CHURCH FURNITURE IN MEDIEVAL ENGLISH

AND WELSH PARISH CHURCHES

Charles Tracy

Despite the regrettable depredations of Edward V i’s reign and the Civil War, England can
boast the finest collection of medieval parochial church woodwork in Europe.1 Elsewhere
very little has survived/ since on the Continent, from the Reformation, monotonous tides
of iconoclasm swept pitilessly to and fro in all directions from the mid-sixteenth century
to the early-nineteenth century. In particular, in Flanders, there was the notorious
destruction of the so-called beelderstorm of 1566-67, and in France the Revolutionary
period, and its after-shocks, particularly in Belgium and Germany.
The destruction of church goods and fittings in England at the Reformation was
almost total in the monastic churches that were not adopted under the new dispensation,
either as cathedrals, or in part at least, as parish churches. At parochial level, the principal
foci of the iconoclastic hatred were the rood-screen and rood-loft. The other fixed
wooden furnishings remained more-or-less untouched. Certainly, they did not suffer to
anything like the same extent as the sculpture in wood and stone, panel paintings and
stained glass. Yet the undeniable heavy losses of medieval furniture in our parish churches
are due as much to neglect and subsequent re-ordering, as to Protestant iconoclasm. The
dynamic development of the Anglican liturgy resulted in an intense sequence of radical
internal alterations, particularly from the early nineteenth century. This led to a further
erosion of medieval parochial nave benching and choir-stalls, as well as to the
comprehensive ‘restoration’ of rood- and parclose-screens.3 Re-orderings have continued
since and, in the early twenty-first century, the threat to medieval parish church
furnishings is, if anything, more grave than ever. The replacement of choir-stalls by west­
facing modern tiered benching for clergy and singers at the west end of the nave, and the
removal of the ancient rood-screen to the back of the church, is not uncommon.
Notwithstanding, however, much of the medieval material still remains in situ.
It is surprising to comprehend the sheer typological variety of surviving furniture, such
as font covers, parclose and rood-screens, rood-lofts, choir-stalls, pulpits, aumbries and
banner stave lockers, lecterns, chests and collecting boxes. Last but not least, the crucial
role played by the structural carpenter within the overall ensemble should be borne in
mind. The timber porches, doors, roofs and canopies of honour are the pride of many
parish churches.4 It is my intention to set the scene for the interior of the medieval English
parish church, in terms of the fittings and their liturgical purpose, with reference, where
possible, to contemporary descriptions, and the contents of parish wills and
churchwardens’ and guild accounts. Due to the paucity of both monuments and
information from before 1400, most of the woodwork discussed, and any related
documentary material, inevitably refers to the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.
Not a great deal is known about the daily life of the typical medieval English or Welsh
parish church. This is partly due to a previous comparative neglect of the subject by
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ZZ F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H AND WE LS H PARISH C H U R C HE S

historians, although there is currently a resurgence of interest.5 The description of the

interior of Long Melford church, Suffolk, written by Roger Martin at the end of the
sixteenth century, is based upon the writer’s clear memories of pre-Reformation times,
when he was already in his twenties. His family lived at Melford Place, one of the several
manors in the town. Martin had been a churchwarden in Queen M ary’s reign and was a
notorious recusant for the rest of his life. His account provides a unique insight into the
furnishings of a late-medieval English urban parish church (Figure i).6 He looked back
with nostalgia to the condition of the unreformed church of his youth. His forbears had
been intimately connected with the rebuilding of the church in the late fifteenth century
and his interest in it seems to have been almost proprietorial. In 1484 his great­
grandfather, Richard Martin, had founded the chantry chapel for his family on the south
side of the new church. Roger begins his personal recollections as follows:
At the back o f the high altar, in the said church, there was a goodly mount,
made o f one great tree, and set up to the Christ's Passion, representing the
horsemen with their swords, and the footmen etc., as they used Christ on the
Mount o f Calvary, all being fair gilt, and lively and beautifully set forth...7
The ‘mount’ was an elaborate oak reredos, depicting the Passion, which stretched from
the top of the altar to the sill of the east window. From Martin’s description it would seem
that it may have been carved from one great tree trunk, although one would expect the
manufacture of such an object to have been additive for the most part. It would have
resembled examples still surviving on the Continent, such as the one on the high altar at
St Nicholas, Kalkar of 1505-08 by the Flemish artist Jan Joest, in the German Rhineland.
Martin goes on to explain that it had painted hinged doors, ‘To cover and keep clean all
the whiche, .... which were opened upon high and solemn feast-dayes\ He added that
‘At the north end of the same altar, there was a goodly gilt tabernacle, reaching up to
the roofe of the chancell, in the which ther was one fair large gilt image of the Holy
Trinity, being patron of the church, besides other fair images. The like tabernacle was at
the south end’.
He went on to describe the rood-loft:
There was a fair roodloft, with the rood, Mary & John, on every side one, with
a fair pair o f organs standing thereby; which loft extended all the bredth o f the
church, and on Good Friday a priest, there standing by the rood, sang The
Passion.
He mentioned that there was also an organ in the rood-loft as well as beside it. From the
church plan it can be seen that the rood-screen was over 57 ft wide, and that access to the
loft was provided by means of an external staircase turret on the north side of the church
(Figure 1). For a building completed in 1484, and of this importance, one would expect
there to have been choir-stalls, particularly as by tradition the space on the south side of the
choir relative to the Clopton chantry on the north has always been known as the choir
vestry. The stalls have long-since disappeared.8 Two bays of ancient parclose screenwork
survive at the west end of the choir space, and there must have been a similar screen filling
the next bay to the east. To north and south the extension of the outer rood-screens, and
parclose screens, enclosed chantry chapels. That for the Clopton family, who lived at nearby
Kentwell Hall, extends from the rood-screen on the north side through an antechapel,
where the church’s founder, Sir William Clopton, is buried as well as several other members
 CHARLES TRACY 23

