Fairon / Fèron (Liège)

The font here is described in Hartog (2002), after Timmers (1980), as a baptismal font of the early Renaissance period mounted on four couchant lions in the style of the earlier Romanesque type. Ghislain (2009), however, states that the three lion protomes of the base are actually the original ones from a baptismal font of the Namurois group, filiation Furneaux, made of limestone (calcaire de Meuse) ca. 1155-1160, and remarks on the similarities with those of the fonts at Furneaux, Othée and Saint-Séverin-en-Condroz. The present font is obviously a composite one; it consists of an octagonal basin with protruding human heads on four of the sides, raised on an octagonal pedestal base; the lower base appears to have been made of fragments from ther original mid-12th century font, and includes three lion heads or protomes. The dome-shaped metal [brass?] cover is typical of the area, 17th-century, or a 19th-century replica.
A communication from Pol Herman to Jean-Claude Ghislain (e-mail of 11 February 2022 [cc'd to BSI]) suggests a similarity of the font base at Rotterdam No. 2 with the bases of those at Fairon and Saint-Severin-en-Condroz. The similarity is closest to Condroz; the animals on the Fairon base are definitely lion protomes with healthy manes, and the lower base shape matches the polygonal stem.