Hempsted nr. Gloucester / Hempstead / Hemsted
Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2006
Standing permission
Results: 4 records
LB01: design element - motifs - moulding
Scene Description: on the colonnettes of the base
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2006
Image Source: digital photograph by John Wilkes in www.allthecotswolds.com
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
view of font and cover
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2006
Image Source: digital photograph by John Wilkes in www.allthecotswolds.com
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
view of font
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © [in the public domain]
Image Source: drawing by J. Basire in Gough (1792)
Copyright Instructions: PD
view of church exterior
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2006
Image Source: digital photograph by John Wilkes in www.allthecotswolds.com
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
INFORMATION
Font ID: 06737HEM
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Font Century and Period/Style: 13th century, Transitional / Early English
Cognate Fonts: [cf. FontNotes]
Church / Chapel Name: Parish Church of St. Swithun
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Church Patron Saint(s): St. Swithun [aka Swithin]
Site Location: Gloucestershire, South West, England, United Kingdom
Directions to Site: Located 2.5 km SW of Gloucester
Font Notes:
Click to view
Noted in Gough (1792), with a drawing by J. Basire: "That at Harbledon is a kind of cup on (I think) four pillars, like that at Hempsted in Gloucestershire." Tymms (1834) describes this font as "curious". It is noted in the National Gazetteer of 1868 simply as "an old font" [source: 2003 transcription by Colin Hinson in www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/GLS/hempsted/Gaz1868.html]. Described in Cox & Harvey (1907) as a baptismal font of the Early English period, "curiously carved". [NB: C&H refer to the site as "Hempstead"]. Noted and illustrated in Wilkes & Taylor [www.allthecotswolds.com]: "The font is Transitional with a pedestal and six shafts." Noted in Verey & Brooks (1999-2002): "Font. Early C13". The font consists of a round basin with plain tapering sides, raised on a cluster of a central shaft and six outer colonnettes, a round lower base and a polygonal plinth with kneeling stone; the only ornamentation on the font are the simple moouldings at the top and bottom of the colonnettes of the base; wooden cover, round, with metal decoration; probably modern. Some damage evident to the upper rim of the basin, with marks where the staples of the old font would have been.
Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to John Wilkes, of www.allthecotswolds.com, for the photographs of church and font]
MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS
Material: stone
Font Shape: bucket-shaped, mounted
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: round
LID INFORMATION
Date: modern?
Material: wood, oak
Apparatus: no
Notes: [cf. FontNotes]
REFERENCES
- The National Gazetteer: a Topographical Dictionary of the British Isles, London: Virtue & Co., 1868, [www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/GLS/hempsted/Gaz1868.html]
- Cox, John Charles, English Church Furniture, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1907, p. 199, 200
- Gough, Richard, "Description of the old font in the Church of East Meon, Hampshire, 1789: with some observations on fonts", X, Archaeologia, 1792, pp. 183-209; p. 186, 188 and pl. XXIV
- Tymms, Samuel, Family Topographer, being a compendious account of the antient and present state of the counties of England: vol. IV, Oxford circuit, London: Nichols & Son, 1834, p. 51 / [http://books.google.com/books?id=qcouAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA51&lpg=PA51&dq=kempsford+church+font&source=web&ots=h2yFXWCzVN&sig=wFjiUVbwBUazMXVSJwmmw5-jmlA] [accessed 23 September 2007]
- Verey, David, Gloucestershire, London: Penguin Books, 1999-2002, vol. 2: 534