Norman architecture on either side of the English Channel developed in parallel towards "Early Gothic". Gothic features, such as the rib vault, had appeared in England and Normandy in the 11th century. Rib-vaults were employed in some parts of the cathedral at Durham (1093–) and in Lessay Abbey in Normandy (1098). However, the first buildings to be considered fully Gothic are the royal funerary abbey of the French kings, the Abbey of Saint-Denis (1134–44), and the archiepiscopal cathedral at Sens (1143–63) They were the first buildings to systematically combine rib vaulting, buttresses, and pointed arches. Most of the characteristics of later "Early English" were already present in the lower "chevet" of Saint-Denis.