Lifton / Listone

Results: 16 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

animal - bird - dove

Scene Description: cover finial

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

design element - architectural - arcade - blind - round arches - intersecting arches

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

design element - motifs - X in a square (nail-head, etc.)

Scene Description: also known as 'Norman star', a form of nail-head and/or dog-tooth motif -- note the area where a modern replacement has been inserted

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

design element - motifs - ball, bead or pellet

Scene Description: tiny pellets, beads or balls in the spandrels of the arcade

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

human figure - grotesque or fantastic - head

Scene Description: some of the heads appear human, whereas others are mask-like

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

view of basin - southwest side

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

view of church exterior - east side

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of church exterior - west tower

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of church interior - looking east

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of font

Image Source: digital image of a B&W photograph in Bond (1908)

Copyright Instructions: PD

view of font

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of font and cover - northwest side

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

view of font and cover - west side

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of font and cover in context

Scene Description: from the NW corner

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of font cover

Image Source: photograph courtesy of Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com]

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received from the author (letter of 9 December 2004)

view of font cover

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 29 June 1998 by BSI

INFORMATION

FontID: 00305LIF

Church/Chapel: Church of Saint Mary the Virgin

Church Patron Saints: St. Mary the Virgin

Church Location: 15-19 Park Rd, Lifton PL16 0BL, United Kingdom -- Tel.: +44 1566 784462

Country Name: England

Location: Devon, South West

Directions to Site: Located off (E) the A30, 6 km E of Launceston, 24 km WSW of Okehampton

Historical Region: Hundred of Lifton [in Domesday]

Font Location in Church: Inside the church, in the W end, centre nave

Century and Period: 12th - 13th century, Late Norman / Transitional?

Cognate Fonts: Clarke [cf. infra] groups this font with the ones at Maristow and Stowford

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Julie Pitrone Williamson [jpwilli@wmi.rr.com] for the added photographs of this font and church]

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

There is an entry for Lifton [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/SX3885/lifton/] [accessed 31 January 2023]; it mentions neither cleric nor church in it. Listed in Lysons (1806-1822) as one of a group of square baptismal fonts in the county that are "for the most part supported by four pillars and a large pedestal in the centre". Noted in John Murray's Handbook for travellers […] (1865): "a good Norm[an] font". Described and illustrated in Bond (1908 (who dates it no earlier than the last quarter of the 12th century, "the foliage and scrolls being Gothic in character", and he is more inclined to date it to the 13th century. The corner heads are of the type found in the fonts at Launceston, Bratton and Altarnon, but the Lifton basin has a squareness and shape which distinguishes it from the latter fonts and makes it closer to the Devonian ones at Maristow and Stowdon, as Clarke (1921) points out. Bond (ibid.) refers to the arches as "pointed", although the arches are actually round and intersecting, and it is only the resulting intersections that are pointed; there is pellet and trefoil or lily motif between the arches; there is nail-head and foliage on the band around the upper rim side. Clarke (1921) notes that "the four-leaved flower at Maristow is replaced by ornament of Early English character, a continuous stem throwing off trefoils on each side." The stem of the base is an octagonal pedestal and the plinth has the same shape. Noted in Pevsner (1952): "Font. Square, Norman, of a type more Cornish than Devonian (but cf. Marystow): corner heads and between them simplky ornamented intersecting arches." Described in Hoskins (1954) as "a magnificent late 12th-cent. font". On-site notes: four grotesque heads at the upper basin side corners (the one on the SW corner appears to be a cat's mask); ornamental motifs, pointed arches [cf. supra re shape], fleur-de-lis or trefoil, and the Early English continuous tendril motif decorate the four sides. The base is polygonal -square chamfered to octagonal- and plain. There is a wooden lid (19th or 20th century). The basin well is not lined with lead, but has a central drainage hole.

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 50.64252, -4.2831

Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 50° 38′ 33.07″ N, 4° 16′ 59.16″ W

UTM: 30U 409277 5610858

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, freestone

Number of Pieces: two?

Font Shape: square (mounted)

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: square

Drainage Notes: not lined

Rim Thickness: 11-13 to 25-29 cm*

Diameter (inside rim): 54-55 cm*

Diameter (includes rim): 77.5 cm**

Basin Depth: 25 cm* / 27.5 cm**

Height of Basin Side: 44 cm*

Basin Total Height: 52 cm*

Height of Base: 42 cm*

Height of Central Column: 22.5 cm**

Font Height (less Plinth): 94 cm* / 92.5 cm**

Font Height (with Plinth): 107 cm*

Trapezoidal Basin: 77 x 80 x 75 x 78 cm*

Notes on Measurements: * BSI on-site / ** measurements given in inches in Clarke (1922: 223 -- NB: Clarke gives only "30 inches" as the measurement of the "base", but it probably refers to its diameter]

LID INFORMATION

Date: modern

Material: wood, oak

Apparatus: yes [counterweight]

REFERENCES

Bond, Francis, Fonts and Font Covers, London: Waterstone, 1985 c1908

Clarke, Kate M., "The baptismal fonts of Devon -- Part IX", 54, Report and Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature and Art, 1922, pp. 216-223; r["References"]

Clarke, Kate M., "The baptismal fonts of Devon -- Part VIII", 53, Report and Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature and Art, 1921, pp. 226-231; r["References"]

Hoskins, William George, Devon, London: Collins, 1954

Lysons, Daniel, Magna Britannia, being a concise topographical account of the several counties of Great Britain, London: Printed for T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1806-1822

Murray, John, A handbook for travellers in Devon and Cornwall, London: John Murray, 1865

Pevsner, Nikolaus, South Devon, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1952