Hempnall No. 1 / Hamehala / Hemehala

There are two entries for Hempnall [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/TM2494/hempnall/] [accessed 17 October 2015], one of which mentions a priest, two churches and a hide of church lands in it. Blomefield (1805-1810) cites the Domesday survey (fol. 251) entry for "The Manor of Hemenhale [...] Belonged to Torn, a Dane at the Confessor's survey, had then three freemen, 41 bordars, (or copyholders,) and 54 villeins; it had one priest (or rector) and two churches, endowed with a carucate of land", and it went to Ralph Lord Bainard, a fellow invader of William, at the Conquest. Of the two churches reported in Domesday, the mother church was "dedicated to St. Margaret the Virgin [...] The church is 20 yards long, the breadth of the nave and two isles is 12 yards, being all covered with lead; it hath a square tower about 16 yards high, and only one bell and a clock; part of the chancel is ruinated, and the remaining part is tiled". Blomefield (ibid.) names "Robert de Nuttele" as its first recorded vicar, in 1303. The second church was "the ancient chapel of St. Andrew, which at the Conquest was parochial though dependent on the mother-church, is now used (as I am informed) for a repository for the stalls." The present church is dedicated to St. Margaret, and its late-medieval font is described in Pevsner & Wilson (1999): "Octagonal, with four beasts and four seated figures against the stem, four beasts and four demi-figures of angels with shields against the bowl. On one shield the emblem of the Trinity, on another the Instruments of the Passion. 28s. Was left for the new font in 1438." Illustrated in Knott (2005). One of the four 'beasts' noted in Pevsner & Wilson's description of the base is actually a seated human, larger than the other four; the underbowl has angel heads, but they have all been defaced. The wooden cover is plain, round and flat; appears modern. [NB: we have no information on the fonts of either of the pre-Conquest churches here].