Stow No. 2 / Stou / Stowe / Stow in Lindsey / Stow in Lindsay

Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

CC-BY-SA-2.0

Results: 14 records

animal - fabulous animal or monster

Scene Description: perhaps a dragon

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158819] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

animal - fabulous animal or monster - dragon

Scene Description: on the back [west] side of the lower base; the wings on the front, the head twisted east at a 90-degree angle

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158823] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

animal - fabulous animal or monster - dragon - detail

Scene Description: the photographer captions this image "possibly Devil's face carving at the base", but it is that head of the dragon whose body extends towards the right outside of the picture here

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158826] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - floral or foliage

Scene Description: on the est-northeast side of the basin

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158835] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - floral or foliage

Scene Description: on the southeast corner of the lower base

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158831] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - foliage

Scene Description: all around the underbowl

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Richard Croft, 2007

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 January 2007 by Richard Croft [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/303315] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

human figure - head

Scene Description: on the northeast corner of the lower base; much eroded now

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158829] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

human figure - male - grotesque or fantastic - head - Green Man or woodwoose? / monster?

Scene Description: on the southeast side of the basin -- orientation is approximate

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © J. Hannan-Briggs, 2012

Image Source: digital photograph taken 4 August 2012 by J. Hannan-Briggs [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3098116] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

symbol - star - 5-point

Scene Description: on the east-northeast side of the basin

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Ian S, 2018

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 19 May 2018 by Ian S [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5887979] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover - east side

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Ian S, 2018

Image Source: digital photograph taken 19 May 2018 by Ian S [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5887979] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover - southeast side

Scene Description: orientation is approximate

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158814] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover - southwest side

Scene Description: Source caption: "St.Mary's font. Thirteenth century Early English octagonal font on nine columns, unusually decorated with non-christian symbols including a dragon, pentangle and a green man."

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Richard Croft, 2007

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 January 2007 by Richard Croft [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/303313] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover in context - southwest view

Scene Description: Source caption: "Stow, St. Mary's Church: The nave with the Anglo Saxon arches that supported the original tower. Between the Anglo Saxon arches is a pointed Gothic arch."

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Garlick, 2016

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 14 September 2016 by Michael Garlick [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/5158846] [accessed 15 April 2019]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font in context

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © [in the public domain]

Image Source: digital image of an illustration in Bond (1908: 42)

Copyright Instructions: PD

INFORMATION

FontID: 00505STO
Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Mary / Stow Minster [served as cathedral of the old diocese of Lindsey]
Church Patron Saints: St. Mary the Virgin
Church Location: 3 Church Rd, Stow, Lincoln LN1 2DE, United Kingdom -- Tel.: +44 1427 788725
Country Name: England
Location: Lincolnshire, East Midlands
Directions to Site: Located 12-14 km WNW of Lincoln up the A1241, 14 km SE of Gainsborough
Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Lincoln [formerly Diocese of Lindsey]
Historical Region: Hundred of Aveland
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Century and Period: 13th century, Transitional / Early English
Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Peter Fairweather, www.chuchmouse.info, for his photographs of this font.
There is an entry for this Stow [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/TF0934/stow/] [accessed 15 April 2019]; it mentions a church in it. The entry for this abbey in the Victoria County History (Lincoln, vol. 2, 1906) notes: "The monastery of St. Mary, Stow, was founded early in the eleventh century [ca. 1040?] for secular clerks [...] After the Conquest Bishop Remigius found that the house had been for some time desolate by the carelessness of its rulers; and in 1091 he determined to convert it into a Benedictine abbey. [...] In 1109 Henry I issued a new charter, [...] at the desire probably of Robert Bloett, Remigius's successor, [...] for the restoration of the abbey of Eynsham. The monks of Stow were soon afterwards transferred thither, and the estates of their church were annexed to the see of Lincoln." This is probably the font noted in Moule (1837) as being `coeval with the oldest part of the church`. Described and illustrated in Bond (1908) as a late 12th-century Norman font; the octagonal basin ornamented with large rosettes on the sides rests on a central pedestal and eight colonnettes topped with transition capitals; the base/plinth is square with ornaments on the upper surface. Jenkins (1999) describes it as "a magnificent Early Gothic font, its bowl resting on colonnettes, with pagan emblems on its eight faces. One of these is a Green Man." Hutton (1957) dates it to the Early English period [1190 to 1250 a/p Hutton]. The square plinth or lower base on which the bases of the columns rest has also several ornamentations, among which a rope moulding. Also in Smith (1976). Cox & Harvey (1907) list it as Norman. Pevsner, Harris and Anram (1989) note: "E[arly] E[nglish], octagonal, on nine supports. On each side of the plain bowl one small motif, none of the Christian. A band of foliage runs round the bottom of the bowl, and there is a largish monster along the W side of the base."

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 53.3275, -0.677222
Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 53° 19′ 39″ N, 0° 40′ 38″ W
UTM: 30U 654688 5911219

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, type unknown
Font Shape: octagonal (mounted)
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal
Drainage Notes: lead-lined

LID INFORMATION

Material: wood, oak?
Apparatus: no
Notes: octagonal and flat

REFERENCES

Bond, Francis, Fonts and Font Covers, London: Waterstone, 1985 c1908
Cox, John Charles, English Church Furniture, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1907
Hutton, Graham, English Parish Churches, London: Thames & Hudson, 1976
Jenkins, Simon, England's Thousand Best Churches, London and New York: Allen Lane, the Penguin Press, 1999 [2000 rev. printing]
Moule, Thomas, The English counties delineated; or, A topographical description of England [...], London: George Virtue, 1837 [vol. 2]
Pevsner, Nikolaus, Lincolnshire, London: Penguin, 1989
Smith, Edwin, English Parish Churches, London: Thames & Hudson, 1976