Wood Carvings in English Churches: I. Stalls and Tabernacle Work. II. Bishop's Thrones and Chancel Chairs.Bond, Francis
History
Wood Carvings in English Churches: I. Stalls and Tabernacle Work. II. Bishop's Thrones and Chancel Chairs.
Bond, Francis
Choir stalls; Church decoration and ornament; Wood-carving
In addition to the above, chairs are often placed in the presbytery to the
north of the altar. These were occupied by the preacher during morning or
evening service, till his turn came to ascend the pulpit and deliver the
sermon. Of these the greater number no doubt have been presented by the
owner of some manor house or parsonage, or have been picked up in recent
years in some second-hand furniture shop. This is probably the case with
the interesting chair which is known to have been for nearly a century in
the Mainwaring chapel of Higher Peover church, Cheshire; it bears not only
the name, but the portrait and initials of the owner. The inscription is
DORATHY MAYNWARING; she married Sir Richard Mainwaring of Ightfield, Salop,
High Sheriff of that county in 1545. Most of the chair is older than her
time; Dorothy seems to have had it put together of old bits of carving,
adding her name and portrait, and the raven, the crest of her father, Sir
Robert Corbet. She lived at Ightfield, and it was probably when that branch
of the family became extinct that the chair was brought to Higher Peover
church, and placed in the Mainwaring chapel. At the top are holes for
holding sconces in which tapers would be placed (123). {128}
[Illustration: Suffolk] [Illustration: Halsall]
At Penshurst there used to be a chair with a bust on the inner panel of the
back; the tradition was that it belonged to Sir Philip Sidney.[74] At
Puddletown, Dorset, a chair has been in the chancel for very many years; it
is of Elizabethan date, and was probably brought from some hall or manor
house. "The tall narrow back, the broadening seat, the vertically straight,
but horizontally angled arms are those of the French caqueteure type rarely
seen in England. The strap carving of the back is of the best; while the
twin greyhounds with averted heads that fit the curved top of the chair no
doubt have reference to the original owner" (124).[75] At Upton, near
Castor, there {129} are two chairs in the chancel; on one of which is
inscribed "A.D. 1700--Joane Browne--Want Not." The other has the initials
J. D.; the Doves were Lords of the Manor at that time (130).[76] In
Redenhall church, Norfolk, is one of two chairs brought there from
Canterbury cathedral by Archbishop Sancroft on his expulsion from the see
in 1615; it is of a curious pattern common in the latter part of the
seventeenth century, in which the back is hinged and can be turned over to
convert the chair into a table. Archbishop Sancroft is buried at Redenhall,
which, by the way, possesses perhaps the finest church tower of any village
in England and an exceptionally fine ring of ancient bells. The other chair
is kept at Gawdy Hall, the seat of the Sancrofts (125).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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