King's Lynn No. 3 / Lena / Lenne / Lun / Lunea / South Lenn / South Lynn

Two entries appear in the Domesday book for this place, variant spellings of Lena and Lun, but no mention of church or cleric in it. The font here is described in Mackerell (1738): "In this Church is a small, but decent Font solid Stone, set on a Platform adjoining to the second Pillar from the West, near unto the North Door. It seems, by all Circumstances, and the Form of it, to be really and undoubtedly of very great Antiquity. The Basin within the Verge is 22 Inches Diameter, and 10 Inches deep perpendicularly the Superficies, of which is cover'd with an Octangular Canopy of Joyners Work Pyramid-wise, rais'd upon small turned Ballisters, upon the Centre or Top of which you fee a Pelican gilt, standing on a Mound or Ball, with her Bill at her Breast, as she is generally Represented by Painters and Sculptors. At this Laver of Regeneration, where we are first initiated and incorporated into the Communion of Christ's Church, in the Year 1673, a Negro of adult Age was Baptized by the Reverend Mordacant Webster, the Vicar of the Parish, and Christened by the Name of Jeremiah." Blomefield (1805-1810) writes: "This village of South Lynn was always a distinct and separate place from King's Lynn, till in the 4th and 5th of Philip and Mary, it was granted to be annexed as a member of that burgh for ever, under the same government, and to enjoy the same privileges, and to be exempt from any power or authority of the sheriff of Norfolk. [...] The Church is dedicated to All-Saints, and is a vicarage [...] It is a regular pile, built in form of a cross, with 3 isles, and a chancel, covered with lead, the whole being about 140 feet long, and the breadth of the isles 48 feet, the cross isle 83 feet long; at the west end was a strong tower, four-square, with battlements of stone, and thereon a shaft, with the weather-cock, the tower being about 82 feet high, and the shaft 30; and five tuneable bells. The tower fell down in 1763, and part of the end of the church, which is now repaired with a strong brick wall; on the top of which is a kind of cupola of wood, &c. in which hangs one small bell". An update on the church renovation here appears in The Ecclesiologist (Nos. XIX-XX, February 1843: 96): "We hasten to express the pleasure we feel in hearing from a correspondent of the restoration of the Font, after many years of desecration, to the church of All Saints, South Lynn, Norfolk. It appears that Mr. Taylor, a gentleman well known as an artist and author, [...] has brought about this most desirable result by his individual exertions. He discovered the bason of the old Font half buried in the vicarage garden, and raised a sum sufficient to restore and replace it." The font here is described in Pevsner & Wilson (1999): "C15, octagonal, the bowl with tracery and cusping, on a C19 stem." The Parish web site [www.allsaintskingslynn.org.uk/history/history-6740.php] [accessed 19 November 2013] informs: "In front of the screen is the mid-14th century font. Broken when the tower fell in 1763 and relegated to the vicarage garden to serve as an ornament, it was reclaimed in 1842 and placed at the west end of the nave south aisle; the marks in the floor show its position. The shields depict the symbols of the Four Evangelists."