Huriel No. 1

Reported in an oral presentation by Georges de Soultrait to the 21st session of the 1854 Congrès archéologique de France, as one of five Romanesque fonts in the Allier; this one, said to resemble somewhat the font at nearby La Chapelaude, both of which dated to the 12th century. Soultrait (ibid.) refers to a description by "M. l'abbé Desrosiers", who noted a serpent, a crocodile and a dove on it [cf. infra]. Listed in Le Patrimoine des communes de l'Allier (1999) as a hemispheric basin mounted on a very short and small base. The ornamentation is described in the source as consisting of a rope-like serpent around the upper rim, from which hang twelve human masks/heads; the open mouth of the serpent "semble reposser les flammes projetées sur lui par un animal fantastique ressemblant à un dragon." (Ibid.) On-site notes: the ornamentation on this cauldron-shaped granite font is very crude, but there appears to be a bird caught in the mouth of the dragon; the serpent and the "heads", if that is what they are, have features that are hardly distinguishable, a moulding around the upper rim of the basin with small knob-like protursions from it. The monolithic object has a round stump as base and rests directly on the ground.