Burford No. 1 / Bureford / Burford nr. Oxford

Noake (1848) writes: "The font is an excellent and a perfect specimen of the Perpendicular style." Anderson (1864) notes that Domesday Book alludes to "a church with two priests" at 'Bureford'. Noted in Timmins (1899): "a fine fifteenth-century font". Listed in Cox & Harvey (1907) as a baptismal font of the Early Perpendicular period. Described in Newman & Pevsner (2006): "Perp[endicular]. Octagonal, the stem with shafts and blank arches, the panels on the bowl enclosing leaf motifs." Baptismal font of the type with an octagonal basin with an underbowl chamfer that curves inwardly and continues all the way down the base without a volume distinction; the panels of the basin sides are deeply carved with a variety of quatrefoil foliage or floral motifs; the underbowl and base sides have a pointed window or arch which incorporates a quatrefoil-in-a-circle in the upper angle, the sides made of thick pipe moulding; the carving is rather crude throughout, and the shape of the font is irregular, not a refined work but one by a lesser local or nor very skilled mason. The font has a wooden cover, octagonal and flat, with a small finial or handle; probably modern. [NB: we have no information on the font of the original church of Conquest or pre-Conquest date]. [cf. Index entry for Burford No. 2, for a medieval stoup in this church]