of the family, to the exquisite Kentwell Chapel, where the remains of his son, John, are
interred.9As already mentioned, the chapel in the adjacent position on the south side was
dedicated to the Martin family.10 It contains two early seventeenth century memorial brasses
to family members and, doubtless, several more unrecognised Martin burials. This space
also doubled as a Jesus Chapel. It seems that the casket-like central space of the exquisite
Lady Chapel at the east end of the church was never fitted with parclose screens.
The nave at Long Melford is now bereft of wooden fittings of much interest. Originally
it would have been furnished with a full set of benching. At Haddenham,
Buckinghamshire, a slightly more populous medieval town, at a conservative estimate,
there would have been a seating capacity in the nave in excess of two hundred
and seventy-four places, for a parish population of little more than one hundred. At Long
Melford the seating capacity could have been more than double this total. Given that in
15 2 4 there were only one hundred and fifty taxpayers at Melford, one wonders whether
such provision would have been in response to the real needs of the town’s population,
or the consequence of a certain hubris on the part of the three interested parties in the
construction of a city-scale church." An important contribution to the commissioning of
the building must surely have been the abbot of Bury, the principal lord of the manor. The
font was probably capped with a spired canopy, the extant one being modern. The pulpit
is also nineteenth century. One should note that, due to the opulence of the commission,
the south porch, the church’s most commonly used entrance, was built of masonry faced
with flushwork, with limestone dressings, instead of the half-timbered construction
typically found in less affluent East Anglian parish churches. The building has a fine set
of Perpendicular traceried external doors.
Melford has retained a list of church goods, made in 1529 and 1 5 4 1 . " Of great interest
are the chests mentioned. Behind the high altar was ‘The Priests Vestry’, which was built
on two levels. These spaces were known as the ‘solar’ and ‘the vestry beneath’.13 The
latter is provided with a stone flat fan-vault and a fireplace. Under ‘Chests’ the first entry
of the 1529 inventory reads: ‘A great chest, upon the vestry cellar (solar), with two great
locks to the same, of iron, the gift of M r Clopton’. One needs to remember that, in the
days before bank vaults, security was a major consideration in a medieval church. The
value of the vestments even in a well-endowed parish church could be considerable, quite
possibly more precious than the gold and silver plate. Nonetheless, one might have
thought that the above-mentioned locks were sufficiently strong to resist any robbery
attempt. Roger Martin, however, was haunted by the memory of the distressing event of
January 1 3 th 1 5 3 1 , when he continues the entry above with the note: ‘which two great
lokes ... were broken by the thieves ... on which day this church of Melford was
despoiled’.14 The trauma of losing sacred and revered objects is all too evident. The next
two chests are described as having only one lock, and there was ‘an old chest to lay in
copes, all in the keeping of the sextonV 5 Furthermore there were a further ‘two old chests,
in Our Lady’s chappel, in decay’.'6
By 15 4 1, it seems that measures had been taken to improve the security of the chests.
For instance: ‘Item, one other great chest, bounde with yrons and dyvers stapuls to hange
on (pad) lokes, serving to lay in the evydens and dedes belonging to the church and other
gode uses within the town’.'7 This suggests that at that time some of the town records
were stored in the church, and that a few chests were close-banded with iron straps. One
24 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARISH CH U R C HE S

is reminded of the magnificent boarded chest at Salisbury Cathedral, with a double lid
and two compartments lined with paper, one for Close leases and the other for City
leases.18 At Melford, another chest referred to: ‘Item, in the vestry beneath, a great huch
(hutch) bounde with yrons, of the gift of Syr William Clopton’, may have been the one
referred to in the earlier inventory but upgraded with iron strap banding. There is a
vestment chest: ‘Item, one other fayre huche to lay in the vestments, albes and towells’,
which may have been a replacement of the one mentioned in 1525). Finally there is a chest
which appears to have been kept in the choir vestry: ‘Item, one other chest at the quere
dore, wherin the Regyster boke and the churches boke be keptek The former was the
register of baptisms, marriages and burials, and the latter contained churchwardens’
accounts and lists of church goods.19

N av e B e n c h in g

In respect of the wooden fittings at Long Melford we have already touched on the
provision of nave pews. Benched seating was as much a feature of the English parish
church before the Reformation, as after it.10 The surviving evidence suggests, however,
that not until sometime before the end of the fourteenth century did English parish
churches start to be provided on any significant scale with congregational seating.
Notwithstanding, as early as 128 7, the ordinances of the synod of Exeter censure the
apparently already existing custom of reserving seats in church:
We enact that no one from hence forth may claim a seat in church as his own;
noble persons and patrons o f churches only excepted. He who for the cause o f
prayer, shall first enter a church, let him select a place o f prayer according to
his will.21
However, any evidence of special seating at this period has been lost, although Justin
Kroesen and Regnerus Steensma suggest that in the twelfth century in northern Europe
integral stone benches on the west wall of the nave would have been used by local gentry
and yeoman farmers.11 Stone benches also line the sides and sometimes the backs of many
English churches. Most of them date from the beginning of the fourteenth century, and
their disposition in the nave is haphazard. Kroesen and Steensma insist that, in northern
Europe at any rate, lateral benches, for women on the north side and men on the south
side, were as much for the use of the general congregation as for the infirm and women
and children.13 During the office of the Mass, able-bodied parishioners were expected to
stand or kneel, but could sit down during the sermon. In their view, these writers suggest
that the accommodation offered by a majority of these stone benches would often have
been sufficient for the needs of an entire congregation. In England stone benches seem to
have gone out of fashion with the introduction of wooden benching, from the end of the
fourteenth century. Some parishioners may have brought their own portable wooden
stools, a highly perishable artefact, to allow them to sit near the pulpit.
Most English early wooden benching dates from the period 14 5 0 -15 5 0 .14 Its
introduction reflected the changing social status of the worshippers and the emergence of
distinctions by class and gender. Moreover, the decoration of benches in many cases
mirrored the standing of their occupants. The increasing influence of the preaching orders
of friars in England must have contributed to the growth in communal seating.15 The friars
 CHARLES TRACY 25

had started to exert a strong influence in English towns from the late-thirteenth century,
although they did not fully come into their own until the fifteenth century. By then their
sermons became longer and more frequent. As early as 1330 , the monk, Richard Whitford,
in his manual, stressed that attendance at the Sunday sermon was even more important than
attendance at Mass.2* The almost cathedral-size of the late-fourteenth century rebuilt parish
church at Boston, Lincolnshire, was a direct response to the flourishing friars’ houses in that
busy trading port, with which it found itself in direct competition.
An allied development in the administration of many of the larger parish churches was
the construction of church- or guild-houses close to the churchyard. These buildings were
provided as an alternative meeting place for church ales, weddings and wakes, and other
community and fund-raising activities, which had formerly been held in the nave.17 With
the introduction of fixed seating for parishioners, the holding of these traditional
activities inside the church was precluded. Benching did not become an absolute necessity
before the reign of Edward VI, when the sermon became a compulsory part of the church
service. The word ‘pew’ occurs occasionally in the fourteenth century and commonly in
the fifteenth century, particularly in churchwardens’ accounts.18 Pews were often
allocated to men or to women only. Many people believe that the practice of renting pews
in the nave for personal or family use was the invention of the nineteenth century, and
are surprised to learn that it was entrenched during the middle ages. In 14 4 1-4 2 at St
Lawrence, Reading, the wife of John Tanner gave 4d. for one ‘setell’, another person
giving 6d.19 In 1498 the annual rents for seats in this church amounted to 6s. 8d.
The doors of the grander pews, particularly in the chancel, were often supplied with
locks. In the Boke o f Nurture, written around 1450, such pews were referred to as follows:
Prynce or prelate, if it be, or any other potestate
Ere he enter into the church, be it early or late
Perceive all thinges for his pew, that it be made preparate..
Bothe cosshyn, carpet, and curteyn, bedes and boke, forget not that!
Very few indeed of these exclusive medieval pews have survived, and they are generally
datable from the end of the fifteenth or early sixteenth centuries.30
This culture of quasi-commercialisation, allied to the rigid class structure of the middle
ages, has been memorably dubbed by one eminent British historian as the ‘privatization
of religion for the gentry...’.3'
As has often been pointed out, there are noticeable regional, formal and stylistic
differences in English church furniture. For example, the central passage through an East
Anglian rood-screen tends be open, whilst in the West of England, doors are normally
provided. East Anglian and north-country screens tend to be tall and open. Those in the
West of England are long and opaque. By the same token, benches vary in appearance by
region. The typical West Country and East Anglian forms are well-known, but how easy
it is to overlook the products of the ‘Midlands’ style, with their squared ends, carved with
tracery in the solid, as at Great Tew, Oxfordshire (Figure 2).31 Most of these benches,
whose seat backs normally reach down to the floor, are of the late fifteenth century.
Bench seat backs in Norfolk and Suffolk often use a horizontal plank that finishes at seat
level. At Haddenham the Midlands-style benches have typical Perpendicular mouldings -
triple three-quarter round beading on the top rail, with smaller similar beading and a
generous hollow below, and variations on the same theme on the en-suite rood-screen
26 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

