Sheepwash / Shipwash

Described in Lysons (1806-1822): "At Shipwash [i.e., Sheepwash] the font is square upon the top, curved below, and connected with a plain octagonal base upon which it stands. Three sides of the font are plain; the fourth, enriched with foliage slightly carved upon its surface." [NB: the spelling 'Shipwash' is noted in the 19th century for 'Sheepwash', a parish in the Hundred of Shebbear. "Sheepwash, or Shipwash" appears in White's Devonshire Directory of 1850 -- cf. Brian Randell's transcription of this entry in www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/genuki/DEV/sheepwash/]. Lewis' Dictionary of 1848, which has "Sheepwash, or Shipwash", reports: "the church was dedicated to the Holy Sepulchre, and the beautifully-formed basin of its font is still preserved." Noted in Stabb (1908), with an illustration, as "an old Norman font". The font is described and illustrated in Clarke (1919): "An old cushion bowl on a modern shaft and plinth in a modern church. The semicircular eastern face is filled with ornament very similar to that at Inwardleigh; a graceful arrangement of a flowering plant with spreading leaves, contained in a circle. Each side of the circle is a pine-shaped panel with a filling of three rings and a digitated leaf. The whole design is well managed and excellently balanced. The horizontal edge at the rim has a square moulding. The other faces of the bowl are plain, and I strongly suspect they have been planed down, as the edge mouldings are absent, and on the northern and western sides there seem to be traces of vanished ornament. At the four points below the corners there are graceful foliage designs. A patch of new stone is inserted on the south side. The bowl is made of the grey stone of the district, and is the only ancient part [...] The semicircular faces almost touch at the rim, but I think this is the result of the cutting down, and that originally it had rounded corners like Inwardleigh." [We are grateful to Dr. Roger Peters, of www.wissensdrang.com, for his permission to use the transcription of and images from Stabb (1908)]