacles two ogee-shaped flying buttresses spring to the near angles of the octagon. A recent writer criticizes these as too flimsy in effect, but the fact that they are in pairs obviates this defect from most points of view. The walls of the octagon are 21/2 feet thick at the base, but, as the inner slope of the spire begins at the level of the window transoms, the thickness at its parapet is more than 3 feet. The greater weight in this part corrects any tendency in the spire to push outwards the upright walls of the octagon; so well has it done this that no artificial helps, such as iron stays or bands, have been found necessary to add to its stability. Though so slender in appearance, its stonework is thicker than that of many later spires, for whereas Kettering is 14 inches thick for the first 10 feet and only 6 inches above, while Louth decreases from 10 to 5, St. Michael’s diminishes from 17 to 11. The inclination from the upright of its sides is very slight, less than that of most others; Chichester having an angle of 71/2 deg., Kettering 6 deg., Louth 5 deg., St. Michael’s 41/2 deg..

The decoration of the spire is admirably designed in relation to the slenderness of the tower, and its own height above the eye. The first stage is panelled so as not to present too great a contrast to the octagon, and the next is also panelled and has narrow canopied slits on alternate sides, with four thin buttress-like projections on each face. These provide the slight entasis to the outline which is found in so many spires, as it is in classic columns, and is designed to correct the appearance of hollowness which would occur in so long a straight line. The upper two-thirds of the spire has triple angle rolls, and, just halfway in the total height, are eight canopied panels of which four are pierced The beauty of the steeple and its pre-eminence among those belonging to parish churches (even if such a reservation be necessary) sufficiently justifies the length of this description.

The oldest existing part of the church is the large south porch, almost facing the entrance to St. Mary Hall. The date of this is not later than 1300. Each jamb of the outside arch has four external and two internal attached shafts; the pointed arch is deeply moulded, while the arch rising from the fourth shaft is of round-headed trefoil form. The ceiling is vaulted with diagonal and intermediate ribs, and has the appearance of having been added rather later.

A doorway on its east side led to the Cappers’ Chapel and there is a chamber over the porch for centuries appropriated to the meetings of the Cappers’ Company. The present chapel and chamber are contemporary with the nave.

The external wall of the Dyers’ Chapel (now the Baptistery) is canted so as not to block the Lane, St. Mary Hall having been already built. Passing east, the road dips gradually and gives this end of the church a more imposing elevation. After the Cappers’ Chapel, there is only a single aisle forming the Mercers’ Chapel and extending as far as the Presbytery. A door here, made in 1750, is opposite to the Drapers’ Hall. The apse is now encircled with a series of sacristies divided into five chambers and spanned by flying buttresses. The first two bays on the south were built at the last restoration the vestry then removed not being part of the original design. Beneath them on the ground level is the engine-room pertaining to the organ. Though sometimes spoken of as an Ambulatory its position on a lower level, its original want of connection with the south side and above all the need for sacristies in so large a church dispose of the idea.

Some have thought that the apsidal Lady Chapel of Lichfield Cathedral built about fifty years earlier suggested an apsidal termination in the design of Coventry, but a certain difficulty in the way of the designer may have led him to adopt this solution. The normal Perpendicular east end had one large window, but owing to the great width of this chancel the proportions of such a one would have been nearly square, and the spring of the arch have been very low. A few years later and the depressed four-centred arch might have been adopted but, fortunately, its time was not yet.

The plans of the apses of Lichfield and Coventry differ in the angle at which the sides are inclined to the chord of the apse, the former having the usual angle of 45 deg., the latter one of more than 60 deg.. Externally this is not so pleasant as the more commonplace form, the great dissimilarity of the several angles being unsatisfactory and the third side too quickly lost to view, but within the church these points are not noticed

So little time elapsed between the building of the choir and nave that we find no marked difference of style as we proceed westward along either flank of the church. The Lady Chapel, known as the Drapers’ Chapel, from its use and maintenance by that Gild, occupies the three bays of the North chancel aisle. From its elevation above the ground it was often spoken of as the “Chapel on the Mount,” Capella Beatae Mariae de Monte. All the four windows are of seven lights, the three northern having a somewhat unusual transom band of fourteen quatrefoils, at the spring of the arch. The two windows of St. Lawrence’s Chapel have a transom across the lights and a band of seven quatrefoils at the spring.

