Just by the lectern at the north-east corner of the nave is a recumbent
effigy of a knight wearing armour of the period when chain-mail was being
exchanged for plate armour. This was during the fourteenth century. The
arms on the shield are those of Bruce, and belonging to this period there
has been discovered a license to Sir William Bruce to have a chantry in
Pickering Church. There can therefore be little doubt that this nameless
effigy is that of Sir William Bruce. The deed is dated "Saturday, the
feast of St John the Evangelist, 1337," and it states that a license was
given in consideration of one messuage and two bovates of land in the
village of Middleton near Pickering for a certain chaplain to celebrate
"Divine (mysteries) daily in the Church of St Peter, Pickering (the full
dedication is to God, St Peter, and St Paul), for the souls of the
masters, William and Robert of Pickering, Adam de Bruce and Mathilda his
wife." The two beautifully carved figures of a knight and his lady that
lie in the Bruce Chapel are not Bruces for the surcoat of the man is
adorned with the arms of the Rockcliffes--an heraldic chess-rook and three
lions' heads. Both the knight and his lady wear the collar of SS, the
origin of which is still wrapped in obscurity. Traces of gilding are
visible in several places on the wings of the angels that support the
heads of both figures, as well as in other parts of the carving where the
detail is not obliterated. The date of these monuments is believed to have
been either the end of the fourteenth or the very beginning of the
fifteenth centuries. In the south-east corner of the north transept,
almost hidden by deep shadows, there lies a truncated effigy of a man in
armour of about the same period as that of Sir William Bruce, but there is
nothing to identify these mutilated remains. The sedilia in the chancel
seem to be coeval with that part of the church. They are ornamented with
some curious carving and some heads, one of them, very much restored,
representing apparently a bishop, priest, and deacon; the fourth head is a
doubtful quantity.
[Illustration: The Effigy of Sir Willeam Bruce in Pickering Church.
The arms on the shield are drawn separately on the right.]
[Illustration: The richly carved Effigies in the Bruce Chapel of Pickering
Church.
The man bears the arms of Rockcliffe on his surcoat. Both figures wear the
collar of SS.]
[Illustration: The holy-water stoup in Pickering Church.]
Close to the sedilia is a piscina decorated in a similar manner.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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