Nooks and Corners of ShropshireTimmins, H. Thornhill (Henry Thornhill)
History
Nooks and Corners of Shropshire
Timmins, H. Thornhill (Henry Thornhill)
Shropshire (England) -- Description and travel
Dunvall formerly belonged to a branch of the Acton family, in whose days
the old house boasted a library of rare and curious volumes, including
a 'Breeches' Bible, dated 1582. But the Actons have long since departed,
their relics and curios have been dispersed, and the place thereof
knoweth them no more.
So now, having done with Dunvall, we take our departure in a
south-westerly direction; faring along, up-hill and down-dale, amidst
green meadows and golden wheat-fields, where the labourers are plying
their peaceful, rural toil; while the clack! clack! of the
'reaper-and-binder' sounds merrily through the still air.
Emerging from labyrinthine lanes, we strike the Wenlock road three miles
from Bridgnorth, and march on thence into the village of Morville.
Calling in at the clerk's cottage for the key of the church--a key of
Brobdingnagian size--we push on past the pretty, rustic post-office, and
the village smithy; and then, espying the old grey church and Hall away
in the vale to our left, we climb over a stile, and make our way
thitherwards.
St. Gregory's church at Morville is an interesting edifice of great
antiquity, though no part of the earlier structure, which stood here in
Edward the Confessor's days, is now in existence. Dating from the early
years of the twelfth century, the present church constituted a cell
subject to Shrewsbury Abbey; and our cherished and most respectable
Leland did not fail to take note of the place, as he journeyed by from
Wenlock to Bridgnorth, describing it as 'a little priory, or cell, at
Morfeilde, on the right hand as I entered the village.'
Morville church has the long chancel usually seen in collegiate
foundations, the semi-headed chancel arch being curiously depressed, and
having rudely sculptured capitals, and billet mouldings. Large, very
quaintly carved wooden effigies of the four Evangelists, are fixed
against the wall just below the corbels of the nave roof; but they are
probably not now in their original positions.
The large, cylindrical font is enriched with primitive, arcaded
ornamentation; and two very ancient oak muniment chests stand in the
adjacent aisle. In the course of repairs, some years ago, traces of
colour-decoration, or fresco, were detected under the whitewash on the
south wall.
Upon regaining the highroad we pass the Acton Arms, a well-to-do-looking
wayside hostelry. Then Morville Hall comes in sight, a grey stone
mansion with projecting wings, occupying the site of the ancient priory,
whose last Prior, Richard Marshall, died in 1558.
[Illustration: Tympanum at Aston Eyres.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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