London Guildhall: Another Wide-Spanned Romanesque Unaisled Hall?

Abstract

Recent research has shown that the original Westminster Hall of the 1090s was not an aisled building, despite its great width, but was unaisled with a clear-spanning roof structure. Little evidence remains of the original London Guildhall, built around the 1120s, but in this re-appraisal it is suggested that it was also of unaisled form.

Keywords:

• London Guildhall
• aisled hall
• unaisled
• wide span
• Westminster Hall

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to Roland Harris and Dan Miles for their insights into the original roof structure of Westminster Hall, on which this article depends. John Blair kindly allowed use of his drawing of Hereford Bishop’s Palace. My thanks also go to Robert Ovens for production of the drawings. The anonymous peer reviewers provided very useful additional comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 R. B. Harris and D. Miles, ‘Romanesque Westminster Hall and its Roof’, in Westminster: The Art, Architecture and Archaeology of the Royal Palace, ed. W. Rodwell and T. Tatton-Brown, BAA Trans. xxxix, 2 vols (2015), II, 22–71; N. Hill, ‘The Romanesque Roof Structure of Westminster Hall’, JBAA, 175 (2022), 67–107.

2 C. M. Barron, The Medieval Guildhall of London (London 1974); C. Wilson, ‘The Original Design of the City of London Guildhall’, JBAA, 139 (1976), 1–14; D. Bowsher, T. Dyson, N. Holder and I. Howell, The London Guildhall: An archaeological history of a neighbourhood from early medieval to modern times, MoLAS Monographs, 36, 2 vols (London 2007).

3 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 65–67.

4 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 139–43.

5 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 182–95.

6 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 66.

7 P. Marsden, ‘The Pre-1411 Guildhall of London’, The London Archaeologist, 4/v (Winter 1981), 115–20.

8 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 66, fig. 65.

9 Hill, ‘Westminster Hall’, 86–87.

10 P. A. Rahtz, The Saxon and Medieval Palaces at Cheddar, British Archaeological Reports, 75 (Oxford 1979), 377–78.

11 See reconstruction drawing in Hill, ‘Westminster Hall’, 101.

12 N. Hill, ‘The Twelfth-century Aisled Hall of Leicester Castle: A Re-assessment’, Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, 93 (2019), 123–67; J. Blair, ‘The 12th-Century Bishop’s Palace at Hereford’, Med. Archaeol., 31 (1987), 59–72.

13 Hill, ‘Westminster Hall’, 73.

14 N. Hill, ‘Hall and Chambers: Oakham Castle Reconsidered’, Antiq. J., 93 (2013), 163–216.

15 E. Impey, ‘The Great Hall at Caen and its Affinities with Westminster’, in Westminster: The Art, Architecture and Archaeology of the Royal Palace, ed. W. Rodwell and T. Tatton-Brown, BAA Trans. xxxix, 2 vols (2015), II, 72–88.

16 Bowsher et al., The London Guildhall, I, 66–67, 140–41.

17 Wilson, ‘Original Design’.

18 Wilson, ‘Original Design’, 7.