Frensham / Frencham

No entry found for Frensham in the Domesday survey. Brayley (1850) notes: "Frensham Church, which is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, was first built in its present situation in the 23rd of Henry the Third (1239)", but does not mention a font in this church. Described in Cox & Harvey (1907) as a square-bowled baptismal font of the Norman period made of dark Petworth marble from Sussex [C&H use the spelling "Frencham"]. The font, as it stands today [7 January 2012] consists of a square basin of the table-top type, the carvings on the sides almost totally obliterated, although there is a hint of a blind arcade of round arches still on one of the sides, the others too eroded for identification; the underbowl may have had decorated capitals where the original angle colonnettes fitted, but they are now shapeless stumps; the basin is raised on a broad central shaft, which is the original, and four angle colonnettes that are a modern replacement; modern also are the square lower base, the quadrangular plinth and the flat and plain wooden cover. A "Holy water stoup adjacent to south door" is reported in the British Listed Buildings database [www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-291551-church-of-st-mary-the-virgin-frensham] [accessed 6 April 2012], but no date given. [NB: Brayley's dating of the church notwithstanding, the font appears to be of the late 12th, rather than the 13th century; was there an earlier church/chapel here? Is this font originally from another church? Is the font of ca. 1239?]. Noted in Leach (1975) as a font made of Purbeck marble: "bowl with shallow panels on two faces; the other two faces are mores worn, but seem to have been treated differently; subsidiary shafts are modern; from recovered from churchyard in 1875 [source given: VCH, 2, 1905].