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By the end of the two weeks, they had uncovered the
building’s corners, a grave, and the massive buttresses,
which confirmed the structure’s immense height.
It turns out the chapel was large: 100 x 40 feet,
with 14 supporting buttresses. To give a comparison,
it was bigger than Chapel, and around the same
length as New Hall.
It had been such a successful collaboration that it was
repeated again the following year, again with financial
assistance from the Headmaster. Although James had
left the School to read history at UCL, he returned in
the summer to participate, even giving the inaugural
briefing before the team went on to excavate the
west doorway and further zones around the centre,
where more graves were found.
James’s research revealed that St Elizabeth’s was an
early chantry college, founded in 1301 by John of
Pontissara, Bishop of Winchester. It housed seven
chaplains, seven clerks, and an ensemble of choristers
to sing a truly punishing daily round of dawn-till-dusk
offices and Masses for the souls of those in purgatory.
(Actually, if you look at Winchester College’s statutes,
Chapel was similarly busy praying for the living
and dead, with an army of tonsured clerics daily
celebrating the full cycle of Prime, Terce, Sext,
46 The Wykeham Journal 2014
Nones, Vespers, Compline, and a minimum of
seven Masses). Chapels were permanently busy
places back then, with important work to do.
The excavations at St Elizabeth’s not only unearthed
details of the ancient building, but also several
important artefacts, including an exquisitely engraved
book clasp, a large medieval key, dressed stonework,
and decorative tiles. (The vast quantities of clay pipes
prove nothing more, the diggers concluded, than that
generations of more recent Wykehemists enjoyed a
quiet smoke in the meadows). Many of these were
seen by over 1,500 visitors who came to see the
digs, including the Mayor (twice) and the Dean
of Winchester.
When Henry VIII put a violent end to the rhythms
of traditional religious life, Winchester College had a
narrow escape. In 1535, the brutal Thomas Cromwell
arrived at the College Street gates. Keenly aware of
Cromwell’s intentions, Warden Edward More
(a priest and former Headmaster), served the King’s
rapacious enforcer a frugal meal before apologetically
presenting him with a tatty, patched-up salt cellar.
An unimpressed Cromwell left in disgust, bent on
richer pickings elsewhere.
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However, as an unambiguously ecclesiastical
organization, St Elizabeth’s was not so lucky.
The priests were all turned out into the night,
except the Provost, Thomas Runcorne,
who wangled himself one of the first prebends at the
newly reformed cathedral, whose historic Benedictine
monks had been chased out. St Elizabeth’s assets were
stripped and shipped off to Cromwell’s treasury in
London, and the buildings were given to his ruthless
apprentice, Thomas Wriothesley, the thug who would
become infamous for personally racking Anne Askew,
pioneer English language poetess.
Wriothesley (future Earl of Southampton) wanted
cash, so sold St Elizabeth’s for £360 to the Warden
and Fellows of Winchester College, along with
the requirement it be pulled down or turned into
a grammar school, which was a standard way of
ensuring it was never again used for religion.
In the event, it was demolished,