Lewes No. 2

Photograph and permission received

Results: 8 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

B01: design element - motifs - geometric - triangle

Scene Description: [cf. Font notes]

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

B02: design element - motifs - rope

Scene Description: [cf. Font notes]

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

view of basin

Image Source: illustration in Lethaby (1893: fig. 26)

Copyright Instructions: PD

view of basin - interior

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

view of object

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

view of object

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

view of object - detail

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

view of object - detail

Image Source: digital photograph taken by Dr. John Blair, of The Queen's College, Oxford, in August 2007

Copyright Instructions: Photograph and permission received

INFORMATION

FontID: 05438LEW

Museum and Inventory Number: Lewes Museum of Sussex Archaeology, Barbican House

Church/Chapel: Origin unknown; now at a museum

Country Name: England

Location: East Sussex, South East

Directions to Site: Lewes is located about 10 km ENE of Brighton [the font is now in a museum]

Historical Region: Rape of Lewes -- Sussex

Font Location in Church: in a museum

Century and Period: , Pre-Conquest

Workshop/Group/Artisan: lead font

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to John Blair for the photographs of this object.

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

There are two entries for Lewes in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/TQ4110/lewes/] [accessed 26 September 2014], but neither mentions a church or cleric in it. Lethaby (1893) writes: "There is in the Lewes Museum a lead cistern-like object of Saxon work [...] It is about 14 inches long and 8 inches high, the sides are decorated with triangles of interlacing patterns cast with the lead. It has two handles of iron; but as it would be much too heavy for a movable vessel, and as the small foreign lead font at Kensington Museum has handles also, it is probably a font. The cross in the decoration would go to confirm this." Described in Bond (1908) as "an oblong lead cistern with two handles of iron and ornamented with a Greek cross surrounded by interlacings, now [i.e., ca. 1908] in the Lewes Museum." [NB: a set of images from a lead tank in Lewes was shared with BSI by professor John Blair, The Queen's College, Oxford. The object is roughly rectangular and has a triangular motif with another [unidentified inscribed] as well as two rows of what appears as thin rope motif to the sides of the triangle; there are definitely handle-like protrusions on the upper rim of the narrower sides; there is no evidence to sustain the use of this object as a baptismal vessel -- It is also not clear by Bond's description whether or not the object referred to in his text is the same as this one].

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: metal, lead (with iron handles)

Font Shape: rectangular (unmounted)

Basin Interior Shape: rectangular

Basin Exterior Shape: rectangular

Basin Total Height: 20 cm**

Trapezoidal Basin: 30 x [15?] cm* -- 33.6 cm**

Notes on Measurements: * [length is correct -- width is approximate] -- ** [Lethaby (1893)]

REFERENCES

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

Lethaby, William Richard, Leadwork, old and ornamental, and for the most part English [...] with illustrations, London; New York: Macmillan & co., 1893

Navoni, Marco, "Il battistero di Varese: una sintesi architettonica della storia del battesimo", 2000, pp. 17-28.