The buttresses of the Lady Chapel are rather richer in design than those of St. Lawrence’s Chapel. The lower level of its parapet indicates some difference of date. The plan of this part of the church presents problems which bear on those connected with the rest of the church. Beneath St. Lawrence’s Chapel and extending under the north aisle westward are two crypts, entrance to them being by two doors from the churchyard, their position is shown on the general plan. It will be seen that the western one is of two aisles, each of three bays, while the eastern is only one bay in length. The entrance to the western was at first in the middle bay but this was blocked when the Girdlers’ Chapel was built. That the eastern crypt was added later, and the present Lady Chapel later still is shown by the presence of windows in the east wall of both parts and other indications. But while the history of the church shows that the original Lady Chapel and crypt or charnel-house, were built soon after 1300, the present superstructures belong to a time about one hundred years later. Now as the western crypt may be safely assigned to the earlier date the Lady Chapel doubtless stood over it and flanked the old chancel of the church, in its normal position in fact as the existing one is now. But a point which remains to be explained is that the walls of the crypt are parallel to the line of the new chancel and not to the line of the old or new naves. It seems certain therefore that the inclination of the new chancel is a simple perpetuation of the old arrangement, and if not, the position of the crypt is hard to account for.

It is generally supposed that these crypts were used as Mortuary Chapels and the eastern one has in fact a piscina and aumbry, showing that there was once an altar. But for some centuries they served as a charnel-house, and are so called in a papal grant of Indulgences. In 1640 there is an entry in the church accounts of five shillings for “cleansinge the charnel-house and laying the bones and sculles in order.”

They now contain fragments that have been removed or discovered in the course of various restorations. A small Norman scalloped capital, another of Early English workmanship and a voussoir showing the Norman zig-zag or chevron are interesting relics of structures earlier than anything now existing, while a number of the decayed statues from the tower find here a dark and damp repose very different from the airy outlook enjoyed by them for five centuries. It will be seen that they are near life size and are executed in a gray sandstone which has stood the weather much better than the red The outer north aisle containing the Girdlers’ Chapel on the east and the Smiths’ or St. Andrew’s Chapel on the west of the porch, is plainly of later date. The windows have depressed, distinctly four-centred arches, and in 1730 their five lights had simply cusped heads, the mullions running up to the architrave.

The north porch has only a slight projection. Above the four-centred arch are two two-light canopied windows opening into the church. The soffit of the doorway is panelled On the west side where is now a canopied niche was formerly an external pulpit reached from within by the staircase which leads to the roof. It is shown in the 1730 view. On the east side are two odd little flying buttresses, intended apparently to repeat the inclined surface of the other side. The two north aisles are fortunately not carried westward so far as the nave, which projects a half bay beyond them and so prevents the otherwise unrelieved flatness of this part. The most effective of the porches is that on the west front, just north of the tower. It appears to have been built after the nave was finished, and may have been added expressly to provide a more dignified entrance to the church when Henry VI came in state in 1451, for it faces directly up the nave. The groining with cusped panels and numerous bosses has escaped restoration. The five niches above the porch are statueless, and so are those on the porch front. May they long continue so! The doors are largely original and are finely panelled and carved

CHAPTER III

THE INTERIOR OF THE CHURCH

From within the door by which the church is usually entered, that near the south-west angle, we obtain an overpowering impression of the special characteristic of the interior, its spaciousness, for it is here more than 100 feet wide and the east window is nearly 240 feet distant.

