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November 25, 2007
Environmental Degradation at Westminster Abbey - interior, and caused by our modern wimpiness
Environmental conditions inside Westminster Abbey are now causing “serious concern”, according to one of its own conservators, Marie Louise Sauerberg. The Coronation Chair, commissioned in 1296 and used for virtually every crowning since 1308, has suffered from serious flaking of its gilded surface. Humidity levels fluctuate considerably in the abbey, mainly because of central heating. Polychromed wood is particularly vulnerable to these changes, causing the paint to flake.
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Serious damage has also been sustained by the ancient sedilia, or priests’ stalls, which date from around 1307. The sedilia, on the south side of the high altar, are decorated with paintings and are among the abbey’s greatest treasures. They also feature some of the earliest English paintings on panel. The sedilia have long been regarded as a rare survival, and William Blake recorded them in a watercolour in 1775.
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The condition of the sedilia is now so fragile that if one were to pass one’s hand over the surface, a considerable area of the surviving 700-year-old paint would simply fall off. Even though they are just beyond the reach of tourists’ hands, tiny paint fragments occasionally fall to the floor.
The throne, too, is on view but beyond the reach of the public in the ambulatory. It is moved, however, for every coronation to the area in front of the high altar, for the new monarch’s anointing and crowning.
The environmental damage is largely the result of heating in the abbey, which reduces relative humidity. This is now thought to vary from around 30% to 80% throughout the year, a very high range.
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Although heating is essential for worshippers, it may be possible to reduce the temperature slightly. [my emphases]
Of course, heating is not essential for worshipers - only for modern worshipers. One of the coldest moments of my life was in the crypt of the Church of St. Mary Magdalen at Vezelay in July. Stone churches are cold! We moderns are not very willing to do more than kneel. Of course, medieval folks were always arguing over which degree of hierarchy got to wear what kind of fur hoods in church, so they were cold, too! Villard de Honnecourt provides a design for a gimbelled hand heater, after all.
Still, they had better solve this fast.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at November 25, 2007 5:00 PM