Saxon Timber Churches
Saxon Timber Churches
Firstly, I’d like to say thank you to everyone who came to my presentation on Saxon and Early Norman Church Architecture at the Heritage Open Day on Saturday 9th September 2017. I was truly surprised by the number of people; I thought it would be a small intimate group.
During the presentation I mentioned the quirks of Saxon construction. Saxon church walls were never parallel or of equal length, angles were never square and their east west alignment was out too. After the presentation I was asked why the Saxons built in this way. I’ve given the question more thought and I think part of the reason is that we are looking at the problem with modern eyes. We are used to having buildings with straight walls and perfect 90 degree angles. We are taught how to calculate these things in school. I think the thing we forget is that each generation learns from the previous generation and then builds on that knowledge. It is rare to have leaps in technology or understanding. Most of what each generation adds is developed from trial and error. For example, lots of church towers fell down (and killed people) before they mastered the techniques for keeping them up.
When we build walls these days we set it out in the ground with measurements and pieces of string pulled tightly around stakes, and then foundations are poured with concrete so that the walls will not move. The Romans knew how to make concrete but this was lost to the Saxons who had only wood to work with. So you have no choice but to build your church out of timber. You knock your timber post into the ground and it is strong and straight and does not move but in a few years, after a couple of wet winters that post has moved a bit because the wet weather has made the soil soft. And then by the time it is 20 years old it has rotted away and needs replacing. So the new post gets put in a slightly different place. Wood is also known to warp and twist. So maybe the walls started out straight and parallel but time and weather took their toll on the wood.
As for the east west alignment, well your guess is as good as mine but I do know that they have found that the Earth has twisted on its axis from time to time so maybe the east west alignment was true back then. But the truth is that we will never really know. There are no written records and without evidence any ideas as to why this happened remain just that.