St. Breock / Nanssans / Saint Breock / St. Breoke

INFORMATION

Font ID: 01464BRE
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Font Century and Period/Style: 14th - 15th century, Decorated? / Perpendicular?
Church / Chapel Name: Parish Church of St. Breoke
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Church Patron Saint(s): St. Brieuc [aka Breock, Breoke, Briavel, Brieg, Brioc, Briog, Briuc, Tyfrïog, Tyvriog]
Church Address: 1 Churchtown, St Breock, Wadebridge PL27 7JS, United Kingdom -- Tel.: +44 7539 928047
Site Location: Cornwall, South West, England, United Kingdom
Directions to Site: Located just S of Wadebridge, about 40 km ENE of Truro
Font Notes:
Noted in Murray's Handbook for the traveller […] (1865) as a "very fine font" of the Decorated period. Listed in Cox & Harvey (1907) as a baptismal font of the Decorated period made of local Catacleuse stone. Cox (1912) notes: "Small octagonal 15th cent, font of wellwrought Catacleuse stone […] dark Catacleuse stone, sometimes mistaken for Purbeck". Pevsner (1970) has it simply as a font of the 15th century. Illustrated in A Sanp at the Time [http://www.caerkief.co.uk/Churches/Breock-St.html] [accessed 13 November 2009]. The sides and underbowl of the octagonal basin are decorated with busy tracery motifs, the sides with large quatrefoils inscribing floral motifs; roll moulding below; plain cylindrical stem; on a two-step lower base, and an octagonal plinth with kneeling extension.

COORDINATES

UTM: 30U 368547 5597090
Latitude & Longitude (Decimal): 50.511, -4.854
Latitude & Longitude (DMS): 50° 30′ 39.6″ N, 4° 51′ 14.4″ W

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, Catacleuse stone
Font Shape: octagonal, mounted
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal

LID INFORMATION

Material: wood
Apparatus: no
Notes: round and flat, with metal decoration and ring handle; date unknown

REFERENCES

  • Cox, John Charles, Cornwall, London: George Allen & Company, 1912, p. 13, 68
  • Cox, John Charles, English Church Furniture, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1907, p. 192, 193
  • Murray, John, A handbook for travellers in Devon and Cornwall, London: John Murray, 1865, p. 223 / [http://books.google.ca/books?id=V_YGAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA58&lpg=PA58&dq=%22roborough+stone%22&source=bl&ots=2ZhOkO8ZIn&sig=RriwKcw-zwLPfFdGUaHE7WccPgU&hl=en&ei=QRWkSZHXMYjTnQe2ud2pBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=7&ct=result#PPR5,M1] [accessed 24 February 2009]
  • Pevsner, Nikolaus, Cornwall, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1970, p. 160