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ECCLESIASTICAL ARCHITECTURE 451
tury, notably Ely, Norwich and, a little later, Peterborough, all
in the eastern part of England. In point of scale they are even
grander than the great church at Durham, but otherwise they
show little ofthe structural enterprise ofthat building. In them,
however, the tendency noticed at Durham, which was to be of
such immense importance to the future of English architecture,
was carried even farther in a variety of ways. This tendency was
to create an overfall impression oflinear pattern by breaking up
the main structural forms such as piers with subordinate shafts,
pilasters, and mouldings so that the areas of plain surface are
reduced to a minimum. This is a
progressive tendency and can
be traced as between the earlier and later parts of all three
churches, and as between Ely, Norwich, and Peterborough,
in that order, which is the order oftheir beginnings. Much dis'
cussion has been occasioned by the custom in these designs of
dividing each bay from the next with a long, attached, halfround
shaft which rises from the ground/level to the top ofthe
clerestory. Writers have speculated as to whether these imply an
original intention to vault the main span ofthe church, which
was subsequently abandoned through timidity in favour of a
wooden ceiling
rather than a stone roof. This seems an unlikely
explanation, and whatever the origin ofthese half-round shafts
between the it bays seems likely that they were continued in
use because by the sharp division between each bay the linear
pattern ofthe succeeding bays was accentuated. That the pur^
pose ofthis device was probably a matter oftaste is made more
likely by the fact that in all of these three great churches, and
more markedly in the later than in the earlier
parts, extra
vertical members in the form of half-columns or breaks in the
plan ofthe compound piers are introduced without any struc^
tural justification, apparently because the builders liked the
look ofthem, and this habit of design continues far beyond the
early Romanesque that we are discussing well into the de/
veloped Gothic of the thirteenth century. It is as though the
structural relevance of the pattern devised by the master of
Durham had few imitators in this country, where the increasing
technical mastery ofstone^cutting and the great variety ofnew