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© Ms Ruth Povey
IoE Number:
379315
Location:
THE GREAT GATEHOUSE, COLLEGE GREEN (south side)
BRISTOL, BRISTOL, BRISTOL
Photographer:
Ms Ruth Povey
Date Photographed:
12 April 2004
Date listed:
04 March 1977
Date of last amendment:
04 March 1977
Grade
I
The Images of England website consists of images of listed buildings based on the statutory list as it was in 2001 and does not incorporate subsequent amendments to the list. For the statutory list and information on the current listed status of individual buildings please go to The National Heritage List for England.
BRISTOL
ST5872NW COLLEGE GREEN
901-1/15/73 (South side)
04/03/77 The Great Gatehouse
GV I
Gatehouse. C12 archway built for Augustinian abbey founded
1140, included in late C15 gatehouse, restored and extended
mid C19 by J Pearson. Limestone ashlar with exterior stacks
and a lead roof. Single-depth plan. Norman style gateways,
Perpendicular Gothic style gatehouse and tower. 3 storeys;
3-window range.
A central gatehouse has a finely carved semicircular-arched
C12 gateway, with twisted columns to an arch with beaded
chevrons, and an architrave with Celtic-style interlacing. The
S side has 3 orders with cushion capitals. C19 buttresses, C15
inscribed cornice, and rosettes to the spandrels, beneath a
2-storey canted oriel with 4-light mullion and transom
windows, raised flowers to the panels beneath, and flanking
2-storey statue niches with canted canopies and statues of
kings. A band of quatrefoil panels below a cornice, blind
panelling to the crenellated parapet with crocketed pinnacles
to the angles.
The single-storey gatehouse to the right has a smaller
pedestrian archway, similar mouldings, but with the architrave
inside the arch. C15 first-floor mullion window with
Tudor-arched heads. C19 single-storey block to the left has an
angle buttress, and a 2-centre doorway in the return with a
crocketed hood, and ridged door.
Behind is a C15 three-stage tower with moulded strings and
matching panelled parapet, and an exterior stack with panelled
top. In the re-entrant is an octagonal stair turret to a
panelled top, and a crocketed ogee cap. The rear elevation has
4 storeys of 3-light mullion windows.
INTERIOR: the main archway has 2 quadripartite vaulted bays
separated by a chevron-moulded arch; the sides have arcades of
pointed-arched niches formed from intersecting semicircular
arches, with columns to cushion capitals and rope mouldings.
The Gatehouse has upstairs rooms with Tudor-arched fireplaces,
and oriels with tracery panels to the soffits; stone winder
stair.
The decoration of the arches and inner sides of the archway,
with the Chapter House (qv), is among the earliest use of the
pointed arch, and '...anticipated the impending Gothic'
(Gomme).
(The Buildings of England: Pevsner N: North Somerset and
Bristol: London: 1958-: 386).