2. The presbytery screen

The only references to presbytery screens that I can find are in Rakowski. He says that in some places a screen was set up between the quire stalls and the high altar. This screen was like an open rood screen with a central gateway and tracery, but without the rood itself. Rakowsky mentions them because he thinks that they are the nearest western equivalent to the eastern ikonostasis. His idea is that the medieval quire is most like the byzantine nave, whereas the nave is most like a greatly enlarged byzantine narthex (?), so the presbytery screen is that which separates the high altar from his newly-defined 'nave'.

Hmm. The only example Rakowsky gives is that of St David's Cathedral in Wales (pictured above); I'm not at all sure that the 'presbytery screen' here wasn't more to do with the presence of the shrine of St David, just in front of the screen. It would have been useful for keeping the press of pilgrims out of the quire stall area.