| ISSN 1357-4442 | Editor: Simon Denison |
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| ESSAY |
Now Oxford Castle itself is threatened by a development scheme, writes John Steane
John Malchair (1730-1812) was a German violinist who supplemented his sparse earnings as leader of the band at the Holywell Music Room, Oxford, by giving drawing lessons. An exhibition of his work now at the Ashmolean Museum (until 13 December) illustrates his remarkable talent as a topographical water-colourist and an influential teacher.
His delicate, largely monochrome studies, are all done `en plein air'. He was a firm believer in his pupils abandoning copying of Old Masters in the studio and making fresh observations for themselves in the narrow streets, college gardens and countryside around the university city.
As someone who has known Oxford since the 1950s, Malchair's water-colours have a particular resonance for me. They show a city of dreaming spires certainly, but also of vernacular buildings, irregular roofs, multiple gables, jettied overhanging stories still bounded by walls and gates. The meadows lap up against the walls. During Malchair's lifetime the remorseless pressure of `improving' communications had begun to make serious inroads on Oxford's architectural heritage. First came carts, then waggons, then stage coaches. As vehicles got larger and speedier, so roads were widened, straightened, cut through to accommodate them. The North Gate, figured in Malchair's drawing, was obliterated in 1771; the picturesque `Friar Bacon's Study' over Folly Bridge, incorporating a Romanesque arch and a two-storied gatehouse, was torn down in 1779. The East Gate was removed: it figures on a misericord in New College chapel, but is otherwise only remembered by a hotel of that name.
Road improvement deprived the city centre of two striking architectural monuments. In 1789 the Carfax conduit, an elaborate stone structure of 1610 comprising a `wealth of images' with `exquisite carving' and said to be based on a Renaissance triumphal arch, was exiled to the grassy slopes of Nuneham Courtenay. Equally regrettably the carcase of St Martin's Church was torn out leaving only the clock tower to dignify the central road junction in the heart of the city.
Oxford's conservationists had to fight tooth and nail in the 1950s to protect Christchurch Meadow from Thomas Sharpe's iniquitous proposal to drive a `relief' road through its middle. The battle between the interests of the pedestrian, the cyclist, and the car-user still rages. Oxford reluctantly acquired railways in the 1840s and 50s. 140 years later its industrial archaeological confraternity conducted an enthusiastic but belated and ultimately futile defence for the retention in situ of its 1850 LMS terminus station (see BA, October). The car-using lobby won, backed by a juggernaut triumvirate of university, City and County Councils.
Malchair's view of the castle with its imposing motte and tapering, late Saxon St George's tower reminds us of another major piece of road building vandalism, the removal of a third of the medieval castle by the construction of `New Road' in 1770-76. It sliced through the towered bailey and the base of the castle mound; there were even suggestions at the time that the entire mound might be removed to allow a clear run from Carfax to Botley Road.
The castle for a thousand years has been a hub of Oxfordshire, a stage on which some of the most significant events of medieval history were played out. From its gaunt tower the Empress Matilda, dressed in white, let herself down to escape from Stephen's siege in the snowy winter of 1139. Henry II and his recalcitrant archbishop Thomas Becket faced out one another in the castle hall. Here was the centre of the sheriff's power; here the assizes were held, from the gatetower of the prison public executions were held until 1863. This is the parade ground where the Lord Lieutenant held the county musters.
One would have thought that the County Council would be proud of such an architectural and historical heritage. Not a bit of it. They have been engaged during the last two years in negotiations with developers whose main motive, it seems, is to turn the site into a glorified shopping centre, a hotel for the rich car-user and a series of wine bars and themed restaurants. Public amenity in the form of a theatre, a lecture hall, and a museum has been dismissed by the developer as being too expensive.
The county is now being asked to think again. An action group composed of archaeologists, historians, and county and city amenity groups, is requesting a delay of six months to explore a more acceptable future for this key piece of Oxford's past. Helped on by the gentle persuasiveness of Malchair's watercolours it is to be hoped that the public of Oxfordshire will rally to defend their threatened castle.
John Steane is a consultant achaeologist based in Oxford. If you wish to influence the debate over Oxford Castle, write to John Harwood, Chief Executive, Oxfordshire County Council, County Hall, Oxford OX1 1ND
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© Council for British Archaeology, 1998