Foxton / Faxton / Foxtone / Foxestone

Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Results: 10 records

design element - architectural - arcade - blind - round arches - intersecting arches - beaded-tape motif - columns with capitals and bases

Scene Description: The four corner arches bend inwards half-way down the basin side

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Timothy Marlow, 2014

Image Source: detail of a photograph taken 7 April 1982 by Timothy Marlow

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (letter of 26 October 2013)

design element - motifs - moulding - graded

Scene Description: some of it badly damaged

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Timothy Marlow, 2014

Image Source: detail of a photograph taken 7 April 1982 by Timothy Marlow

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (letter of 26 October 2013)

view of church exterior - north portal

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 18 July 2000 by BSI

view of church exterior - west tower

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 18 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - detail

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 18 July 2000 by BSI

view of church interior - detail

Scene Description: Former holy-water stoup? part of a cross? now used as flower stand

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 18 July 2000 by BSI

view of font

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Baptisteria Sacra Index, 2023

Image Source: digital image of a photograph taken 18 July 2000 by BSI

view of font - northeast side

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Timothy Marlow, 2014

Image Source: photograph taken 7 April 1982 by Timothy Marlow

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (letter of 26 October 2013)

view of font and cover - east side

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Timothy Marlow, 2014

Image Source: photograph taken 7 April 1982 by Timothy Marlow

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (letter of 26 October 2013)

view of font and cover - southwest side

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Timothy Marlow, 2014

Image Source: photograph taken 7 April 1982 by Timothy Marlow

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (letter of 26 October 2013)

INFORMATION

FontID: 00510FOX
Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Andrew
Church Patron Saints: St. Andrew
Church Location: Main Street, Foxton, Leicestershire, LE16 7RD, UK
Country Name: England
Location: Leicestershire, East Midlands
Directions to Site: Located off (S) the A6, 5-6 km WNW of Market Harborough, about 20 km ESE of Leicester
Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Leicester
Historical Region: Hundred of Gartree [in Domesday]
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Century and Period: 12th century (mid?) [basin only] [composite font], Medieval [composite]
Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Timothy Marlow for his photographs of this font
There are two entries for this Foxton [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/SP7090/foxton/] [accessed 8 November 2014], one of which, in the lordship of Robert de Bucy, reports a priest on it; there is no mention of a church, though there probably was one in it. A font here is listed in Cox & Harvey (1907) as a baptismal font of the Norman period. Noted in Kelly's Directory of Leicestershire (1929): "the font is of very early date". In Pevsner (1984): "Font. Square, Norman, but carved so as to fit on an octagonal base (not the present one). Intersected arches; the shafts at the corners bend inwards as if made of plastcine, to connect with the octagon." The Victoria County History (Leicestershire, 1964) notes that a part of the shaft of a Saxon cross "and the 12th-century font bowl indicate the existence of an early church on the site [...] The large square font bowl probably dates from the mid-12th century. It is carved with interlaced arcading, the beaded semi-circular arches resting on cushion capitals. At the angles the columns are bent round under projecting corbels. The pedestal is not the original one [...] and appears to have been made up of two 13th-century capitals, one upside-down, taken from composite piers". A footnote in this same source [VCH above] informs on the original(?) lower base of the font: "A large square stone now in the garden of the Chestnuts, Foxton, might be the original base of the font. Circular depressions on its upper surface could have housed a central pedestal and small supporting shafts" [source: www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=22047] [accessed 21 September 2006]. Described and illustrated in Cook (1976). Bond (1908) refers to a baptismal font in "Faxton" having a side recess 2 1/2 inches square; he must referring to the Foxton font [there is no Faxton site recorded in England]. On-site notes: the basin is square at the top but the sides are carved in, diagonally, about half-way down so that the bottom of the basin is much narrower. The sides of the basin are covered by a bling arcade of intersecting round arches; the arches are of the bead-tape kind, with elaborate capitals and bases; the four corner columns of the basin sides just bend inwards half-way down to the basin side, thus giving the basin a strange shape. A series of torus separate the basin from the columnar (constructional) base. [NB: the church has a rectangular object now used as a flower stand that may -or may not- have been a holy-water stoup - cf. Image area]. Not mentioned in the CRSBI [last checked 14 October 2016].

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 52.501001, -0.97171
Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 52° 30′ 3.61″ N, 0° 58′ 18.16″ W
UTM: 30U 637676 5818697

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, limestone
Number of Pieces: two
Font Shape: square (mounted)
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: square
Drainage Notes: lead lining
Rim Thickness: 10 cm* (27 cm* at the corners)
Diameter (inside rim): 58 cm*
Basin Depth: 38 cm*
Height of Basin Side: 54 cm*
Basin Total Height: 54 cm*
Height of Base: 82 cm*
Font Height (less Plinth): 136 cm*
Trapezoidal Basin: 76 x 78 cm*
Notes on Measurements: * BSI on-site

REFERENCES

Victoria County History [online], University of London, 1993-. Accessed: 2005-03-03 00:00:00. URL: https://www.british-history.ac.uk.
Bond, Francis, Fonts and Font Covers, London: Waterstone, 1985 c1908
Cox, John Charles, English Church Furniture, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1907
Kelly, Kelly's Directory of Cambridgeshire, London: Kelly's Directories Ltd., 1929
Pevsner, Nikolaus, Leicestershire and Rutland, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1984
Smith, Edwin, English Parish Churches, London: Thames & Hudson, 1976