(Figures 3, 4). The use of similar mouldings on top rails can be seen on benches in
Oxfordshire (Minster Lovell, Steeple Aston, Great Tew), Northamptonshire (Byfield,
Ashby St Legers), and Cambridgeshire (Landbeach). Haddenham and Great Tew are
examples of ancient more or less completely pewed-out parochial naves.
The superior quality of both design and joinery at Haddenham is highlighted in a
comparison with the less ambitious productions in many other parish churches in the
Midland region, such as Blunham or Shelton, Bedfordshire and Guilden Morden,
Cambridgeshire. The level of competency at Haddenham, however, is still below what
one would expect to find in a greater religious house. Nonetheless, only an urban
workshop would have had the facilities to plan and execute such a large commission, and
the scale of manufacture would have been well beyond the capabilities of a village joiner.
By the same token, the handling of the framed-up double-panelled bench ends at
Haddenham, another speciality of the Midland region, represents a noticeable technical
advance over the solid traditional-style bench-ends at Great Tew and elsewhere. For the
latter, an unusually thick piece of timber was required, Frank Howard and Fred. Crossley
claimed that those in Devon were made from a thicker scantling than anywhere else, since
the supply of oak in that region was more plentiful.33
The decoration of bench-ends has been well documented, and includes a plethora of
allusions to clergy, parish officials, donors, maker’s names, as well as heraldry, religious
iconography, trades, secular images and date of manufacture.34 At Alturnan, Cornwall,
Joanna Mattingly has pointed to the images of fund-raisers ‘whose activities presumably
helped to pay for the benches’, which were made sometime between 15 2 3 and 15 5 4 .35
These include a fool or jester, viol player, and two sword dancers. A bagpiper
with attendant dog may in fact be the shepherd in charge o f the flock o f sheep
grazing on the adjoining bench (Figure 5). This may represent the parish or
guild store o f sheep and is comparable to the poor's stock at St Columb Minor
(in Cornwallj which was said to have paid for all the benches there in i j i y J 6
The Alturnan bench ends, which very unusually appear to have been ‘signed’ by their
carver, are stylistically close to those at Braunton, near Barnstaple, Devon, and Poughill,
just over the county boundary in North Cornwall, and about twenty miles to the south­
west. At Poughill punching is used again, to provide a field for the motifs (Figure 6). It is
evident that at a time when West of England benches were being installed everywhere,
carvers and joiners were travelling around within a hundred miles of their domiciles.
The installation of pulpits in parish churches, not discussed in this article, was in many
ways analogous to the development of nave benching.

R o o d -S c r een s

The rood-screen was the most conspicuous and liturgically important wooden furnishing
component in a late-medieval parish church.37It played a central part in the religious life
of the parishioners, and acted as mediator between the daily celebration of the eucharist
in the holiest part of the church, and the parochial nave. The familiar image of a rood-
screen carrying a loft, and the rood-beam above supporting a Crucifix with figures of the
Virgin and St John, often flanked by angels on either side and backed by a painted
tympanum, is likely to date from no earlier than the middle of the fifteenth century, and
 CHARLES TRAC Y 27

is usually much later than this. The genesis of the rood-screen barely dates back to before
the late-thirteenth century. In the West of England, the puritanical strictures of the diocese
of Exeter in the late thirteenth century appear to have excluded altogether the provision
of a rood in parish churches.38 The evidence of what appears to be a rood-loft access
door-frame, decorated with nail-head ornament, at Colsterworth, Lincolnshire, is an
anomaly which has yet to be clarified.39 The documentary evidence for a rood-loft in
129 7 at Furneaux Pelham, Hertfordshire, is incontrovertible. It mentions that ‘a large
staircase to the rood-loft is wanting in the body of the church’.40 In a typological
chronology of the different components of the rood-screen one can predicate that the
rood itself and the beam on which it rests came first. In the twelfth century the beam was
usually attached to the upper wall of the low chancel arch, with a painted scheme behind,
such as a Last Judgement. Unusually, the surviving fragments of the original painting at
East Shefford, Berkshire, indicate that the subject matter of the painting was the Adoration
of the Three Kings. One of the earliest surviving rood-beams was the late-thirteenth
century example formerly at Dodington, Kent, since lost.41 The section of the beam at the
foot of the Cross was often elaborately carved, as at Cullompton, Devon, with its vivid
depiction of the detritus of the Mount of Olives, including the skull of Adam.41
The wholesale rebuilding of the east end in the thirteenth century greatly increased the
height and size of the chancel arch. The tradition of painting on the west side of the
chancel wall was replaced by the insertion of a painted wooden tympanum, as at Penn,
Buckinghamshire. The first surviving wooden rood-screens of the late-thirteenth century
can be seen at Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire and Cumnor, Berkshire, both minster
churches. Contemporary parish church examples are at Thurcaston, Leicestershire and
Gilston, Hertfordshire. A later reference to a rood-loft, at Tillingham, Essex in 13 3 5 ,
complains that it ‘impedes the light around the altar of the Holy Virgin, and (it) makes a
dark space in which the parishioners chatter’.43 This is an interesting instance of parochial
opposition to the introduction of a loft.
The functions of the rood-loft were multifarious. Its key role was in providing a high
place from which to recite the Gospel, and to make certain public announcements, such
as the Letters of Communion and bishops’ Pastorals. For such purposes a lectern was
often provided. It could also serve as a parish muniment room or library, and a chapel
dedicated to the Holy Cross, when pews were sometimes provided. By the later middle
ages the nave altars were universally situated at ground level on either side of the rood-
screen entranceway. The specifically liturgical functions of the rood-loft included the
shrouding of the rood and the high altar during Lent, the use of the rood-loft bressumer
for burning candles, particularly on Easter Day, in some cases, the provision of
accommodation for an organ and singers, and as a place to keep the sacring bell.
The most interesting complete rood-screens in Britain are in Wales, where several lofts
have remained in remarkably authentic condition.44 In England almost every single
surviving rood-loft is more or less restored.45 As an illustration of a Welsh rood-screen the
example at St Anno, Llannano, Montgomeryshire (Figure 7) will be briefly analysed. The
style of the foliate decoration is typical for mid-Wales, and is close to that on the rood-
screen at Llanwnog, in the same county (Figure 8). They must have both been
manufactured by the same workshop. There are fragmentary remains of others belonging
to this ‘school’, but the principal almost complete loss is the former rood-screen in the
28 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H AND WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

