Ruscombe / Roscombe / Roscompe / Rotescamp / Rothscamp / Rotiscamp / Rowescompe / Ruscoumbe

Main image for Ruscombe / Roscombe / Roscompe / Rotescamp / Rothscamp / Rotiscamp / Rowescompe / Ruscoumbe

Image copyright © Michael Ford, 2002

CC-BY-SA-2.0

Results: 3 records

view of church exterior - southeast view

Source caption: "St James, Ruscombe. Grade 1 listed building erected in the 12th century."
Scene Description: Source caption: "St James, Ruscombe. Grade 1 listed building erected in the 12th century."
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Michael Ford, 2002
Image Source: photograph taken in 2002 by Michael Ford [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1525480] [accessed 25 March 2015]
Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font - southwest side

the octagonal basin was re-cut from an original square font; the whole base is modern
Scene Description: the octagonal basin was re-cut from an original square font; the whole base is modern
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland, 2015
Image Source: B&W photograph taken 20 April 1997 by Ron Baxter [www.crsbi.ac.uk/site/1112/] [accessed 25 March 2015]
Copyright Instructions: PERMISSION NOT AVAILABLE -- IMAGE NOT FOR PUBLIC USE

design element - architectural - arcade - blind - round arches - columns

a faint trace of a blind arcade on the re-cut north side here
Scene Description: a faint trace of a blind arcade on the re-cut north side here
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland, 2015
Image Source: B&W photograph taken 20 April 1997 by Ron Baxter [www.crsbi.ac.uk/site/1112/] [accessed 25 March 2015]
Copyright Instructions: PERMISSION NOT AVAILABLE -- IMAGE NOT FOR PUBLIC USE

INFORMATION

Font ID: 05959RUS
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Font Date: ca. 1200?
Font Century and Period/Style: 12th - 13th century [basin only] [altered font], Transitional / Early English [altered]
Church / Chapel Name: Parish Church of St. James the Great [formerly Chapel of St. James]
Font Location in Church: Inside the church, at the W end of the nave, N side
Church Patron Saint(s): St. James the Greater [aka James the Great, James the Elder]
Church Address: Church Lane, Ruscombe, Berkshire, RG10 9UD
Site Location: Berkshire, South East, England, United Kingdom
Directions to Site: Located just E of Twyford, 7-8 km NE of Reading, between Reading and Maidenhead
Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Oxford
Historical Region: Hundred of Sonning
Additional Comments: disappeared font? / altered font? re-cut? (the one from the 12thC church here) -- unless the present basin, much altered, is it? [cf. FontNotes] -- MUST USE: another old square font re-cut later into octagonal shape
Font Notes:
No entry for Ruscombe found in the Domesday survey. Keyser (1919) notes: "The font is a relic of the earlier church [i.e., Early English of the 13th-century]. It is composed of Purbeck marble, with an octagon bowl, on a modern base, and apparently coeval with the chancel" [i.e., early part of the 13th century]. The Victoria County History (Berkshire, vol. 3, 1923) notes: "The oldest part of the present church is the chancel, which dates from late in the 12th century"; the VCH (ibid.) reports the baptisms register starts in 1574, but does not mention a font in this church. Listed in Tyrrell-Green (1928) as one in a very large group of baptismal fonts of the 14th or 15th century that are plain octagonal with straight-sided basins. The font here is noted and illustrated in theCRSBI (2015): "The Purbeck font dates from c.1200 at the earliest, and could well be 13thc [...] NW end of nave. In its present state, the font consists of a plain octagonal bowl of Purbeck marble (or a similar limestone with smallish fossils) standing on a 19thc. base of the pilier cantonnée type. The cracked N face of the bowl, carved with a plain blind arcade in shallow relief and more weathered than the rest, suggests that the bowl was originally of the square arcaded type, more commonly found in Sussex. The upper edge of the rim is chamfered, and the inner bowl is circular and lined with lead."

COORDINATES

UTM: 30U 649120 5705436
Latitude & Longitude (Decimal): 51.4804, -0.8525
Latitude & Longitude (DMS): 51° 28′ 49.44″ N, 0° 51′ 9″ W

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, limestone (Purbeck marble?)
Font Shape: octagonal, mounted
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal, re-cut from square
Drainage System: centre hole in basin
Drainage Notes: lead-lined
Diameter (inside rim): 60 cm*
Diameter (includes rim): 71 cm* [i.e. side of original square bowl]
Basin Total Height: 30 cm*
Notes on Measurements: * CRSBI (2015)

REFERENCES

  • Victoria County History [online], University of London, 1993-. URL: https://www.british-history.ac.uk.
  • Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland, The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland, The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland. URL: http://www.crsbi.ac.uk.
  • Keyser, Charles E., "Notes on the churches of Ruscombe, Shottesbrooke, Waltham St. Lawrence and Hurst", 25, No.1 (July 1919), Berks, Bucks & Oxon Archaeological Journal, 1919, pp. 3-18; p. 5
  • Tyrrell-Green, E., Baptismal Fonts Classified and Illustrated, London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge: The Macmillan Co., 1928, p. 30