Antiquaries in the Age of Romanticism: 1789-1851 - Queen Mary ...

church, though she supervised its careful dismantling. Archaeology had ‘many and
lasting attractions’ for her and she analysed the building as it was taken down largely on
the basis of the fabric itself. 174 ‘The destruction of an ancient structure, however
necessary, must always afford cause for regret,’ she wrote, adding with perhaps a touch
of self-justification that ‘the chapel at Wreay had apparently little claim to respect, either
in an antiquarian or an architectural point of view.’ 175
Figure 21 St Mary’s, Wreay
The original church was thought, she recorded, to date from the reign of Edward
II (1307-27), but having found no coins in the course of demolition, one of the easiest and
securest ways of dating a building, Losh had her doubts. The ‘old’ window she noted
‘resembled the common coupled windows of the Tudor period… of square form
containing two round headed lights’. 176 Buildings of this late, ‘debased’ Gothic were not
so much to be regretted in the early 1840s. More significant for her was the discovery of
174
Londsdale, The Worthies of Cumbria, p.206.
175
Document in the Jackson Collection, Carlisle Library.
176
Document in the Jackson Collection, Carlisle Library.
84