Wheathampstead / Huuaethampstede / Watamestede / Wathamstede / Wethamstede

Results: 8 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

design element - motifs - floral

Scene Description: between the clustered colonnettes of the base

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442985] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - floral and/or foliage

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442985] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - moulding

Scene Description: forming the capitals and bases of the clustered colonnettes of the base

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442985] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

design element - motifs - quatrefoil - in a circle - 16

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442985] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of church exterior in context

Image Source: digital photograph taken 19 January 2016 by Adrian Cable [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4801714] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of church interior - nave - looking east

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442987] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font and cover

Image Source: engraving in Clutterbuck (1815-1827)

Copyright Instructions: PD

view of font and cover in context

Image Source: digital photograph taken 18 May 2007 by John Salmon [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/442985] [accessed 20 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

INFORMATION

FontID: 11946WHE

Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Helen

Church Patron Saints: St. Helena

Church Location: 36 High Street, Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire AL4 8BB

Country Name: England

Location: Hertfordshire, East

Directions to Site: Located at the B653-B651 crossroads, E of Harpenden, 8 km NNE of St. Alban's

Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of St. Albans

Historical Region: Hundred of Danish [in Domesday] -- Hundred of Dacorum

Font Location in Church: Inside the church, at the W end of the nave

Century and Period: 14th century (early?), Decorated

Church Notes: ca. 1060 church documented here [cf. FontNotes]

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

There is an entry for Wheathampstead [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/TL1714/wheathampstead/] [accessed 20 September 2016]; it mentions a priest but not a church in it, though there must have been one in it. A font here is illustrated in Clutterbuck (1815-1827). Lewis' Dictionary of 1848 notes: "the font is a curious specimen of the early decorated style". The Victoria County History (Hertfordshire, vol. 2, 1908) notes that a grant involving this, among other churches, had been issued by Pope Alexander (1159–81) and Pope Clement (1187–91) in favour of the rector at Wheathampstead; regardless of the issues involved the grant indicates that a church was acrive here in the second half of the 12th century, perhaps the same church that is implied, but not directly mentioned, in the Domesday survey [cf. supra]. The VCH (ibid.) further notes that the earliest evidence of the medieval church here is early 13th-century andadds: "The beautiful carved font at the west end of the nave is of the first half of the fourteenth century; at its base will be seen some ancient tiles." Described in the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, Hertforshire (1911): "Font: with octagonal panelled and carved bowl, clustered shafts with moulded bases and capitals, early 14th-century." In Pevsner & Cherry (1977): "Font. Early C14, octagonal, with quatrefoil circles on finely carved but somewhat decayed leaves." Daniel Secker (2019) [https://www.academia.edu/39265287/St_Helen_Wheathampstead_Hertfordshire_the_Saxo-Norman_Cruciform_church?email_work_card=view-paper" suggests that the original church here was pre-Conquest: "The earliest surviving fabric of the church at Wheathampstead pertains to a cruciform building, which, it is suggested here, was founded by Edward the Confessor shortly before 1060."

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 51.8125, -0.294722

Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 51° 48′ 45″ N, 0° 17′ 41″ W

UTM: 30U 686477 5743646

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone

Font Shape: octagonal (mounted)

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal

Drainage Notes: lead lining

LID INFORMATION

Date: 17th-century?

Material: wood, oak?

Apparatus: no

Notes: Ogee dome with crocketed arrises and foliated finial

REFERENCES

Victoria County History [online], University of London, 1993-. Accessed: 2016-09-20 00:00:00. URL: https://www.british-history.ac.uk.

Clutterbuck, Robert, The History and Antiquities of the County of Hertford : compiled from the best printed authorities and original records [...], London: Printed by and for Nichols, Son, and Bentley [...], 1815-1827

Great Britain. Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Hertfordshire, London: Printed for His Majesty's Stationary Office by J. Truscott, 1911

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

Pevsner, Nikolaus, Hertfordshire, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1977