abandoned medieval church of St Mary, Newtown. The artist and antiquary, the
Reverend John Parker, painstakingly recorded the most important specimens. He visited
Llannano in 1828, noting that originally there were only four bays either side of the
entranceway, rather than the five bays at present. Crossley and Ridgway suggested that,
when the church was rebuilt at the end of the nineteenth century, it must have been
widened, and the screen adapted accordingly.46This would also explain why there is no
longer any access to the rood-loft. The sculpted figures under niches along the loft front
were inserted in the nineteenth century. Originally the screen was lavishly polychromed,
but sadly most of this has been pickled off. There is a satisfying series of Perpendicular-
type half-round mouldings on the standards and mullions. The fringe-like tracery heads
of the main screen lights are typical of Montgomeryshire, but also for south-west Welsh
woodwork. The soffit of the rood-loft is slightly tipped. The traceried soffit panels are
astonishing in the variety of the mesh-like character of their ornament (Figure 9). This
feature is uniquely mid-Welsh, as is also the handling of the foliage decoration, such as
the water plant. The detailing on the east side of the Llananno screen is much plainer than
that on the west side. Because the church has been rebuilt, there is no evidence for the
tympanum. Importantly, there does not appear to have been a door filling the screen
entranceway. The roof foundation beam is still intact, but the loft floor is gone.
Further south-west is to be found the modest single-cell church at Bettwys Newydd,
Monmouthshire. This is a picturesque rural church without any particular architectural
pretension. As at Llananno, it exemplifies the standard Welsh rural single-cell plan, and
is distinguished by its rare integrated internal fittings and fixtures. Newman described it
as ‘A little grey stone building, Perp, nave and chancel in one, with W double bell gable
(remodelled in the C 19), and W porch, clearly a medieval addition’.47
The verandah-style rood-screen, which is 16 feet in length, is somewhat archaic in
character (Figure 10). Although it has been rebuilt, and has lost its tympanum, it is
otherwise largely authentic. It has a plain-panelled dado to the lower screen and five open
bays with three-light Perpendicular heads above. The loft is 42 feet deep and supported
on pairs of posts, attached to the nave walls, flanking the entrance. Although the latter
are modern, they cover ancient mortises on the underside of the bressumer beam at each
end. The entrance has a basket-shaped arch-head with pierced tracery. Behind the loft is
a boarded tympanum, with applied cross-shaped struts in the centre, and two three-light
windows either side (Figure 11 ) . The bressumer beam has ovolo mouldings in the hollows
between which are running foliage trails (Figure 12). Above are fourteen openwork
panels with heavily-finialled traceried ogee arches. It is noticeable that the rhythm of the
bay plan in the lower screen is ignored on the loft front above. The screen is lit from a
wide-splayed window to the south-west, adjacent to the door to the rood stair, which is
hidden in the thickness of the wall. The integrity of the two major components of the
fixtures and fittings in this church, the rood-screen and timber ceiling, raise the
archaeological status of the interior to a high level. The tympanum fits exactly within the
radius of the later plastered and double-purlined wooden boarded barrel-vaulted ceiling.
The latter has mostly restored foliate carved roof bosses at the intersections. In the
chancel it has not been plastered over and the butted boarding, and the ancient carved
bosses, can still be enjoyed. The loft front fits exactly beneath the highly moulded wall
plates. Notwithstanding the disjunction of the front elevations at ground and loft level,
 CHARLES TR AC Y 2.9

the rood-screen appears to be all of one build.

M o st of the panelling in the dado o f the rood-screen is secondary, having been replaced
possibly in the seventeenth century. The entire monument has been stained down to an
unpleasantly dark and dirty appearance. The bays of the loft front are filled with
somewhat ingenuous finialled, traceried and crocketed arches, which would have looked
a little more impressive if the original attached moulded stiles each side had been
retained. Crossley and Ridgway pointed out the redundant nail holes in the latter,
although they acknowledged that buttresses were normally carved in with the stiles in this
part of Wales.48 The unusual feature of the design is its attempted three-dimensionality,
with the attached archlet standing proud of the cusped tracery below, and the bare
triangular shapes at the base. Crossley and Ridgway suggested that this feature would
originally have been covered by ‘good cresting’ above the lower bressumer (Figure 12).49
The trailing oak and vine foliage friezes are well carved, although they could do with
more shadow behind to bring out the shapes. The handling of the loft front here,
particularly the treatment of the vine-scroll friezes, is reminiscent of that at Mamhilad,
also in Monmouthshire (Figure 13). There is an attempt to represent a surprising variety
of plant species on the loft archlets at Bettws Newydd, with six in all, including
hawthorn, voluted-trefoil leaf, and four squared-up examples, reminiscent of the English
fourteenth and fifteenth century ornament vocabulary. Mamhilad is a good example of a
loft that has been re-used as a singing gallery at the west end of the church.
The ample windows in the back of the rood-loft at Bettwys afford an excellent view of
the high altar. They contrast with the irregular and covert squints at Llanelieu,
Breconshire and Llangwm Uchaf, Monmouthshire (Figures 14 , 15). Crossley and
Ridgway claimed that the screen entrance posts at Bettwys, although moulded on the
inside faces, appear to have been prepared to take a door, hinged on the west side. They
felt that, since the tracery of the door-head is cut from thicker timber than that used for
the open bay heads on either side, the former might be a later addition. This tracery, and
the basket arch which contains it, is probably somewhat later in date than the mid­
fifteenth century-looking character of the rest of the screen.
Unfortunately, there is not space here to contextualise these Welsh screens any further,
but it is to be hoped that this account will stand for other more-or-Iess complete examples
in the Principality, as well as in England.