The nave, which is 37 feet 6 inches wide in the clear, is wider than that of many cathedrals, and much exceeds that of most parish churches, the widest (Worstead) given in Brandon’s “Parish Churches” being 29 feet. Boston alone exceeds it by about 3 feet. While the ordinary aisle width ranges from 10 to 14 feet, the north aisle here is 23 feet, the outer north and the south being each 17 feet. The total internal length is 265 feet, exclusive of the sacristy; Boston, the only larger one, being 284 feet, while very few exceed 200 feet, and most are far smaller. The greatest internal width is 120 feet; Manchester, a double-aisled collegiate church, is about the same, and York Minster is 106 feet. Finally, the area is about 22,800 square feet, probably greater than that of any other English parish church, indeed, St. Nicholas, Yarmouth, is the only one which pretends to rivalry in this respect. Size is, of course, only one element in the impressiveness of a building, and may even be neutralized by the treatment (as, for instance, in the Duomo of Florence and St. Peter’s, Rome, by increasing the size of its parts rather than multiplying them), but these few comparisons will help the visitor to judge how far this element colours his appreciation of the whole. As an illustration of mediaeval methods of church building, it is interesting to trace the growth of the structure with the help of the few historical notices already given and the evidence of the building itself. The subject is full of difficulties, and the writer does not hope to solve them conclusively, but to put before the reader the main points which have to be considered before forming a judgement.

Both historic and structural evidence agree that there was an existing smaller church when the tower was built in the last quarter of the fourteenth century, that the choir and apse were either contemporary, or begun a few years earlier, and that the nave was built between 1434 and 1450. The south porch and the west crypt (beneath the original Lady Chapel) are almost contemporary, belonging to the beginning of the fourteenth century. Now the axis of the tower is parallel to the axis and walls of the nave, while the centre line of the choir is deflected towards the north about 7 deg.. Notwithstanding this, however, owing to the tower not being central with the nave, the axis of the choir, if prolonged, runs directly to the centre of the tower arch, as may easily be seen by anyone who stands there and looks along the ridge of the choir roof. (See dotted line on Plan.)

Next we see above the tower arch the mark of the old nave roof and the old north wall of the nave. These show that the south wall stood where the present one does, and the low-pitched fourteenth century roof-line suggests incidentally this alternative: either a clearstory had been added to the nave before the building of the new chancel or tower was in contemplation, or, when the huge tower was built it was felt necessary to raise the nave roof so as to lessen the disproportion. But, if we adopt the latter alternative we must accept too the improbability that this expense should have been incurred when the inadequacy of the old narrow nave of 151/2 feet compared with a chancel of 33 feet must have been so obvious. This is one of the difficult questions.

Then it is held by some that the axis of the old nave and chancel was in line with that of the present choir; but the south porch, built more than one hundred years before the new nave, is at right angles with it which would hardly have been the case had the two naves not been on the same lines.

Needless to say the old east end could scarcely have extended beyond the present nave, so that the new chancel was probably built without disturbing the old church. The position of the older Lady Chapel supports this view, while its bearing towards the north, as already pointed out, indicates that the deflection of the new chancel is simply copied from the older one.

The position of the south porch proves also that the south aisle was as wide as the present one, while the fact that it was wider than the nave shows that it was almost certainly not designed at the same time.

The nave is of six bays and is 54 feet high at the centre, while each arch is 20 feet wide in the clear. The piers are slender, but, owing to the depth of the panelling above the arches and the large size of the windows, the weight upon them is reduced to a minimum. Shafts carried up from the ground support the roof brackets, and there are intermediate ones over the centre of each arch. The clearstory windows of four lights each are in pairs, and the mullions are carried down to form panelling and finish on the backs of the arches, which recede in two sloping faces and form a somewhat unusual feature in the treatment of the wall surface. The detail of the piers and arches is rather weak, even for Perpendicular work.

The chancel is about 93 feet long, and in height and width is 4 or 5 feet less than the corresponding nave measurements. Its width further diminishes by about 31/2 feet in the length of the three bays. The omission of a chancel arch is a step towards the ideal simplicity of the late Perpendicular churches (e.g., St. Peter Mancroft, Norwich), running from east to west without break, but the large rood piers and reduced width and height of chancel make the pause demanded in so long a church. The step at this point is of oak, and is probably the original sill of the rood screen. The large figures of Ss. Peter and Paul were placed on the piers in 1861. Of the three arches which open on either hand the centre one is widest, having four-light windows, instead of three-light, over it. The panelling beneath the clearstory is richer than that in the nave. The five four-light windows of the apse are lofty and divided by two transoms, but the design is somewhat commonplace. The glass of the middle three is a memorial to Queen Adelaide, dated 1853. The other two are filled with fragments of the ancient stained glass of the church.

