Dover No. 1 / Douerei

Results: 1 records

INFORMATION

Font ID: 12049DOV
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Font Date: ca. 1000?
Font Century and Period/Style: 10th - 11th century / 12th century, Pre-Conquest? / Norman?
Church / Chapel Name: Castle church / St. Mary-de-Castro / St. Mary-in-Castro / St. Mary-sub-Castro
Font Location in Church: [cf. FontNotes]
Church Patron Saint(s): St. Mary the Virgin
Church Address: Dover CT16 1HU, United Kingdom
Site Location: Kent, South East, England, United Kingdom
Directions to Site: The church is located in the SE area of the Dover Castle complex
Additional Comments: disappeared font?: noted in the statutes of 1267 -- altered font?
Font Notes:
There are several entries for Dover [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/TR3241/dover/] [accessed 30 May 2024], one of which reports three churches in it. In his 1863 visit to the renovated Dover castle ancient church -which had earlier been "long in a state of hopeless ruin- Glynne (1877) notes: "The font has a square bowl on an octagonal stem with four legs". Listed in Tyrrell-Green (1928) with a group of Norman-period fonts on which "the arcading is rather rudely represented by a succession of shallow sunk panels with semicircular heads [...] the only adornment" of the basin. The Dover Castle Statutes of 1267, were promulgated in the reign of Henry III [1216-1272] and declared by the Constable of the Castle, Sir Stephen of Pencestre. One of the statutes orders that "The font, Eucharist, the oil and ointments are to be well garded by the Rector", the font possibly from the original date of the church, which Newman (1976) suggests to be ca. 1000 [source: www.dover-web.co.uk/castle_statutes.asp]. [NB: we have no other information on this font]

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone
Font Shape: square, mounted
Basin Exterior Shape: square

REFERENCES

  • Glynne, Steven Richard, Sir, Notes on the churches of Kent, London: John Murray, 1877, p. 242
  • Newman, John, North East and East Kent, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1976, p. 287
  • Tyrrell-Green, E., Baptismal Fonts Classified and Illustrated, London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge: The Macmillan Co., 1928, p. 75