East Winch / Estuuinc / Winic / Wininc

There are six entries in the Domesday survey [http://domesdaymap.co.uk/place/TF6916/east-winch/] [accessed 5 December 2013] [variant spellings], neither of which mentions a church or cleric in it. The first mention of a church here in Blomefield (1805-1810) is in conjunction with a lord here, Sir Ralph Le Strange, who lived in the reign of Henry II. and gave the rectory of this church to the priory of Carhow by Norwich, which was after appropriated to that house, by Roger Sherwing, Bishop of Norwich", which would document the existence of a church here between 1154 and 1189 at the latest. Blomefield (ibid.) adds: "The church was anciently a rectory [...] but being granted to the priory of Carhow, and appropriated to that house, (as is abovementioned,) by Roger Skerwing Bishop of Norwich, a vicarage was then settled and endowed in the patronage of the said priory [...] The Church is dedicated to All-Saints." The font and the old cover were illustrated, though not very accurately [cf. infra] in Weever (1631). A chapter by the Rev. George Munford, in Nichol's Topographer and Genealogist of 1853, updates Weever's earlier description of the monuments in the parish church of East Winch. Munford notes: "At this time no memorial of the stately family of Howard exists in the church of East Winch, except two shields of arms upon the font […] The cover of the font, which was of wood, and is engraved by Weever, is also gone; but the font itself remains, and is of much handsome proportions than weever has drawn it. It is octagonal in shape; the compartment facing the east is plain, having been probably so left to receive the shield of some future benefactor to the church; on the right of this are the arms of Sir John Howard, Knt. Who erected the font, and on the left the arms of Alice de Bosco, wife of Sir John: each of the remaining five compartments is occupied by a rosette. Weever's plate of this font could never have been quite correct, as he places the Howard arms between two rosettes. Its cover of wood was very handsome, having been richly painted and carved, and adorned with the arms of Howard, Scales, Ufford, East Anglia, and the shield of the Crucifixion." The coats of arms are described in Farrer (1887 [1885?]). Noted in Pevsner & Wilson (1999): "Font. Octagonal, Perp[endicular], with shields and foliated panels. One shield is that of the Howards. Font cover. By Comper, 1913, copying a C17 original."