C h o i r -S t a l l s

The possible role of the rood-loft in providing a platform for the singers in a parish
church has already been mentioned in passing. The surviving evidence, such as it is,
however, implies that in most churches of the later middle ages, particularly the larger
urban ones, there must have been sets of stalls at the east end for a choir and clergy. In
trying to verify this information we are hampered by our inability to inspect the
foundations beneath the floor-boards, which may or may not cover a resonance passage.
If we were able to identify this feature, we could be much more confident about the
incidence and distribution of parochial choir-stalls. However, it is possible that only a few
of them were provided with acoustic chambers, which were probably only associated
with more prestigious establishments. The financial resources of most smaller parish
churches may not have run to such a sophisticated provision.
3 0 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

Fine sets of choir-stalls survive at places like Lavenham, Suffolk (mid-fourteenth

century), Ludlow, Shropshire (c.1430), Boston, Lincolnshire (mid-15th-century), St
M ary’s, Beverley, East Riding of Yorkshire (c.1445) and Salle, Norfolk (c.1450). All four
churches are atypical, each being unusually well endowed. Accommodation for the boy
singers in such churches was sometimes provided on shallow benches incorporated on the
front of the stall desks, as at Sefton, Lancashire and Stowlangtoft, Suffolk. We are much
less well informed about the arrangements in the average village church. A complicating
factor is the alleged introduction of alien furniture from neighbouring religious houses
into parish churches after the Dissolution, as for instance at Barkestone, Leicestershire,
where the four stall-ends are, supposedly, from either Croxton Abbey or Belvoir Priory,50
or the twenty stalls at Beaumaris, Anglesey, traditionally believed to have migrated from
the nearby Franciscan friary at Llanfaes.
One of the finest sets of parochial stalls in England is at Nantwich, Cheshire (Figure
16 ).51 The high quality of the furniture in this provincial urban church of the late-
fourteenth century is a great surprise, until one comes to terms with the building’s
unexpectedly cathedral-size and sophistication. It must have been funded by a
combination of the brethren of Combermere Abbey, the mother church, the four religious
guilds based in the parish, and a number of wealthy local families, whose armorials
formerly decorated the windows. The stalls are highly unusual, because they exhibit a
direct stylistic influence from the nearby Chester Cathedral (formerly a Benedictine
abbey) (Figure 17). The designers and manufacturers of parish church stalls were
normally regional workshops, that operated exclusively within their own orbit. The
Nantwich furniture (c. 1390) is ultimately the unexpected progeny of the Lincoln
Cathedral stalls, whose distinguished design emanates from royal commissions in London
in the mid-fourteenth century, and other sources.51 The desking at Nantwich is nineteenth
century, but otherwise the furniture is authentically medieval, albeit inevitably, with some
Victorian restoration. The arrangement of the seating is unusual for England, there being
only two return stalls each side. These have been angled off, so as to stop just in front of
the eastern piers of the wide chancel arch. These seats must have been reserved for the
rector and the presiding chantry priests. They are wider than the other seats, a normal
hierarchical refinement found in choir-stalls. The seat rail, on which the seats and the
superstructure depend, is original throughout. Iron clamps are embedded in the back
wall, to restrain the superstructure.53 At Nantwich there are enough stylistic parallels with
the stalls at Chester Cathedral, themselves a stylistic intermediary between Lincoln and
Nantwich, to make it a reasonable assumption that at least one of the master carpenters
who worked on the Chester furniture must have subsequently found employment here.
John Maddison attributed the contemporary architectural works at Chester and Nantwich
to the same ‘Perpendicular Master’.54 Many details of the Nantwich stalls betray an
intimate knowledge of the Chester woodwork. But at the same time there are considerable
differences. The seat standards are much wider, the shape of the seats is quite different and,
most importantly, the superstructure has undergone important modifications.
The impressive canopy design at Nantwich takes the refinement and complexity found
at Chester one stage further. There is an even greater interest in the exploitation of light
and shade. The hierarchical massing of forms, which Chester inherited from Lincoln and
exploited still further - the cavernous lower canopies, the tall hollowed-out open-work
 CHARLES TRACY 31

screens and the large shadow-casting upper canopies that resemble the lids of so many
sumptuous ciboria —whilst still evidently present at Nantwich, is played down in favour
of an impressionistic blurring of the outlines. The painstaking use of applied detail at
Chester - the variety and articulation of the foliage, the unusually specific modelling of
the sculptural detail even at the upper level of the structure, the use of elaborate carved
bosses in the vaults of the canopies at both levels and the application of traceried
panelling and figure carving on the seat backs - is as much reminiscent of goldsmith’s as
joiner’s work. It is on the creation of a quasi-goldsmith’s art, with the emphasis on
dematerialisation, that the designer of the Nantwich stalls concentrates. This
superstructure is a lacy skeleton freely accessible to light and air. It is as if the intensely
intricate design were sketched impressionistically upon a sheet of paper. The major
emphasis is upon the small forms which merge one into another in both horizontal and
vertical directions. The tendency to dematerialisation and flatness is further emphasized by
the penetration of light from behind. With this monument we move into a different world
from that of Lincoln both formally and aesthetically. This is the most progressive canopy
composition of the century in all England. It demonstrates how the north of England took
the lead during the second half of the fourteenth century in the making of canopied choir-
stalls. This was to fuel a vigorous spate of choir-stall making on distinguished and
idiosyncratic lines throughout the fifteenth and into the sixteenth centuries in these parts.55
The existence of the most sophisticated canopy design of all in an obscure Cheshire parish
church gainsays the notion that the most expensive is always the best.
By way of contrast we shall consider the late-fourteenth century parish church at
Balsham, Cambridgeshire, and its highly idiosyncratic choir-stalls (Figures 18, 19). There
are now twenty-six seats in all, with ten lateral and six return stalls, although there were
originally twenty-eight. The church has a thirteenth century west tower, what appears to
be an early fourteenth century chancel and a mainly fifteenth century nave.56 Despite the
claim on his memorial brass in the chancel that John de Sleford, the rector of Balsham
from 137 8 , who died in 14 0 1, had built the church (ecclesiam struxit), the archaeology
indicates that, whatever else he did, he fitted out the choir with stalls. Sleford was an able
administrator and churchman.57 He died a canon of Ripon, archdeacon of Bath and
Wells, Prebendary of Stephen’s Chapel, Westminster, and had been chaplain to Queen
Philippa. A Lincolnshire man, he had begun his career as a clerk of the King’s works
around 13 6 2 , and was promoted to Keeper of the King’s Wardrobe at the Tower. His
brother William was dean of St Stephen’s Chapel, Westminster. By 1384 John was forced
out of office, his face no longer fitting in the new regime. His previous royal duties must
have been well rewarded. He would have been well able to rebuild, or at least restore his
church. He is reported as holding the lease of Oxcroft Farm in the 1370 s and at Linton.58
In 1384 he is known to have owed the considerable sum of £400 (later marked paid),
which must relate to his building activities.59 John Sleford’s memorial brass is
exceptionally fine, and its inscriptions provide much information about him. Apart from
the claim that he had built the church, it also recounts that he gave the stalls.
The latter are very unusual because, although revealing a typical late fourteenth
century style, they do not conform to any comparable joinery in England. Under the seats
there is no capping rail. The seat backs consist of two panels, one above the other, the
upper being filled with a moulded single trefoil-headed light. The destroyed seat backs of
32 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A ND W E L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

