Anstey / Anestei / Anestie / Anestige

Results: 23 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

animal - fabulous animal or monster - siren - male

Scene Description: on the northwest side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

animal - fabulous animal or monster - siren - male

Scene Description: on the southwest side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

animal - fabulous animal or monster - siren - male

Scene Description: on the northeast side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

animal - fabulous animal or monster - siren - male

Scene Description: on the southeast side

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of basin

Scene Description: with traces of yellowish paint or wash on it

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of basin

Scene Description: with traces of yellowish paint or wash on it

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of basin - northeast side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of basin - southwest side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of church exterior

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior - detail

Scene Description: mask

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior - detail

Scene Description: mask

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior - stained glass window

Scene Description: by Patrick Reyntiens; installed in 2000

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - alms box

Scene Description: chest

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - misericords

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - misericords

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - monument

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - monument - detail

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - plan

Scene Description: noting the position of the font behind the western-most pillar of the nave, south side

Image Source: digital image of a drawing in the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, Hertfordshire (1911)

Copyright Instructions: No known copyright restriction / Fair Dealing

view of font - northeast side

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 30 July 2000 by BSI

view of font - northwest side

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 July 2010 by Adrian Fletcher [www.paradoxplace.com]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of font and cover

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

Copyright Instructions: PD

INFORMATION

FontID: 00308ANS

Object Type: Baptismal Font1

Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. George

Church Patron Saints: St. George

Church Location: St Georges End, Anstey, Hertfordshire SG9 0BY

Country Name: England

Location: Hertfordshire, East

Directions to Site: Located 10 km SE of Royston, off the B1368.

Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of St. Albans

Historical Region: Hundred of Edwinstree [in Domesday]

Font Location in Church: Inside the church, in the W end, S side, behind the westernmost pillar

Century and Period: 12th century [basin only], Medieval [composite]

Cognate Fonts: The font at Cambridge St. Peter's

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Adrian Fletcher, of www.paradoxplace.com, for his photographs of this font

Church Notes: The church has a new stained glass window commissioned from the contemporary artist Patrick Reyntiens, which commemorates the October 1944 crash of the B17 Flying Fortress that killed 10 people at the edge of the churchyard. The new window was installed in June 2000.

Font Notes: Click to view

There are two entries for this Anstey [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/TL4032/anstey/] [accessed 11 July 2016], one of which mentions a preist in it but not a church, though there must have been one there. Cox & Harvey (1907) list a noteworthy baptismal font of the Norman period here. Described and illustrated in Bond (1908) as a baptismal font of the late 12th or early 13th century date. There are only two known fonts in England which depict the siren motif: four mermen hold their split fish-tails with their hands. The other example is found in St.Peter's in Cambridge, male sirens in both cases. The area below the basin appears to have been reconstructed or re-cut. The base consists of five uneven columns resting on a round lower base. The plinth is rectangular with kneeling stone. Noted in the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, Hertforshire (1911): "Font: square with rounded corners, ornamented with curious figures of two-tailed mermen or figures holding up cloths, late 12th-century." Jenkins (1999) writes: "What these creatures implied to their carvers is unknown. They are of an age that must have seemed impenetrably ancient even to the Gothic era." Listed as Norman font in Tompkins (1929). Noted in Pevsner & Cherry (1977): "Font: Very crude Norman with four mermen holding their split tails with both their hands; the design makes a symmetrical pattern along the four sides of the bowl."

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 51.976648, 0.043148

Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 51° 58′ 35.93″ N, 0° 2′ 35.33″ E

UTM: 31U 296927 5762570

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, limestone

Font Shape: square (mounted)

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: square

Drainage Notes: lead-lined

Rim Thickness: 4-6 cm* (18 at the corners)

Diameter (inside rim): 54-55 cm*

Basin Depth: 32 cm*

Basin Total Height: 55 cm*

Height of Base: 53 cm*

Height of Central Column: 44 cm*

Height of Side Columns: 44 cm*

Font Height (less Plinth): 108 cm*

Font Height (with Plinth): 124 cm*

Trapezoidal Basin: 66 x 69 cm*

Notes on Measurements: * BSI on-site

LID INFORMATION

Date: modern

Material: wood

Apparatus: no

Notes: Octagonal low pyramid, with metal ornaments and ring handle. The old hinges are still embedded in the rim of the basin.

REFERENCES

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

Cox, John Charles, English Church Furniture, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1907

Great Britain. Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Hertfordshire, London: Printed for His Majesty's Stationary Office by J. Truscott, 1911

Jenkins, Simon, England's Thousand Best Churches, London and New York: Allen Lane, the Penguin Press, 1999 [2000 rev. printing]

Pevsner, Nikolaus, Hertfordshire, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1977

Tompkins, Herbert Winckworth, Hertfordshire, London: Methuen & Co., 1922