The roof is very similar to that of the nave. Both are of very low pitch, with tie-beams supported by curved brackets. There are two longitudinal beams (purlins) on each side, and each division of the roof made by these main timbers is sub-divided by mouldings into panels, all the intersections and angles being decorated by carved bosses or paterae, with angels upon the tie-beams. Where the roofs of nave and chancel join there is a cove to connect the two levels; and on the tie-beam above this was found a Latin inscription, giving the attributes and powers of the nine choirs of angels forming the hierarchy of Heaven. Translated it is as follows:

SERAPHIMS burn in love of God
CHERUBIMS possess all knowledge.
THRONES, of them is judgement.
DOMINIONS preside over angelic spirits.
VIRTUES effect miracles.
POWERS have rule over demons.
PRINCIPALITIES protect good men.
ARCHANGELS are set over states.
ANGELS are the messengers of the Lord

Bare and shorn as it is of its ancient magnificence, St. Michael’s is in its structure a monument of the importance and wealth of the Gilds. Many of them built or maintained chapels and altars, adding largely to the already spacious proportions given to the main structure by the munificence of a few rich citizens. That in 1491 there were eleven altars we know from the will of Thomas Bradmedow, directing that eleven torches, price 2d, be given every Good Friday, one to every altar. Besides the High Altar there were those of Our Lady, Jesus, Holy Trinity, St. John, St. Anne, St. Katherine, St. Thomas, St. Andrew, St. Lawrence, All Saints.

The application to the Lady Chapel of the present name, the “Drapers’ Chapel,” is probably subsequent to 1518, when John Haddon, a draper, provided by will for the support of a priest, “to singe in the Chapell of our Ladye in the Church of Saint Mychell.” But long ere this, by an instrument dated from St. John Lateran, A.d 1300, eighth year of Pope Boniface, Indulgences for forty days were granted for all persons coming to confess before her altar in St. Michael’s Church on the Nativity, Conception, Annunciation and Assumption of the glorious Virgin Mary. Also 700 Indulgences for 720 days were granted for building “the Chapple and Charnell house of St. Michaell, Coventry.” The Drapers’ Company was responsible for other things than the priest’s stipend as this extract from their Rules shows: “1534. Ev’y mastur shall pay toward ye makyng clene of oure Lady Chapell in saynt Mychell’s churche and strawyng ye setus [seats] wt rusches in somer and pease strawe in wyntur, everyone yerely 2d”

The piers at the chancel entrance contain the staircases leading to the roofs and formerly to the rood loft. The screen on the west side of the chapel was put together from fragments brought together from various parts of the church. Against it, and on the south side, are fifteen of the ancient stalls. Several admirable ends and elbows remain, and some of the twelve ancient Misereres are of special interest. Three represent scenes from the popular mediaeval allegory of “the Dance of Death.”

The centre groups are: (1) a death bed, (2) a kneeling man being deprived of his shirt and a cripple waiting to receive it (?), and (3) a very well-expressed burial scene. The side groups in each show Death leading by the hand personages of various ranks, including a pope. Of the others, Satan in chains, the General Resurrection, and a delicately executed Tree of Jesse are the best.

Several monuments formerly in this chapel are now elsewhere in the church. A memorial to the Hon. F.W. Hood, killed in battle in 1814, is by Chantrey. On the north wall is a brass plate bearing the following inscription:

Here lyeth Mr Thomas Bond, Draper, sometime Mayor of this Cittie and founder of the Hospitall of Bablake, who gave divers lands and tenements for the maintenance of ten poore men so long as the world shall endure and a woman to looke to them with many other good guifts; and died the XVIII day of March in the yeare of our Lord God MDVI.

