Hambleden / Hambledon / Hambleton / Hamelden / Hameledene / Hamleden / Hanbledene [Domesday]

Standing permission

Results: 10 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

design element - motifs - diamond or lozenge

Scene Description: (four?), with large crosses inside them

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

design element - motifs - floral - fleur-de-lis

Scene Description: (eight?), in the triangular gaps or spandrels created by the rhomboid frames; the upper ones are inverted, and all have half of the round motif that the crosses bear at their centres

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

design element - motifs - roll moulding - double

Scene Description: very thin, right under the band of saw-tooth motif

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

design element - motifs - sawtooth

Scene Description: a thin band t the upper rim side

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

symbol - cross - fleurdelysée

Scene Description: several (four?) large ones, inscribed in rhomboid frames; they have a floral or geometric motif at the centre of the cross

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

view of church exterior - southeast view

Scene Description: Source caption: "Hambleden Church. The Norman church had a central tower which collapsed in 1703 and a new tower was built at the west end in 1721, and heightened in the early 1880's."

Image Source: digital photograph taken 1 September 2006 by Mark Percy [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/649700] [accessed 16 October 2015]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of church interior - nave - looking east

Image Source: digital photograph taken 17 January 2010 by Colin Smith [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1672363] [accessed 16 October 2015]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

view of font and cover - northeast view

Image Source: digital photograph taken 17 January 2010 by Colin Smith

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of font cover

Scene Description: decorated with similar motifs to those on the sides of the font

Image Source: digital photograph taken April 2005 by Penny McLeish

Copyright Instructions: Image and permission received (email of 16 April 2005)

INFORMATION

FontID: 10592HAM

Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Mary the Virgin

Church Patron Saints: St. Mary the Virgin

Church Location: Hambleden, Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, RG9 6RX

Country Name: England

Location: Buckinghamshire, South East

Directions to Site: Located off the A4155, just E of Fawley, 5 km NE of Henley, 6 km W of Marlow

Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Oxford

Historical Region: Hundred of Desborough

Font Location in Church: Inside the church, at the W end, S side

Century and Period: 12th century, Late Norman? / Transitional?

Cognate Fonts: The font at Dorney, in the same county

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Penny McLeish for her photographs of, and to Amanda Bloor for other information on this font. We are also grateful to Colin Smith for his photograph of this font

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

There is an entry for Hambleden [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/SU7886/hambleden/] [accessed 16 October 2015], but it mentions neither clric nor church in it. Lysons (1806-1833) note a round baptismal font decorated "with crosses-florées" in this church. Lewis' Dictionary of 1848 mentions "a circular font, richly ornamented" in this church. Rickman (1850) reports "a good N[orman] font" in this church. Sheahan (1862) writes: "The Norman font remains, in which, it is said, St. Thomas of Cantilupe was baptised" [NB: Sheahan (ibid.) explains: "This St. Thomas, Bishop of Hereford, who was a native of Hambleden, died in 1282"]. In Murray (1882). Described and illustrated in the RCAHM (Buckinghamshire, 1912- ): "cylindrical sides carved with diamond-shaped panels containing floriated crosses and fleurs-de-lis, of coarse limestone, 12th-century." The Victoria County History (Buckingham, vol. 3, 1925) notes: "The existing building appears to have been developed from a cruciform church of the 12th century with a central tower [...] The font is of the 12th century and of tub shape. Along the top is an indented moulding, and the sides are ornamented with large lozenges, each containing a floreated cross; the spandrels between the lozenges are filled with foliage approximating in type to the fleur de lis." In Pevsner (1960): "Font. Cylindrical, Norman, with big foliated cross motifs and similar motifs in lozenge-shaped and triangular panels." There is a visible patch of new stone on the upper basin side, the type of repair that indicates damage caused by the forceful removal of the staples of the old cover. The flat round cover now on the font is modern.

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 51.572921, -0.870562

Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 51° 34′ 22.52″ N, 0° 52′ 14.02″ W

UTM: 30U 647566 5715688

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, limestone

Font Shape: tub-shaped -- cylindrical

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: round

Drainage Notes: lead-lining

Rim Thickness: 8.5 cm [calculated

Diameter (inside rim): 65 cm*

Diameter (includes rim): 82 cm*

Basin Depth: 42 cm*

Basin Total Height: 61.5 cm*

Font Height (less Plinth): 83 cm*

Notes on Measurements: * [courtesy of Amanda Bloor]

LID INFORMATION

Date: [unknown]

Material: wood,

Apparatus: no

Notes: round, flat and plain [cf. FontNotes for evidence of the staples of an earlier cover]

REFERENCES

Victoria County History [online], University of London, 1993-. Accessed: 2011-05-27 00:00:00. URL: https://www.british-history.ac.uk.

Great Britain. Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), An inventory of the historical monuments in Buckinghamshire, London: H.M. Stationary Office, 1912-

Lewis, Samuel, A Topographical Dictionary of England, Comprising the Several Counties, Cities, Boroughs, Corporate and Market Towns, Parishes, Chapelries, and Townships, and the Islands of Guernsy, Jersey, and Man, with Historical and Statistical Descriptions [...], London: S. Lewis, 1831

Lysons, Daniel, Magna Britannia, being a concise topographical account of the several counties of Great Britain, London: Printed for T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1806-1822

Murray, John [the firm], Handbook for travellers in Berks. Bucks and Oxfordshire, including a [...], London: John Murray, 1882

Parker, John Henry, The Ecclesiastical and architectural topography of England: Oxfordshire, Oxford, London: Published under the sanction of the Central Commitee of the Archaeological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland [by] John Henry Parker, 1850

Pevsner, Nikolaus, Buckinghamshire, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1960

Sheahan, James Joseph, History and topography of Buckinghamshire, comprising a general survey of the county, preceded by an epitome of the early history of Great Britain, London; Pontefract: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts; William Edward Bonas [...], 1862