Great Maplestead / Mapledesteda

Standing permission

Results: 8 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

design element - architectural - arch or window - trefoiled - 8

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

design element - motifs - floral - 8

Scene Description: on the lower level of underbowl chamfer

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

design element - motifs - moulding - graded

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

design element - motifs - moulding - graded

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

symbol - shield - blank - in a quatrefoil

Scene Description: several; blank now; not known whether all painted originally [cf. FontNotes]

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

symbol - shield - emblem - the instruments of the Passion

Scene Description: [cf. Font notes]

view of church exterior - southeast view

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of font

Image Source: digital photograph taken by John Whitworth [www.essexchurches.info]

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

INFORMATION

FontID: 00798GRE

Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Giles

Church Patron Saints: St. Giles [aka Aegidus, Egidus, Gilles]

Church Location: Church St, Great Maplestead, Halstead CO9 2RG, United Kingdom

Country Name: England

Location: Essex, East

Directions to Site: Located E of the A131, 4 km NNW of Halstead, about halfway between Braintree and Sudbury

Historical Region: Hundred of Hinckford

Font Location in Church: Inside the church

Date: ca. 1400?

Century and Period: 14th - 15th century, Medieval

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to John Whitworth, of www.essexchurches.info, for his photographs of church and font

Church Notes: 12thC church; partially re-built 17thC

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

There is an entry for [Great] Maplestead [varian spelling] in the Domesday surveyy [https://opendomesday.org/place/TL8034/great-maplestead/] [accessed 19 April 2023]; it mentions neither cleric nor church in it. Listed in Bond (1908) as one of "a set of sculptured fonts which have credited with undue antiquity, owing to the ruthness of or uncouthness of their ornament; but it by no means follows that what is archaic is always ancient". The RCHM (1916) does not mention any font in this church, but includes a possible 11th-century font in Little Maplestead -- Pevsner (1976) notes"Noted in Pevsner (1976): "Font. Perp[endicular], octagonal, with traceried stem, and bowl with foliage decoration. Remains of colour found in 1929. The panels were bright blue with thin yellow diapering." Bettley & Pevsner (2007) write: "Perp[endicular], octagonal, with traceried stem. Remains of colour found in 1930. The panels were bright blue with yellow diapering, and the shields on the bowl had painted Emblems of the Passion with alternating borders of green and yellow, and red and yellow." The British Listed Buldings database [http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-114302-church-of-st-giles-great-maplestead] [accessed 7 July 2010] notes: "Circa 1400 octagonal font, each side carved with a quatrefoil and shield, originally painted with only traces now remaining."

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 51.98, 0.632

Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 51° 58′ 48″ N, 0° 37′ 55.2″ E

UTM: 31U 337374 5761462

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, type unknown

Font Shape: octagonal (mounted)

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal

REFERENCES

Bettley, James, Essex, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007

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

Pevsner, Nikolaus, Essex, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976