Boisheim / Boishem nr. Viersen / Bussem / Buyschem

Noted and illustrated with a drawing in Die Kunstdenkmäler der Rheinprovinz, Bd. 1: Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreises Kempen“ (1891, Seite 13) as a baptismal font with a round basin that has rather crude human heads at 90-degree angles; between them are a series of motifs and/or symbols, as well as some other heads, one of which with vegetation stemming from the mouth; the basin stands on a plain cylindrical pedestal base; no cover present. Enlart (1902) lists a hemispherical basin with four heads -at 90-degree angles- and a round pedestal base at Boisheim. Mentioned in Sauerman (1904) along with Hönnepal, Höjer and Born as Namur stone fonts. The parish web site [http://st-peter-boisheim.kibac.de/geschichtliches/] [accessed 29 March 2017] notes: "Taufstein des 13. Jhs., Blaustein, H. 62 cm, aus 1952", the date being perthaps when the font was reconstructed; a second font is mentioned in this source: "Taufstein, Marmor, H. insgesamt 116 cm, aus 1900, Comuth, Venlo, mit Messingdeckel, um 1900, Bausch, Kevelaer." [NB: the old font appears to have been damaged, perhaps in 1945, and reconstructed in 1954, but we have no information on the details -- there may be some details in Georg Dehio's Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler. Nordrhein-Westfalen II Westfalen (Berlin/München: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2011)] The font is noted and illustrated in the 1/2015 edition of the Komm mit magazine [Journal_St_Cornelius_und_Peter_2015_06_WEB.PDF] [accessed 26 January 2024]. A series of communications to BSI from Pol Herman regarding this font (e-mails 10 August 2023 through 23 January 2024) contain a number of sources, comments and images: the reference to Clemen (1891) with the illustration; a series of photographs proivided by Barbara Toerschen, Pfarrsekretärin, Kath. Pfarrei St. Cornelius und Peter, and: "The old drawing shows a side of the font that is lost. Probably the font was discarded and broken in 1899, when the church was enlarged. In 1952, some fragments of the font were found, and re-assembled. The decoration is very unusual. Jean-Claude Ghislain thinks that it is a later crude work by a local unexperienced stone mason. Personally, but Ghislain does not agree, I have the impression that the heads are not unusual for a Mosan Romanesque font of the Ardennes-style. It is the [rest of the] iconography that is strange. A font that has resembling heads, and an equally strange, although different, iconography is Lummen : https://balat.kikirpa.be/object/27263. I would not discard it as rubbish, as Ghislain does, but I am really puzzled by the decoration."