the return stalls would have been treated similarly. They have been modified to
accommodate the later rood-screen. The shoulder pieces at the top of the seat standards,
that would normally have been made from an extension of the capping rail, consist of a
figure leaning forward at the top of the standard ‘quadrant’. A pair of these standards is
used to create the corner arrangement. The desk fronts are decorated with pairs of cusped
lights under a moulded ogee arch, with small pairs of lights in the spandrels.
The misericords represent a fairly standard range of subject matter, except for a man
eating with a wooden spoon from a mazer. There are plain desk-ends with trefoil poppy-
heads, some with human heads, typical of the period. The chief interest is the elbow and
shoulder carvings, which include birds, animals, hybrids, and human figures. The image
of a ‘Fen Fowler’, wearing a pleated cloak and holding a dog on a leash in his left hand,
seems to be unique (Figure 19). He has stilts strapped to his legs, and he is, presumably,
catching fish, eels and waterfowl in the then mainly undrained water fens.
It is interesting to speculate on the reasons for the existence of these very unusual stalls
in what today is a remote country village. As a retired royal servant and pluralist, Sleford
was probably interested in providing as full a liturgical routine in the church as possible.
We know that there were two guilds at Balsham in the fifteenth century, one dedicated to
the Holy Trinity and the other to St Nicholas. Their altars were located at the east end of
the nave aisles. The two guild chapel priests would have been expected to attend the main
services in the choir, and given Sleford’s familiarity with the liturgical round at St Stephen’s
Chapel, one would not be surprised to learn that he made sure that there were boy singers
and lay clerks for his choir. Another interesting dimension at Balsham is the Ely
connection. The parish of Balsham had been the property of the monastery of Ely since
10 35, and in 110 9 was transferred to the bishops of Ely, when the monastery became the
seat of a bishopric. The present church dates from the thirteenth century, and may have
been built at the behest of Hugh de Balsham, who was bishop of Ely from 1258 to 1286.
John Sleford must have been well aware of the strategic importance of his church, in
a village in which was located one of the bishop of Ely’s palaces. It would have been an
overnight stop for the episcopal retinue on the journey south. Interestingly, in the
fifteenth and early-sixteenth centuries, there were two rectors with strong Ely
connections. John Blodwell, another clever churchman, was a lawyer. He was educated
at Bologna, and at the close of his career, between 1438 and 1444 appointed absentee
Bishop and Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Ely.60In the early sixteenth century
the rector was Henry Mynn, who had been steward to bishop West. Unfortunately, we
know practically nothing about the Balsham palace, which was only a five-minute walk
from the parish church. Whereas it probably had an oratory or private chapel for the
bishop’s exclusive use, one wonders whether the prelate’s retinue at least routinely used
Holy Trinity Church for worship.

E aster Sepu lch res

Although the importance of both temporary and permanent sepulchres in the Easter
liturgy in England is becoming better understood, there are still plenty of unanswered
questions in regard to the conduct of the ceremony and the form of the sepulchre itself.61
Apart from the unique wooden monumental but portable example in oak at Cowthorpe,
North Yorkshire (Figure 20), combining the characteristics of both sarcophagus and
 CHARLES TRACY 33

shrine, the survivors are in stone. The permanent kind is built into the fabric of a church,
generally on the north side of the chancel/1 The multi-purpose kind consisted of the
canopied effigee-less ‘tombs’ of the type found on the north side of the high altar, which
became popular in parish churches in the second half of the fifteenth century, for instance,
at Long Melford, Hadleigh and Blythburgh, in Suffolk,63 Wooden sepulchres, like the one
at Cowthorpe, were also intended to be placed for the most part against the north chancel
wall during Easter Week, remaining until the Sunday after Easter (for the rest of the year
they would have been stored elsewhere)/4There is also evidence for the use of a miniature
sepulchre, almost certainly of wood, which was placed within these ‘tombs’ on the
evening of Good Friday. They must have been small enough to fit on top of the
sarcophagus within the sides of the open canopy/5 Thus the tomb-sepulchres enjoyed the
privilege of being used at Easter as receptacles for the symbols of the body of Christ.
Therefore, those with sufficient status and influence to commission such ‘tombs’, whether
clerics or gentry, were guaranteed eternal life through their permanent proximity in the
church to the celebration of Mass at the high altar after their death and their intimate
association with the body of Christ, placed within their tomb during the Easter period.
According to the entries in churchwardens’ accounts, the wooden demountable type of
Easter sepulchre was the most commonly used in parish churches. Many of them were of
simple construction, such as the one at Tunstall, Kent, of deal boards/6 Apart from that
at Cowthorpe, and a shrine-shaped example at Coety, Glamorgan, with pitched roof and
carved Passion scenes,67 the more elaborate carved wooden Easter sepulchres have
disappeared, save for a few fragments reported in the early-twentieth century to have
survived.68 The ritual took its own course in England, and was centred around the rites
of Depositio (the Deposition of Christ’s body), when after Vespers on Good Friday, the
Cross (a crucifix) was buried with the Host in its pix in the sepulchre, and the Elevatio
on Easter Day (Christ Risen from the Grave) when the Host was carried from the
sepulchre to the high altar, and then the Cross was taken in procession around the church
to an altar on the north side/9 For this liturgical drama the sepulchre would have been
decorated with coloured fabrics,70and at Melford,
‘a fair painted frame o f timber set up about Maundy Thursday, with holes for
a number o f fair tapers to stand in before the sepulchre and to be lighted in
service time & sometimes it was set overthwart the quire before the high altar,
the sepulchre being always placed, and finely garnished, at the north end o f the
high altar ...’ /'
The Cowthorpe sepulchre is 216 5 mm high, 16 10 mm wide and 650 mm deep. At the
base is a chest, 1450 mm high, with four stiles at the corners, meeting the base of the
gable above.71 The stiles have tracery and sloped offsets in two zones, and mouldings at
the base, now mostly missing or rotted away. The chest is embattled at the base, and its
front has applied traceried panels with segmental heads, leaf spandrels and flower cusps.
There are two storage compartments, on the left about 610 mm square and on the right
965 mm by 6 10 mm, with six original wrought-iron strap hinges with trefoil ends on the
chest lid. The two iron lifting rings are backed by flower escutcheons. The lock plates are
original. The remains of a locking mechanism survives on the back of the right hand
hatch. The hasps and staples are probably more recent in origin.
The superstructure is gabled, and decorated with crockets and cresting at base and top.
34 F UR N I T UR E IN M E D I E V A L E NG LI SH AND WELSH PARISH C HU R C HE S

The finials, which were at each end, are lost. There is a frieze decorated with various motifs
under the lower cresting. The spandrels of the openings on the front and left side are
decorated with leaves and shields, presumably originally coloured. From the positioning of
the decorative carving it is clear that the object’s principal viewing point was from the front
or the left side. At the right end the buttresses were not carved, and the back is completely
plain. There are a few repairs and replacements, but the condition is generally authentic.
There are traces of a gesso covering on the superstructure, which suggests that it was
originally fully coloured. The ritual cross (crucifix), used in the Depositio, representing
Christ’s dead body, was probably placed in the larger compartment of the chest, and the
host in the smaller. This portable Easter sepulchre was unquestionably made for the church.
Bryan Rouclyff, who had been a lawyer in the reign of Henry VI, became a Baron of the
Exchequer, and was also Lord of the Manor and patron of the living at Cowthorpe. He was
given permission by the Archbishop of York in 1456 to start building a church on a new
site.73 The celebrated brass memorial to him and his wife Joan Hammerton, which partially
survives, displays, amongst other family armorial motifs, the fleur-de-lys of his maternal
uncle’s family. Also interlaced with the marginal inscription were the chess rooks of the
Rouclyffs. Both appear on the frieze of the sepulchre.

