Diddlebury / Duddelebury / Dudelebury / Dudenebury

INFORMATION

FontID: 16286DID
Object Type: Baptismal Font1
Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Peter
Church Patron Saints: St. Peter
Country Name: England
Location: Shropshire, West Midlands
Directions to Site: Located on the B4368, 8 km NE of Craven Arms
Font Location in Church: Inside the church
Century and Period: 15th century, Perpendicular
Church Notes: The Sheela Na Gig project [http://www.sheelanagig.org/index.html#http://www.sheelanagig.org/SheelaDiddlebury.htm] [accessed 1 April 2010] describes the claim that a sculpture in this church can be identified as a Sheela as "somewhat dubious […] However it is so damaged that it is hard to say what it originally was meant to represent. It appears to a torso with the remnants of two legs and what could be a jutting out neck. There is no evidence of any sexual organs carved between the legs."
Font Notes:
Anderson (1864) notes that the church of St. Peter, mentioned by name in Domesday Book, had been granted to Shrewsbury Abbey by Roger de Mortimer [1st Earl of Shrewsbury (d. 1094)]. Newman & Pevsner (2006) date the nave "Late Saxon", but describe the baptismal font in it as octagonal, of the Perpendicular period [NB: we have no information on the earlier font(s) of this church]

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone
Font Shape: octagonal (mounted)
Basin Interior Shape: round
Basin Exterior Shape: octagonal

REFERENCES

Anderson, John Corbet, Shropshire, its early history and antiquities, comprising […], London: Willis and Sotheran, 1864
Newman, John, Shropshire, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006