OLD YORK.

New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, 1 December 1904, Page 185

OLD YORK.

By H. L. MACHELL.

Part I

York after years spent in New Zealand ; there is a delightful sense of repose in these oldworld towns ; they have had their day — and a stormy one it has been ; — now they slumber ! York is old— very old— York was old when Sevcrus, Emperor of Rome held his court here A.I). "200, and the Roman galleys anchored, in the river ; nay ! it seems to have been old when Agricola, the Roman General, completed the subjugation of North Britain in '^5, after bloody battles with the tribe of Brigantes who then held the place. It was Eburacum in those days, and a very important place commercially as well as politically ; the largest vessels afloat could then sail right up to the Port. The " Conquering Sixth " Legion from Germany, and the " Spanish Ninth " had their head-quarters here — the former for three hundred years ; only a short time ago their cemetery was opened and all the tiled coffins and massive stone sarcophagi unearthed ; the former stamped "LEG. VI. VIC," or "LEG. IX. HISP.," as the case might be. The letters " D.M." on many of

HEN Max O'Rell toured the Colonies, he was asked what he should do when he got back to Europe. "' 1 shall go and look at some old wall with a bit of ivy on it," he replied. This is how one feels on returning to

the coffins and tombstones are a tribute to the goddess Mothers ( Dea Matres), who were Romanised German deities, and presided over all that was homely and beautiful in life ; this votive inscription shows how the hearts of the soldiers turned homewards to the " Vaterland '" whence they had been torn. In one of the sarcophagi was found a lead coffin containing the remains of a Roman lady embedded in gypsum, her auburn hair in excellent preservation, and pinned up with ornaments of Whitby jet : a pillow had evidently kept the head apart from the gypsum ; this hair has been carefully combed out. recoiled as found, and now may be seen in the Museum. In ar.other, the skeleton's mouth contained a small coin, presumably for charon's fare across the Styx— so the gl corny boatman is still waiting for his money ! The bcnes of two young 1 girls reposed in another of the stone coffins, at the head of which lay two food -vessels of coarse pottery and two drinking'- vessels, intended no doubt to symbolise care and thought for the departed. The socalled lachrymatories often found with the remains did not contain the mourners' tears, but unguents. A quantity of beautiful Samian. ware from the Roman potteries in Gaul and Germany has also been found ; this is of a dark red colour, highly glazed, and either plain or ornamental with embossed and incised figures. Some rough imitations apper.r to have been produced

in Britain, but very inferior to the real thing ; and in one case the British workman has forged the mark of the potter, Severianus, in order no doubt to palm off his ware on some " ignorant connoisseur " ; a piece of genuine " Severianus " alongside shows up the forgery and inferior work. Then we have the children's toys, the babies' feeding-bottles and the shells collected by families on their summer trips to the East Coast watering-places, Scarborough, Filey, Whit'hy ; then again, all the ladies'

scent-bottles, combs, pins, needles, hair-pins and jewelry. At the feet of one lady of rank lay her female slave with a box of scent or medi-cine-bottles, ready for use ! In one large case are collected a number of most interesting relics, the bone circus-ticket, the gladiator's badge, and all the little things which speak of a wealthy, powerful nation at home. Baths and beautiful mosaic floors have been unearthed, the foundations of the Roman City wall have been traced all round, but the lower part of the Multangular Tower,

