access, the details of the
transitional Norman style can be very clearly studied, the graceful
intersecting arches, upheld by slender coupled columns, recently
supplemented by additional supports, enriched with characteristic
mouldings, shadowing forth the approaching change to the early English
phase of Gothic.

Winchester Cathedral, originally a very typical Norman building designed
by William of Wykeham, retains its Norman framework, covered over, as it
were, with a drapery of detail in the latest development of English
Gothic, and with it may be named as characteristic Norman buildings with
Gothic additions, Peterborough Cathedral, all Norman except the west
front and eastern extremity of the choir; Malmesbury Abbey, with a
flat-roofed nave and vaulted aisles, the latter with pointed arches; the
Cathedral of Exeter; the Minster of Sherbourne; and portions of
Westminster Abbey.

Many parish churches, too, including those of Kilpeck in Herefordshire,
a very typical Norman building; Tickencote in Lincolnshire, with
intersecting pointed arches; S. Peter's in the East, Oxford, with a
groined vaulted roof; Barfreston Church, Kent, with a very beautiful
recessed doorway; Goring and Iffley in Oxfordshire; and above all, S.
Bartholomew's in London, date from Norman times, and, though they have
all been more or less modified by restoration, retain the general
characteristics of the period to which they belong.

[Illustration: Plan of Peterborough Cathedral]

Anglo-Norman secular architecture is characterised by much the same
qualities as ecclesiastical, the castles and residences of the
sovereigns and the nobles having been of dignified and impressive
appearance, well proportioned, and thoroughly in harmony with their
surroundings. During the reigns of the Conqueror and his successors many
noble strongholds were erected on points of vantage. The most important
feature, and in every case the first to be built, having been the lofty
central keep or donjon, the home of its owner in peace, and the last
refuge of a besieged garrison in time of war. In it was a fine hall, in
which the host received his guests, with a raised platform known as the
dais for the use of those of high rank, and the approach to it was
protected by a complex series of defences, including deep ditches or
fosses, walls with towers and turrets at intervals, forming two distinct
enclosures known as the outer and inner baileys, often covering a vast
exten