The Communion Table is a fine example of early seventeenth century work, and outside the screen is a very beautiful oak chest, believed to date from the time of Henry VII. From the Lady Chapel we pass into that of St. Laurence. Its two windows are filled with glass to the memory of past mayors. The dates, 1860 and 1862, sufficiently suggest their artistic merit. Several old monuments are upon the north wall, one of 1648 with an extravagant inscription to Thomas Purefoy, a boy of nine; another to Mrs. Bathona Frodsham, a daughter of the John Hales who bought so much monastic property, and founded the Grammar School. The tomb of his first wife, Frideswede, near which he was buried, may be seen in the Dugdale view near the north porch.

The outer north aisle contained the Girdlers’ Chapel. The arcade which divides the aisles shows the consummation of the process which converted columns into piers by the omission of capitals and bases and the continuation of the mouldings from pier into arch.

The altar was below the eastern window, the piscina (restored) stands on the south side.

The Company has been long extinct and no documents exist. We know, however, that Haye’s Chantry was founded by a Girdler in 1390, for a Mass to be sung daily at All Saints’ altar, and may therefore conclude that it was in this chapel.

In the two western bays of the same aisle was St. Andrews Chapel, supported and probably founded by the Smiths Company. The first notice of its existence occurs in 1449, but as this part was not built until 1500 it was perhaps originally in the adjoining aisle. The window tracery is modern. The panelling within the internal arches and between the windows should be noted The floor near the wall is partly paved with much worn ancient tiles.

Several large monuments have been brought hither from the Drapers’ Chapel. An altar tomb of black marble is to the memory of Sir Thomas Berkeley, only son of Henry, Lord Berkeley, who died in 1611; another of 1640, to William Stanley, Master of the Merchant Taylors’ Company of London and a benefactor of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital and of his native city, Coventry. While these are ponderous and unlovely that of Julian Nethermyl, at the west end of the principal north aisle, is a work of interest and much beauty. It is an altar tomb with a sculptured panel on one end and one side, the other end and side having been next to walls. It is of interest as an early example of the Italian style then finding its way into England, and an example so free from Gothic influence that there can be little doubt that a foreign craftsman was employed upon it. On the centre of the long panel is a mutilated crucifix, and a brief inscription with a shield of arms beneath. On either hand kneel Julian Nethermyl and his wife, with five sons behind him and five daughters behind her. A cherub at each end pushes aside a curtain. The group of sons is well treated, the variations in pose and dress show the hand of one who was accustomed to study composition, and the result is very different from the formal repetition of equal or lessening figures usual on mediaeval brasses and Elizabethan tombs. The Latin inscription is partly illegible, translated it runs:

Here lies Julian Nethermyl, Draper, formerly Mayor of this City, who died the 11th day of the month of April in the year of our Lord 1539 and also Joan his wife, to whose souls God be propitious. Amen.

A small brass on the wall to the memory of Mary Hinton, wife of a vicar, who died in 1594, represents her kneeling at a faldstool, and facing a row of four swaddled infants laid upon the floor.

Near by is the old Purbeck marble font, said to have been given by John Cross, Mayor, in 1394.

As, however, the form, material, and shallow decoration are all quite consistent with a thirteenth-century date there can be little doubt that this one is the predecessor of that given by John Cross, which was condemned and removed by the Puritans as superstitious. A small brass, bearing a shield with four crosses, the ancient merchant mark, is fixed upon it.

Beyond the west door is the north-east buttress of the tower, strengthened by a mass of masonry, part of which formed part of the old nave wall. The tower arch is high and very narrow, owing to the narrowness of the old nave. The interior of the tower is very effective, both from the height, which is almost 100 feet to the crown of the vault, and the beautiful lighting of the upper stages. Each of the large windows of the ground story is set in a recessed arch, and between the two lantern stages is a range of panelling. The vertical lines of the various stages are not continuous, a want of regularity, which would probably not have occurred had it been built a century later. Upon the floor of the tower are two small brasses, which mark respectively the centre of the tower and the point below the apex of the spire, showing that the spire has an inclination of 3 feet 6 inches towards the north-west. On the walls of the tower two very large brasses record the names of the Vicars of the church since 1242, and of the Bishops in whose Diocèses Coventry has been included from the earliest times. Of the latter, four were Bishops of Mercia, twenty-seven of Lichfield, six of Coventry, thirty-three of Coventry and Lichfield, thirteen of Lichfield and Coventry, four of Worcester, and two Bishops-Suffragan of Coventry.