forming one angle and two othersmall portions of the wall, are all now left of undoubted Roman building- above ground ; yet, one livingrepresentative of that mighty Empire remains ! the snails — descendants of those brought over by theRoman caterers are occasionally found even in York. They are also common South of the Thames. Now for a little romance ! Some 300 years ago, about a quarter of a mile to the west of York Wall, there was found a stone coffin with an inscription to the effect that M. Yerec. Diogenes, an official of the Colony of Eburacum, had had it made for himself during his lifetime ; but the plural " haec " was used — these coffins. Well, it was subsequently removed to Hull and used as a horse-trough outside an Inn for many years ; but to-day all trace of it has disappeared. However, the North-Eastern Railway Co., when recently excavating for their new railway station about a quarter of a mile to the west of the City wall, came upon a Roman cemetery of a square mile in area,, and another stone coffin containing the skeleton of a tall woman, and bearing an inscription to the effect that within it were the remains of Julia Fortunata, the faithful wife of Verec. Diogenes ! It was in York that Constantine,. the first Christian Emperor, was invested with the purple, and all the tributary kings of the Empire assembled to do homage, so the town must often have been a scene of great splendour. But the glory departed when Constantine moved his court to Byzantium, and the Legions no longer protected the city against its numerous enemies : first, the inhabitants drove out theRoman officials ; then, down came the fierce Picts and Scots on plunder bent ; on came the Saxofts and Angles for the land ; up the river came the pirates— the inhabitants were driven as chaff before the wind, and the unhappy city was reduced to a heap of ruins ; thus ends the

four hundred years of Britain's occupation by the Romans. It has been lately pointed out that the pure Romans were really a very small minority in the provinces of the Empire, and that if one had come down on Roman York on any one clay it might well have been that no person would be found who had ever been in Italy or Rome ; in fact, that the Empire had in course 06 time come to consist very largely, not of Romans, but of people who had been Romanised. As an instance of this, the faith-

i'ul Julia above-mentioned is described on her cofiin as having been a native of Sardinia, and Diogenes, on his, as a citizen of Celtic Gaul. H seems hard that poor Julia's bones should not have been allowed' to rest in the coffin ; her .skull is exhibited in case G. "To this favour she must come !" But it was not from Britons or, from Roman Colonists that England derived the qualities which made her a great nation, it was from those German and Scandanavian sea-kings, fierce and lawless,

and perhaps also from the Normans who were originally " hardy Norsemen/ The name "York" is the English form of the Danish " Yorvick/' and this is how, according to some' historians, the Dane* appeared on the scene : — Two rival kings of Northumbria each invited them to come over and help him thrash the other — so they came— but thrashed both kings and seized the kingdom ! York was u'iven over to the usual atrocities," compared with which Bulgarian were mild ; it is even

said that one of the rival kings was skinned alive ! A Danish officer, named G nth rum, was appointed governor of the town — hence the name of the street where he lived is still " Goodramgate." The Danish occupation of York extended from the ninth century to the eleventh, either as' ruling England, or as subject to English kings. " Eoferwic " (the town on the Eure) was the name given by the Saxons who, or the Angles, had possession of York for 400 years,, until their overthrow, and a mighty

one it was, by the Danes. Even today, the Yorkshire villages, East and North of the town, are full of Danish faces, and their language is rich in Danish words. Caer Ebranc was the British name, taken from the Roman Eburacum ; it stood at the head of the British cities, Caer Ceint (Canterbury) being second, and Caer Londene a long way down the list. The legends of King Arthur's day

tell us that he was then at the head of the British forces, and that it was in this city the first British Christmas was celebrated, the king and his people observing the festival, as the shocked historian relates, "in a spirit of heathenish revelry with feasting and mirth, in wantonness and many excesses !" Here's to him ! But it is difficult to get any real facts of this period. The Danes and Saxons have left but few relics to mark the period of

their occupation., their chief pleasure seems to have been in destruction ; but the glorious work of levelling the city with the ground was never so thoroughly and satisfactorily performed as by William the Conqueror. In his day the suburbs extended one mile outwards every way,, and York was " fair as the City of Rome from the beauty and magnificence of its buildings " ; but William was very thorough in all

thai he undertook, and by the time he had finished, there was not one inhabited house between Durham and York, and for nine years afterwards neither plough nor spade were put into the ground ! Poor York, one need hardly say, was once more a heap of ruins, amony which another jolly Christmas was celebrated by the hero and his friends, and it is from those gentlemen that everyone of importance now claims descent !

