Ingworth / Ingewrda / Inghewurda / Yngworth

There are two entries for Ingworth [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/TG1929/ingworth/] [accessed 5 October 2014], neither of which mentions a cleric or church in it. Blomefield (1805-1810) writes: "William Rufus [i.e., 1087-1100] gave a mediety of this church to Battle abbey in Sussex, [...] with the fee that Brithric the rector of it then held, namely the land of one socman in Ailesham manor; but it was not confirmed. [...] The Church is dedicated to St. Lawrence, and not to St. Andrew, as some have observed". Blomefield (ibid.) further names "Hugh de Ingworth, dean", as first recorded dean of the Rural Deanery of Ingworth, in 1189. The present font here is described and illustrated with an engraving by J. Basire in Repton (1812) as a baptismal font "from about the reign of King Henry the Sixth to that of Henry the Eighth" [i.e., 1422-1509+]. Octagonal mounted font; seven of the eight sides of the basin have blind cinquefoil arches, the eigth has a large rosette inscribed in a Gothic window. A print of this font made by Sir William Jackson Hooker is held at the British Museum [ref.: AN1086614001 Department: Prints & Drawings. Registration number: 1871,0610.597. Location: British XIXc Unmounted Roy]; "Inscribed in pencil in lower margin: 'Ingworth Font'; Date 1800-1865". Cautley (1949) proposes that the fonts at Ingworth and Croxton should be included in the group of 'Seven-sacrament fonts'. Nichols (1994) argues against Cautley's suggestion that this was ever a Seven-sacrament font, based on the evidence of the stem features and the motif on the eigth panel; it is quite possible that the now blank panels may have included some sort of [painted?] decoration removed in the past; the chamfer of the underbowl has shields on it, and the slender octagonal stem of the base is decorated with quatrefoils arranged vertically between marked buttresses that run all the way from the underbowl to the moulded lower base. The plinth is octagonal and plain. Both font and cover are noted in Pevsner & Wilson (1997), the cover with date of 1935. Noted and illustrated in Knott (2005). [NB: we have no information on the font of the original church here].