C o n clu sio n s

This is a vast subject with a generally well-known supporting bibliography, with which
specialists will be familiar. Within the confines of this paper, by no means exhaustive, it has
been possible to touch on no more than some the key components of the typology - nave
benching, rood-screens, choir-stalls and Easter Sepulchres, although passing references have
been made to altarpieces, chests and pulpits. It is difficult to gain the impression of an
authentic English medieval church today. The biggest losses being the nave altars, screened-
off chantry chapels, choir-stalls, and the statues of the Virgin, the church’s patron saint, and
the many popular saints, the indispensible vehicles of intercession. It has been my intention,
as far as possible, to recall the liturgical functions of the medieval parish church, and to
evoke the former role of its principal wooden furnishings.
Today the rural parish churches of Brittany and Scandinavia provide the most genuine
experience of a Northern European medieval parish church, even though much of the
material that survives there is of the Baroque period. Brittany provides a distressing contrast
with the rest of France, where the depredations of the mainly Revolutionary iconoclasm are
all too evident. In England and Wales the interiors of parish churches have been irrevocably
transformed by the reformers, and the re-orderings and restorations of successive centuries.
None the less, in England, and to a lesser extent in Wales, much of the medieval wooden
furnishing has survived. Its potential for historians can never be exhausted.

R EFER EN CES
1. C. Tracy, ‘Woodwork’, in J. Alexander and P. Binski, Age o f Chivalry. Art in Plantagenet England
12 0 0 -14 0 0 Royal Academy of Arts, London, 19 8 7 , pp. 1 1 8 - 2 4 .
2. C. Tracy, Continental Church Furniture in England. A Traffic in Piety, Antique Collectors’s Club,
Woodbridge, 20 01.
3. Some of the restoration work carried out in parish churches from the middle of the 19th-century was,
however, sensitively handled and of a high quality.
4. See the recent invaluable review of parish church fittings in western Europe in J. Kroesen and R. Steensma,
 CHARLES TRACY 35

The Interior o f the Medieval Village Church, Peeters, Louvain, Paris, Dudley, M A , 2.004.
5. For a recent study of the English parish church, containing many useful references, see P. Binski, ‘The English
Parish Church and its Art in the Later Middle Ages: A Review of the Problem’, in R. K. Emmerson and P.
Sheingorn, Studies in Iconography, Routledge, Kalamazoo, 19 99 , pp. 1-2.5. E ° r an up-to-date general coverage
of Welsh medieval culture, see P. Lord, The Visual Ctdture o f Wales: Medieval Vision, University of Wales Press,
Cardiff, 2003. For the classic series on Welsh church woodwork, see F. H. Crossley and M . H. Ridgway,
‘Screens, lofts, and stalls situated in Wales and Monmouthshire’, Archaeologia Cambrensis. Parts one, two and
four were written by Crossley, and the remainder was under joint authorship. A complete list of the components
is as follows: ‘ Part one. General introduction’, 9 7 .2 (19 4 3), pp. 13 5 -6 0 ; ‘Part two. Anglesey and
Caernarvonshire’, 9 8 .1 (1944), pp. 6 4 - 1 1 2 ; ‘Part three. Merioneth and Flintshire’, 98.2 (19 45), pp. 1 5 3 -9 8 ;
‘Part four. Denbighshire and Cardiganshire’, 99 .1 (1946), pp. 1 - 5 6 ; ‘Part five. Montgomeryshire and
Carmarthenshire’, 99.2 (1947), pp. 17 9 -2 3 0 ; ‘Part six. Radnorshire’ , 10 0 .2 (1949), pp. 2 0 7 - 5 1 ; ‘Part seven.
Brecknockshire’, 10 2 .1 (19 52), pp. 4 8 -8 2 ; ‘Part eight. Pembrokeshire’, 10 6 (19 57), pp. 9 -4 5 ; ‘Part nine.
Glamorgan’, 10 7 (19 58), pp. 7 2 - 1 0 8 ; ‘Part ten. Monmouthshire’, 108 (1959), pp. 1 4 - 7 1 ; ‘Part eleven. Border
influences. Additions and Corrections etc.’, i n (1962), pp. 5 9 -10 2 . In the final part the authors itemized
thirteen Welsh screen types, and provided a distribution map; see part eleven, pp. 9 9 -10 0 .
6. Roger Martin, ‘The State of Melford Church and our Ladie’s Chappel at the East End. As I did know it’ . See
Dymond and C. Paine, The Spoil o f Melford Church. Reformation in a Suffolk Parish, Salient Press, Ipswich,
19 9 2 . For an account of Martin’s life, see Dymond, Dictionary o f National Biography, 36, 2004, pp. 9 75-76 .
7. Dymond and Paine, Spoil o f Melford, p. 1.
7a. ‘See a speculative discussion of the former Melford altar piece in K.W. Woods, ‘The pre-Reformation altar
piece of Long Melford church; Antiquities Journal, 8 2 , 2 0 0 2 , pp. 9 3 -10 4 .
8. By the early 16th century the ‘choir of singers’ at Melford was given three dinners a year by the abbots of
Bury St Edmund’s, ibid., p. 7, note 37.
9. N . Pevsner and E. Radcliffe, Suffolk. The Buildings o f England, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 19 74 , p. 347.
10 . On the exterior of the lower windows of the Martin Chapel is inscribed: ‘Pray for ye soulis of Lawrens
Martyn and Marion his wyffe, Elysabeth Martyn a’d Jone, and for ye good estat of Richard Martyn and Roger
Martyn and ye wyvis and alle ye childri of whose good is.................made anno Dni millesimi ccccLxxxIIII.
1 1 . See W. Goult, A Survey o f Suffolk Parish History, Suffolk County Council, Ipswich, 1990.
12 . The 15 2 9 list begins: FIRST OF T H E P L A T E , O R N A M E N T S, A N D GOODS, B ELO N G IN G TO TH E
SAID CH U RCH . It lists plate, ‘basons’, a silver pot, paxes, crosses, a pix, christmatories, ‘ships of silver’, two
silver candlesticks, two silver censers, and ‘four cruets of silver’ . Other items from both of the inventories
include ‘Coats belonging to Our Lady’, copes and vestments, altar cloths, mass books, ‘Grails’ (gradual), towels,
corporasses, coverlits, Lattyn (latten), ‘holy water pails of Lattin (sic.)’, basons and ewer, chests, coffer, ‘cross
cloaths’, banner cloths, streamers of silk, table of beech, ‘cloth of Adam and Eve (lenten veil), etc. Dymond and
Paine, Spoil o f Melford, pp. 1 0 -3 5 .
13 . ibid., p. 2 1 , note 73.
14 . ibid., p. 2 1.
15 . ibid.
16 . ibid.
17 . ibid., p. 34.
18. J. Geddes, Medieval Decorative Ironwork in England, Society of Antiquaries, London, 19 99 , p. 368.
19. Dymond and Paine, Spoil o f Melford, p. 3 7 , n. 5.
20. See entry for ‘Pews’, including a bibliography, in Macmillan’s Dictionary o f Art, London, 1996.
2 1 . D. Wilkins, Concilia Magnae Britanniae et Hiberniae, 4 4 6 - 1 7 1 7 , 4 vols, London, 1 7 3 7 1, p. 14 2 . The same
is quoted at greater length in J.C . Cox and A. Harvey, English Church Furniture, Methuen, London, 19 07,
p. 28 3. The latter is the place of first resort for the study of English church furniture.
22. Kroesen and Steensma, Medieval Village Church, pp. 2 6 8 -7 1.
23. ibid., p. 268.
24. The set of benches at Dunsfold, Surrey, which in the old literature is given as late-13th-century, has been
dated by dendrochronology to 14 0 9 -4 1! See Cox and Harvey, English Church Furniture, p. 2 8 1, and A. Bott,
The Parish Churches o f Dunsfold and Hascombe, Privately printed, 2005, 3 8 - 4 1 .
25. E. Duffy, The Stripping o f the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, Yale University Press, N ew Haven
and London, 19 9 2 , pp. 5 7 -5 8 .
3 6 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A ND WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

