London No. 5

Allen (1839?) notes that this old church, "originally in the abbot and convent of Westminster, […] was destroyed by the fire of London [1666], after which the present edifice was erected on its ruins […] finished in 1684, by sir Christopher Wren […] The font is an elegant circular basin of statuary marble, enriched with mouldings and sustained on a pillar of the same material. The cover in profile shews two conjoined ogees, it is ribbed and much resembles a canopy of the pointed style, and is painted to imitate veined marble. The Greek inscription on this font has attracted much notice, partly from the circunstance of its being a palindrome, and partly from its frequent use in the church from the early ages. The inscription is ΝΙΨΟΝ ΑΝΟΜΗΜΑ ΜΗ ΜΟΝΑΝ ΟΨΙΝ (Lord) wash my sin and not my face only,) it will be readily perceived that this Greek inscription reads either backward or forward. This monostich appear to have been adopted from the Greek church. It is, or was to be seen, on the font of the basiilica of St. Sophia at Constantinople. In this country its occurrence is frequent, in particular on the covers of the fonts at Dulwich College, and Worlingworth church Suffolk, a festive basin at Trinity College Cambridge, on the font at Harlow in Essex, and at Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire, and in France on a marble benitier in the church of Notre Dame, and the fonts at St. Stephen d'Egres at Paris, and in that of St. Menin's Abbey near Orleans. Beneath this inscription is the following, in English, '1673, THE GIFT OF THOMAS MORLEY, ESQ. BORN IN THE PARISH.'" Mentioned in Bond (1908) as a baptismal font dated to 1673 and bearing the inscription ΝΙΨΟΝ ΑΝΟΜΗΜΑ ΜΗ ΜΟΝΑΝ ΟΨΙΝ, which Bond renders in English as "Cleanse your sin, not your face only". Listed in Cox & Harvey (1907). Blatch (1995) informs that this font was "given by one Thomas Morley in 1673, is a small elegant example in white marble with fluted bowl" and refers also to the Greek palindrome inscription mentioned in Bond above.