ot its date
well assured no one would believe it to be later than the end of the
twelfth century. The chancel, which was aisleless and lower than the
rest of the church, is gone, but the nave and its aisles are still in a
tolerable state of preservation, though outside all the detail has been
destroyed except one round window on the south side filled in with white
marble tracery of a distinctly Italian type, and the corbel table of the
boat-keel shape. The inside is most unusual for a church of the
fourteenth century. The central aisle has a pointed barrel vault
springing from a little above the aisle arches, while the aisles
themselves have an ordinary cross vault. All the capitals too look
early, and the buttresses broad and rather shallow. (Fig. 30.)

[Sidenote: Leca do Balio.]

A few miles north of Oporto on the banks of the clear stream of the Leca
a monastery for men and women had been founded in 986. In the course of
the next hundred years it had several times fallen into decay and been
restored, till about the year 1115 when it was handed over to the
Knights Hospitaller of St. John of Jerusalem and so became their
headquarters in Portugal. The church had been rebuilt by Abbot Guntino
some years before the transfer took place, and had in time become
ruinous, so that in 1336 it was rebuilt by Dom Frei Estevao Vasques
Pimentel, the head of the Order. This church still stands but little
altered since the fourteenth century, and though not a large or splendid
building it is the most complete and unaltered example of that
thoroughly national plan and style which, developed in the previous
century, was seen at Thomar and will be seen again in many later
examples. The church consists of a nave and aisles of four bays,
transepts higher than the side but lower than the centre aisle of the
nave, three vaulted apses to the east, and at the south-west corner a
square tower. Like many Portuguese buildings Sta. Maria de Leca do Balio
looks at first sight a good deal earlier than is really the case. The
west and the south doors, which are almost exactly alike, except that
the south door is surmounted by a gable, have three shafts on each side
with early-looking capitals and plain moulded archivolts, and within
these, jambs moulded at the angles bearing an inner order whose flat
face is carved with a series of circles enclosing four and five-leaved
flowers. Above the west door runs a projecting gallery whose parapet,
like all