Christianity had of course disappeared on the departure of the Romans, and the pa^an Saxons made short work of any Christian buildings ; 'but on their conversion a small wooden oratory was erected on the site of the present Minster ; this was subsequently replaced by a handsome stone church, finally and satisfactorily levelled with the ground by William the Conqueror ;

the building- having been thus disposed of, there was of course no necessity for church revenues or clergy, so he seized the former and expelled the latter. The Minster was, however, rebuilt, but burned down again in the great fire which destroyed also thirty -nine parish churches ; and, as it now stands it is of thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth century work, built in the form of a cross,

524 feet long by 250, and with stone vaulting TOO feet high, a magnificent specimen of pure Gothic architecture, light but massive, simple but grand. Mr. V, Bond, in a recent lecture,, points out that these cathedrals were not huilt merely for congregations to worship in, but as monuments to God, with something about them of the divine attributes

of eternity ; builders were not hampered by notions of utility or considerations of expense — they built to last. Many of the Parish Churches in York are interesting, but these are of a character quite distinct from the Cathedrals, they were built for practical purposes, and appeal in a less degree to the religious feelings. St. Michael-le-Belfry contains an entry in its Register of the Baptism

•of the notorious " Guye Faux/ in 1570. The Archbishop's palace is a fine old mansion on the bank of the river in the village of Bishopthorpe. ]t was here that Archbishop Har•court, grandfather of the distinguished statesman, Sir William Harcourt, resided ; his Grace was very fond of sport, and used to repair to a corner of Knavesmire Common, where York race meetings are held, to get a quiet view from the other side of the fence of what was going on ; the place is called

Archbishop Harcourt's corner to this day. And it was in these fields that Archbishop Scrope was executed by Henry IV. (Bolingbroke), after sentence passed in the dining-room of the Palace — the property was purchased some 700 years ago by an Archbishop, who also paid the Pope £10,000 for his pall. His Grace's jurisdiction is now limited to the Northern Province, although he is : officially " Primate of England/ ; the Archbishop of Canterbury is, however, v Primate

of all England,'' and takes precedence—also £15,000 a year, against York's £10,000. The struaxrle for supremacy commenced in n"01, and continued for 750 years, when the Pope effected a compromise resulting in one of those anomalies for which we are famous, but which, work well in practice, illogical though they may seem. In searching the old records of Episcopal 1 ' Visitations," some very curious entries are to be found, of which the following are specimens :

" Henry .Ncwstede for sleping'e in servyce tyme is ordered to confess his falte in the parishe churche of Busshoppethoi-pe.'' The following shocking 1 scandal also appears : " Tristram Tildesley is a prest and, notwithstanding, very immodestly upon Sondaies or hollidais hath daunced emon^est li^ht youthfull companie both men and women, and especially upon one Sondaie in dauncino', wantonly and dissolutely kissed a ma\>d or younti woman : that the said Tristram, very unsemelye did daunce skip and hoi<zhe,

gallantly as he thought in his owne iolishe conceipte," and so on — the result of the kissing being that *' dyvers swordes were drawne." Amongst quaint customs, the following may be mentioned : On St. Nicholas day in every year a choir-boy was elected to assume bishop's vestments and functions, the rest of the boys being habited as priests, and together they discharged all the holy offices ■except Mass ; the boy-bishop used to go on " visitations " to mansions and monasteries with a considerable retinue and, in early days

at all events, the tiling was done in all seriousness, though with what good object it is hard to say ; any how, Henry V l l l . stopped the practice on account of the scandalous abuses resulting. How refreshing to turn from such a subject to the following : A custom used to prevail on board trading brigs passing the Palace to fire three guns, the signal being answered by a distribution of ale among the mariners by order of his Grace ; Archbishop Harcourt certainly used to observe and answer the signal ; but times are altered !

(TO BE COXTrNUED.)