Tuxford / Tuxfarne

There is an entry forTuxford [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/SK7371/tuxford/] [accessed 18 February 2024]; it mentions neither priest nor church in it. Bond (1908) states that "hanging would not have been good enough for those who wrought the fonts of Tuxford [...] and Bottesford", and continues to exclaim that "the pseudo-Gothic fonts of the Restoration are mere Gothic shells; the Gothic spirit is not in them." Although one would wholeheartedly agree with Bond on the Bottesford font, the one at Tuxford seems undeserving of such choleric vituperation. Though lacking in character, the font is of simple imitation-Gothic design, very white, very plain; the basin and the base are octagonal and plain, except for a couple of roll mouldings at the upper rim of the basin, and an inscription dating it to 1662 [cf. Inscription area]. The font is totally out-staged by the two covers: the smaller is an octagonal pyramid with short vertical sides at the lower end, all the panels ornamented with carved foliage; the second and larger cover is actually a suspended canopy of the Jacobean period with several levels, all profusely ornamented. According to Bond there is inscription on it which gives the name "Francis Turner" and the date "1673" (ibid.). In Cox (1912): "Font inscribed ';G.M., R.Y. 1662. C.W.' The cover and separate suspended canopy are most richly carved; the latter is inscribed :'Francis Turner made this 1673'". Noted and illustrated in Guilford (1927). Both inscriptions -on the font and on the canopy- are transcribed in Standish (1907) [source: Nottinghamshire History web site [www.nottshistory.org.uk/articles/tts/tts1907/summer/tuxford2.htm] [cf. Lid information area]. [NB: there are actually two 'covers': the canopy and the lid proper, the latter a low-rise pyramidal on a crown base, all octagonal]. Cox (1912) notes Tuxford's font cover as 17th-century and remarkable. In Pevsner & Williamson (1979): "1662, with conical cover dated 1673." The entry for this church in Historic England [Listing NGR: SK7366171066] notes: "Parish church. C12, C13, C14, C15, clerestory 1473, chancel rebuilt c.1495 by Gunthorpe, chapel restored and widened C18, restored 1811, 1879 and 1893 [...] Ashlar font dated 1662 with fine and elaborate conical cover and suspended from the roof a similarly fine and elaborate canopy dated 1673."