Hall Highlights:
The Undercroft
The Merchant Adventurers’ Hall has accumulated many treasures over the centuries: art, artefacts, architecture and the stories of those who have passed through it’s walls. This blog series seeks to shine a spotlight on the Hall’s incredible collections, individuals and rooms from its past. This post is looking at Undercroft.
For this blog post we are looking at the Undercroft...a space very different from the rest of the Hall. This space was never designed to be used by the merchants but for the sick and poorer members of York's society, many of which had fallen on hard times.
An undercroft is traditionally a vaulted chamber, partly or fully underground, usually used for storage. The term can be interchanged with 'crypt', though a crypt was used primarily as a religious space for burials or for holding relics, whereas an undercroft was used for general storage purposes. In the case of the Merchant Adventurers' Hall it was an almshouse or hospital and although below ground level not strictly underground!
In 1373, King Edward III licenced an almshouse to operate in the Undercroft to provide care for thirteen (the number of Jesus Christ and his apostles) "poor and "weak persons". Niches in the walls mark where inmates stored their belongings and many of the oak posts have scorch marks on them left behind by candles; candles and torches were, of course, the only way in which anything could have been illuminated in the space for 500 years.
From the 17th century onwards the space was divided up between the great oak posts to create cells for the hospital inmates. In 1818, celebrated diarist Anne Lister visited the almshouse and described it in her diary, "- to the merchants hall in Foss-gate, an odd looking old building - there are 2 large rooms, in 1 of which the bible society holds its meetings - there is a charity here for 5 old widows and 5 old men - the widows have a living room with 5 little fire places in it, and a sleeping Ditto with 5 beds, placed round three sides of the room, as it were in wood closets, each just large enough to hold 1 bed and 4 shillings a month."
The Undercroft was used until the beginning of the 20th century when the last remaining Company pensioners were moved to more modern surroundings. To this day the Company of Merchant Adventurers still look after 13 older members of York's community, carrying on a tradition that has existed for over seven centuries.
Plan of the Undercroft from 1814.
If you enjoyed reading about this particular Hall highlight, why not come and see the Undercroft in person?