Dunstan, who had assumed the habit of that order, and was now archbishop of Canterbury. It is impossible to say with certainty, whether any of the few remains that now exist, belong to this edifice; but, from the small portions of sculpture that I have seen (vide pp. 113-114), I am disposed to attribute them rather, to the next building in the order of succession, which was begun to be erected in 1110, under the Abbot Hugh of Winchester, a relation of King Stephen de Blois. The mouldings are better cut, and the carving is more profuse, than would have existed in a building of so early a date as 964. To which I may add, that the use of polished Purbec marble for shafts, of which there are more than one example, was not, so far as I know, introduced at so early a period. And if I am right in concluding, as I think I am, that the stone for the exterior was from Caen or its neighbourhood, this will undoubtedly point us to a period subsequent to the Norman Conquest. And as we have no evidence, of any very extensive buildings, having been erected here long after that period, I think we shall not be far wrong, in assuming the style of that day, as the general style of the edifice. To this, however, I will revert presently.
The parish of Chertsey, whenever originally formed, seems to have comprised, at least, all that now constitutes the parishes of Chertsey, Thorpe, Egham, and Chobham, and in all probability the whole of Surrey as it then was, or, at all events, all the country bounded by the Hog's-back and the Wye, the whole of which, as late as 1673, was a king's chace, not afforested, but under the jurisdiction of the honour and Castle of Windsor, the whole or greater part having come to the crown, probably, on the dissolution of the Abbey. Egham and Chobham were both chapelries of Chertsey