The south aisle is 6 feet narrower than the north at the west end, but its want of parallelism adds 7 feet to its width at its far eastern end

The south-west doorway has its original doors, though these have been subjected to restoration. The first chapel on the south side belonged to the Dyers’ Company. When the principal trade of Coventry was the manufacture of woollen and worsted stuffs and the production of a special blue thread, so excellent that it gave rise to a proverbial expression, “he is true Coventry Blue”, the Dyers were an important Company. A chantry known as Tale’s was probably attached to this chapel, as the salary of the priest, L5 6s 8d, was paid by the Dyers’ Company of London. An upper chamber for the priest existed as late as 1607; the floor corbels still remain. A large marble monument (removed hither from the chancel) has medallion portraits of two ladies Dame Mary Bridgeman and Mrs. Eliza Samwell. The former with her husband, Sir Orlando (Lord Keeper of the Great Seal under Charles II), both died in 1701. The latter, dying in 1724, “ordered this monument to be erected as a remembrance of their great and loving friendship.”

The Chapel is now the Baptistery. A large eighteenth-century marble font was removed to the Lady Chapel and a new Gothic one put in its place, so that there are now three in the church.

The south porch (1300) is the earliest part of the existing church. The inner doors appear to be of the early sixteenth century, the outer, though old, are of much later date and are not part of the original scheme. On the wall on each side of the inner doors are brasses of some interest. That on the right hand has a curious epitaph which runs thus:

Here lies the body of Captn Gervase Scrope, of the family of
Scropes, of Bolton in the County of York, who departed this life
the 26 of August, Anno Dni 1705, aged 66.

An Epitaph, written by himself, in the agony and dolorous paines
of the gout and dyed soon after.

Here lyes an old toss’d Tennis Ball
Was racketted, from spring to fall,
With so much heat and so much hast,
Time’s arm for shame grew tyred at last.
Four kings in camps he truly served
And from his loyalty ne’er swerved,
Father ruin’d and son slighted,
And from the Crown neer requited
Loss of estate, relations, blood,
Was too well known, but did no good;
With long Campaigns and paines oth’ gout
He cou’d no longer hold it out.
Always a restless life he led,
Never at quiet till quite dead
He marry’d in his later days,
One who exceeds the common praise
But wanting breath still to make known
Her true affection and his own,
Death kindly came, all wants supplied
By giving rest which life denyd

The other brass, of 1609, has a portrait of Ann Sewell in Jacobean costume, kneeling, with an epitaph in which she is described as “a worthy stirrer up of others to all holy virtues.

A doorway leads to a priest’s chamber over the porch, sometimes incorrectly spoken of as the Cappers’ Chapel. It is still used for the annual meeting of the Company, but is inaccessible to the public.

The next chapel eastwards is St. Thomas’, belonging until 1629 to the Cappers’ and Feltmakers’ Company. In 1531 they were associated in its maintenance with the Woollen Cardmakers who had founded it in 1467 and had after declined in importance. Leland, as we have seen records also the decay of the Cappers’ industry. A large eighteenth-century monument conceals the original doorway from the porch. The eastern part of the south aisle as far as the screen formed another chapel as the dilapidated piscina in the south wall shows. The organ is now placed in the first bay of the chancel aisle, the whole aisle having once formed the Mercers’ Chapel.

Where the altar once stood are now steps descending to the sacristies. On the right of the window is the statue of St. Michael brought hither from the tower. The finely carved corbel on which it stands was discovered among rubbish in the recess below. Three altar tombs now stand against the south wall. The eastern has the recumbent effigies of Elizabeth Swillington and her two husbands. The inscription (translated) runs: “Pray for the soul of Elizabeth Swillington, widow, late the wife of Ralph Swillington, Attorney General of our Lord King Henry VIII, Recorder of the city of Coventry, formerly the wife of Thomas Essex Esq: which said Elizabeth died A.d 15...” She died after 1543. The side and ends have arcaded panelling containing shields of arms. At the west end is a realistic representation of the Five Wounds. The effigy of Thomas Essex is in armour, that of the Recorder in official robe and chain. The head of each rests on a helmet, and the lady wears the “pedimental” headdress of Tudor fashion. The arcading is purely Renaissance in detail though the general treatment is mediaeval. The figures are in dignified repose, wholly free from the later affectations of the Elizabethan school yet evidently individual portraits. The second tomb dates from 1640. The top is far too heavy for the little Ionic pilasters below.

