Owlpen / Old Pen / Oldpen / Olepenne

The Listed Buildings list by the Stroud District Council, dated 20 June 1961 [www.stroud.gov.uk/info/listed_buildings/owlpen.pdf] [accessed 3 December 2008] netry for Owlpen records: "Interior of tower treated as baptistery […] Norman font bowl on later base". Noted in Verey and Brooks (1999-2002): "Font. Norman, on a restored base." The Owlpen Manor Estate web site [www.owlpen.com] [accessed 3 December 2008] informs: "The Norman font was rescued from use as a cattle-trough, all that effectively survives from the medieval church, and installed on a new base." The Norman basin is bucket-shaped, with a thick moulding at the upper rim and a thin one at the bottom; otherwise plain; a triangular opening was cut into the upper rim, no doubt when the basin was used as a trough in a nearby farm; it is raised on a plain cylindrical stem with a moulded lower base. The wooden cover is round and flat, decorated with metal and ring handle; appears modern, probably 19th-century.