The Rebuilding of the Medieval Dormitory.

Stretching down to the river from the west cloister are the remains of the old monastic dorter or dormitory and the reredorter or monks’ toilets. The reconstruction of the medieval dormitory in the fourteenth century at Worcester Cathedral is one of the few major building projects for which there survives a detailed record by one of the monks.

 

The Annales for Worcester reported in 1302 that there was ‘great damage’ done to the dormitory.  Whether this was as ‘great’ as reported is debateable as there doesn’t seem to have been repair until 1344 and it took until 1375 before what appears to be a major piece of work on the dormitory and, at the same time, the cellarer’s accounts^[i] tell us that pipes were laid, or more likely relaid, to the lavatorium[ii].

 

Why might it have taken so long to undertake the work? There are a number of possible factors that probably contributed. One possibility is that a great deal of money had been required to build the aqueduct to the monastery just before this, as well as other projects around the Cathedral[iii]. Another issue was the arrival of the Black Death in 1348 and subsequent outbreaks, which perhaps reduced not only the available workforce in Worcester, but also revenue from manors and rents to finance the work[iv]. Also to be considered was the need to prepare for such large-scale work. In a pre-industrial age, the monks had to organize not just the amount of stone they needed but even arrange the purchase of two quarries in Ombersley, and obtain the right to access a road from one of these to the river to allow the stone’s transport to the priory in 1352[v].

 

Work was finally started in 1375[vi]. In 1376-77 some of this was recorded in the surviving account roll of cellarer William Power[vii]. Power worked with a master mason J. Clyve, who was given his own livery costume to distinguish him. From Power’s accounts we know that they marshalled a large workforce and impressive resources to ensure that the project succeeded.

1,170 ‘rendbords’ (planks of wood) were purchased, together with hundreds of nails of various types, stone, coal, tiles, and a door bar for the main door of the dormitory latrine, which is always important. Power even obtained iron for bars for the windows of the dormitory, as well as 300 window nails, twelve latches for the great windows in the dormitory, a lock and key for a nearby wash house, metal for the instruments of the stone masons and workers at the quarry, lead, window glass including for private windows located in the dormitory and much more. Stone and rubble were brought from quarries at Ombersley and Comberton.

Power also had to pay the wages of the stonemasons, and he recorded the totals for each week. Unfortunately, he does not give their individual names or the numbers involved. He also hired five carpenters to work at various times, and a tiler.

You might be forgiven for expecting all of the monks to have slept in the dormitory. In fact, the prior, as head of the monastery had his own accommodation within the priory complex, as did many of the senior monastic officials such as the sacrist. Joan Greatrex suggested that from the evidence some twenty-three monks probably slept in the dormitory in the later middle ages[viii].

 

It is not clear what prompted the monks at Worcester to reconstruct the dormitory when they did. Was the previous structure in disrepair? Unfashionable? Or was it that the monks could afford better accommodation in the later fourteenth century? It has been pointed out by Colin Platt, that there was a trend for dormitories in English monasteries to be partitioned for greater privacy in the later middle ages[ix]. William Power certainly paid for timber to be purchased so that the monks could have new beds made.

Another clue that suggests the earlier dormitory and toilet may have been a smaller building comes from a brief reference in 1313, when the cellarer and bursar paid 2s 4d for the cleaning of the dormitory garderobe[x].  A garderobe was a slightly different thing to what was in the reredorter[xi]. A garderobe is a single toilet or at most a double cubicle with a chute going down to the outside, hence the need for it to be ‘cleaned’ regularly. This was different to the reredorter in the new dormitory, which had running water to flush it out!  This medieval drain was still there when the ruins were studied in the twentieth century.

 

Vanda Bartoszuk and David Morrison

Bibliography:

Worcester Cathedral Muniments

Ute Engel, Worcester Cathedral – An Architectural History, Phillimore, Chichester 2007

Joan Greatrex, ‘The Layout of the Monastic Church, Cloister and Precinct of Worcester: Evidence in the Written Records’, in Christopher Guy (ed.), Archaeology at Worcester Cathedral: Report of the Eighth Annual Symposium March 1998, 12-18

Pat Hughes and Annette Leech, The Story of Worcester, Logaston Press, Woonton Almeley 2011

H. R. Luard (ed.), Annales Prioratus de Wigornia, in Annales Monastici IV (Rolls Series 1869)

Colin Platt, The Abbeys and Priories of Medieval England, Chancellor Press, London 1995

Carole Rawcliffe, Urban Bodies – Communal Health in Late Medieval English Towns and Cities, The Boydell Press, Woodbridge 2013

[i] WCM C77 & WCM C77a

[ii] Annales prioratus de Wigornia, ed. HR Luard in Annales Monastici IV (Rolls Series 1869)

[iii] WCM A12 fol.77v

[iv] For the general picture nationally see Carole Rawcliffe, Urban Bodies – Communal Health in Late Medieval English Towns and Cities, The Boydell Press, Woodbridge 2013, pp.66-70

[v] WCM B594

[vi] WCM A12, fol.77v

[vii] WCM C69

[viii] Joan Greatrex, ‘The Layout of the Monastic Church, Cloister and Precinct of Worcester: Evidence in the Written Records’, in Christopher Guy (ed.), Archaeology at Worcester Cathedral: Report of the Eighth Annual Symposium March 1998, 12-18, p.14.

[ix] Colin Platt, The Abbeys and Priories of Medieval England, Chancellor Press, London 1995, p.166

[x] WCM C482

[xi] Also sometimes referred to as a necessarium – see Ute Engel, Worcester Cathedral – An Architectural History, Phillimore, Chichester 2007, p.33

[xii] WCM A26 fo.133v

[xiii] Pat Hughes and Annette Leech, The Story of Worcester, Logaston Press, Woonton Almeley 2011, p.215.