Chelwood / Celeworde / Cellewert
Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Standing permission
Results: 6 records
B01: design element - motifs - scroll or curl - 4
Scene Description: is this part of the unfinished work? [cf. Font notes]
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
B02: design element - motifs - circle - concentric
Scene Description: is this part of the unfinished work? [cf. Font notes]
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
BBU01: design element - motifs - scallop
Scene Description: just outlined on the stone, all around the upper basin sides -- is this part of the unfinished work? [cf. Font notes]
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
LB01: design element - motifs - roll moulding
Scene Description: on the lower base
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
view of font
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
view of church exterior - southeast view
Copyright Statement: Image copyright © John Wilkes, 2008
Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 February 2008 by John Wilkes [www.allthecotswolds.com]
Copyright Instructions: Standing permission
INFORMATION
Font ID: 09150CHE
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Font Century and Period/Style: 12th century, Norman
Cognate Fonts: the fonts at Castlemartin and Hinton Blewett [cf. FontNotes]
Church / Chapel Name: Parish Church of St. Leonard, Chelwood [redundant]
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Church Patron Saint(s): St. Leonard
Church Notes: 14thC church; re-built ca. 1860
Church Address: Chelwood, Bristol BS39 4NW, United Kingdom -- Tel.: +44 1761 490586
Site Location: Somerset, South West, England, United Kingdom
Directions to Site: Located off the A368, just E of the A37, 3 km SE of Pensford, 22 km S of Bristol
Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Bath and Wells
Historical Region: Hundred of Keynsham
Additional Comments: unfinished font? / re-tooled font? [cf. FontNotes]
Font Notes:
Click to view
There are two entries for Chelwood [variant spellings] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/ST6361/chelwood/] [accessed 28 July 2025], neither of which mentions priest or church in it. Noted in Kelly's Directory of 1883: "old Norman font". Wade & Wade (1929) note: "an ancient font (probably Norm[an])". Described in Pevsner (1958): "Norman, circular, or rather with a large block capital rounded at the top corners. At the edges tiny volutes. Top frieze of something like lambrequins." Described by Peter Lord, in Diwylliant... (1998-2003) as an example of unfinished baptismal font, "which suggests that it was the practice to roughout the shape and incise the general design at the quarry or central workshop, and carry out the detailed carving at the church" [NB: compare Lord's theory with the evidence of the export of finished fonts from Tournai, Gotland, etc. -- especially Lars Berggren's "The export of limestone and limestone fonts" in Cogs, Cargoes, and Commerce: Maritime Bulk Trade in Northern Europe, 1150-1400 (Toronto: PIMS, 2002)]. Thurlby (2006) notes the similarities in the treatment of the decorative elements on the fonts at Castlemartin, Chelwood and Hinton Blewett [NB: is this a case of an unfinished font or has the original carving been semi-erased? -- font not yet inspected in situ by BSI]. The entry for this church in Wikipedia [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_St_Leonard,_Chelwood#cite_note-2] [accessed 28 July 2025]
notes: "The font is Norman with tiny volutes at the edges and a top frieze of something like lambrequins. These have been described as the remains of locking staples used to prevent witches stealing the holy water" and gives ' The Thankful Villages'. Norman Thorpe, Rod Morris, Tom Morgan. as reference.
notes: "The font is Norman with tiny volutes at the edges and a top frieze of something like lambrequins. These have been described as the remains of locking staples used to prevent witches stealing the holy water" and gives ' The Thankful Villages'. Norman Thorpe, Rod Morris, Tom Morgan. as reference.
Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to John Wilkes, of www.allthecotswolds.com, for his photographs of church and font
COORDINATES
UTM: 30U 532915 5690274
Latitude & Longitude (Decimal): 51.362778, -2.527222
Latitude & Longitude (DMS): 51° 21′ 46″ N, 2° 31′ 38″ W
MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS
Material: stone
Font Shape: square, mounted
Basin Interior Shape: square
Basin Exterior Shape: square
LID INFORMATION
Notes: there are holes in the rim of the basin at opposite angles; were the staples for the cover removed or never installed?
REFERENCES
- The Visual Culture of Wales = Diwylliant gweledol Cymru, Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1998-2003, vol. 3: p. 80 fn71
- Kelly, Eric Robert, Kelly's Directory of Somersetshire with the city of Bristol, London: Kelly & Co., 1883, p. 160
- Pevsner, Nikolaus, North Somerset and Bristol, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1958, p. 157
- Thurlby, Malcolm, Romanesque architecture and sculpture in Wales, Little Logaston, Woonton, Almeley, Herts.: Logaston Press, 2006, p. 188
- Wade, G.H., Somerset, London: Methurn & Co., 1929, [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12287/12287-h/12287-h.htm] [accessed 11 March 2008]