The third, traditionally called Wades tomb, probably belongs to John Wayd, a Mercer, who lived in Coventry in 1557, but no inscription remains.

There are seven shields of arms on the side, nearly all defaced, a motto “Ryen saunce travayle,” and nine images in low relief which present quaint studies of early sixteenth-century costume.

The matrices of brasses are still visible in several parts of the church. Sir James Harrington, writing in the reign of James I, tells a curious story of their loss:

The pavement of Coventry church is almost all tombstones, and some very ancient, but there came in a zealous fellow with a counterfeit commission, that for avoiding superstition, hath not left one pennyworth nor penny breadth of brass upon all the tombs, of all the inscriptions, which had been many and costly.

The last monument that need be mentioned is upon the wall over “Wade’s tomb.” Twenty-six verses of eulogy follow these opening lines:

An Elegicall epitaph, made upon the death of that mirror of women Ann Newdigate; Lady Skeffington, wife of that true moaneing turtle Sir Richard Skeffington, Kt., and consecrated to her eternal memorie by the unfeigned lover of her vertues, Willm. Bulstrode, Knight. (She died in 1637, aged 29).

The present organ was built by Henry Willis and erected in 1887. It is a four-manual and pedal instrument and has fifty-three stops.

The old organ on which Handel played more than once, stood on a raised platform at the west end It was the work of Thomas Swarbrick of Warwick, a German by birth, in 1733. He also built those of Trinity Church, St. Mary, Warwick, Lichfield, St. Saviour Southwark, Stratford-on-Avon, and Amsterdam.

The best of the ancient glass now remaining has been collected into two windows, one on either side of the apse. Much was brought from the clearstory where six windows on the south and all save one on the north side still have panels made up of a mosaic of fragments with portions here and there of which the subject is intelligible. From what remains in the tracery we may gather that there was a row of eight angel figures filling the spaces immediately over the lights. Some of these or similar ones, are now in the apse. They are represented as covered with feathers and standing on wheels and each holds a scroll over the head with inscriptions in very contracted Latin. A few less fragmentary pieces may be found, e.g., in the north window, Judas giving the traitor’s kiss, in the north clearstory the arms of Trenton and Stafford, mentioned and figured by Dugdale, in the south, the figure of a man in a red gown kneeling with a scroll inscribed “deo gracias” and over his head “groc(er) de london” doubtless a donor. Of modern glass there is a great amount but little worth mentioning save on account of the persons commemorated One window in the Lady Chapel is a memorial of the Prince Consort and one in the Mercers’ Chapel is of interest as a deserved memorial to Thomas Sharp the Antiquary to whose labours all later historians of the city are so deeply indebted He died in 1841.

The pulpit is of brass and wrought iron, the work of Frank Skidmore a native of Coventry who made also the choir screen of Hereford Cathedral and the metal work of the Albert Memorial at Kensington. It was placed here in 1869. The bells, ten in number, now hang in the octagon. They were cast in 1774 and weigh nearly seven tons. The first peal was hung in 1429 and a clock existed in 1467. In 1496 an Order of Leet ordained that “all manner of persons that will have the bells to ring after the decease of any of their friends, shall pay for a peal ringing with all the bells, 2s. and with four bells, 16d, and three bells 4d”

The six bells were cast into eight in 1674 and the present tenth has the same inscription as the heaviest of the old peal:

I am and have been call’d the common bell
To ring, when fire breaks out, to tell.

The chimes, which existed as early as 1465, were restored in 1895, after a silence of ten years, in memory of Lieut.-Col. Francis William Newdigate. Electric lighting has been introduced throughout the church.