26. J. C. Cox, Pulpits, Lecterns, & Organs in English Churches, London, 1 9 1 5 , p. 16.
27. J. Mattingly, ‘The Dating of Bench-ends in Cornish Churches’, Royal Inst, of Cornwall J n l , n.s II, I, Pt. I,
1 9 9 1, pp. 5 8 -7 2 .
28. W. J. Hardy, ‘Remarks on the history of seat-reservation in churches’, Society o f Antiquaries, Westminster,
18 9 2.
29. ibid., p. 4.
30. See Cox and Harvey, English Church Furniture, pp. 2 8 2 -2 5 , where the early 16th-century Scrope pew in
Wensley Church, in the Yorkshire Dales is cited. The definitive work on English church pews throughout their
history is M . Aston, ‘Segregation in Church’, in W. J. Sheils and D. Wood, Studies in Church History, 27,
Women in Church, Ecclesiastical History Soc., Oxford, 1990, pp. 2 3 7 -9 4 .
3 1 . C. Richmond, ‘Religion and the Fifteenth-Century English Gentleman’, in The Church, Politics and
Patronage in the Fifteenth Century, ed. B. Dobson, Alan Sutton, Gloucester, 1 9 8 4 , p. 198.
32. F. E. Howard and F. H. Crossley, English Church Woodwork, Batsford, London, 1 9 1 7 , p. 39, note 25.
3 3 . ibid., p. 302.
34. For books on English benches in all their variety, see J. C. Cox, Bench Ends in English Churches, Oxford,
1 9 16 ; A. Gardner, Minor English Wood Sculpture. 14 0 0 - 1 5 5 0 , Alec Tiranti, London, 19 5 8 ; J. Agate, Benches
and Stalls in Suffolk Churches, Suffolk Historic Churches Trust, Chattisham, 1980.
35. At Alturnan the benches were originally dated, but the inscription has been damaged so that the evidence
is now lacking. Mattingly, Dating of Bench-Ends, p. 60.
36. ibid. Also at Morebath, Devon, see the several references to ‘Our Lady’s sheep’, in E. Duffy, The Voices of
Morebath. Reformation and Rebellion in an English Village, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2001.
37. C. Tracy, ‘Three Welsh Rood-Screens in South-East Wales’, in Medieval Art and Architecture in South Wales
(2004), ed. J. Kenyon and D. Williams, B A A Cardiff Conference Trans., X X IX , Leeds, 2006, pp. 1 6 1 - 2 0 1 .
38. C. F. Davidson, ‘Written in stone: architecture, liturgy and the laity in English parish churches, c.
1 1 2 5 - C .1 2 5 0 ’, unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, University of London, Birkbeck College, 19 98 , p. 2 0 1.
39. A. Vallance, English Church Screens, Batsford, London, 19 3 6 , p. 66.
40. ibid.
4 1 . ibid., fig. 12 .
42. ibid., Fig. 9. See also the fragments of the former rood at Kemeys Inferior, Monmouthshire, and remains
of the rood group at Mochdre, Montgomeryshire.
43. London Guildhall Library, M S 2 5 1 2 2 / 1 1 1 2 . C. Peters, ‘Interior and furnishings’, in Church Archaeology.
Research Directions for the Future, ed. J. Blair and C. Pyrah , York, 19 96 , p. 69 and n. 15 .
44. A select list of the rood-screens discussed by Crossley and Ridgway is as follows: Anglesey: Llaneilian;
Caernarvonshire: Aberconwy, Dolwyddelan, Llanbedrog, Llanengan; Merioneth: Llanaber, Llandderfel,
Llanddwywe- is-y-Graig, Llanegryn, Llanfor, Llanfrothen; Denbighshire: Abergele, Clocaenog, Derwen,
Gresford, Llanrhudd, Llanrwst; Cardiganshire: nothing of note: Montgomeryshire: Llangynyw, Llanwnog,
Llanwrin, Pennant Melangell; Carmarthenshire: nothing of note. Radnorshire: Aberedw, Beguildy, Bettws Clyro
Chapel, Cefnllys, Cregrina, Llananno, Old Radnor, Llanbister, Llandegley, Michaelchurch; Breconshire:
Bronllys, Llanderfalle, Llanelieu, Llanfilo, Llanfihangel Cwm Ddu, Llywell, Merthryr Cynog, Partrishow;
Pembrokeshire: Nothing of note; Glamorgan: Ewenny, Llancarfan, Llantrithyd, Porthkerry; Monmouthshire:
Bettws Newydd, Gwernesney, Kemeys Commander, Llangeview, Llanfair Kilgedin, Llangwm Uchaf, Mamhilad,
Redwick, Usk. More or less intact rood-lofts survive in Wales at Llannano and Llanwynog (Montgomeryshire);
Partrishow, Llanelieu and Llanfilo (Breconshire); Llangwm Uchaf and Bettws Newydd (Monmouthshire);
Llanegryn (Merioneth); Llanrwst (Denbighshire), and Llanergan and Llaneilian (Caernarvonshire). For a recent
discussion of these screens, see Tracy, Three Welsh Rood-Screens.
45. The best surviving examples of rood-lofts in parish churches in England are as follows: Atherington (Devon)
(north aisle); Avebury (Wiltshire); Hillesden (Buckinghamshire); Hubberholme (Yorkshire); Marwood (Devon)
(single loft parapet); St John, Timberhill, (Norwich) (from Horstead Church, Norfolk); Upper Sherringham
(Norfolk) (single loft parapet); South Warnborough (Hampshire); Warfield (Berkshire) (now used as a screen to
the north chapel), Attleborough (Norfolk); Cotes-by-Stow (Lincolnshire) (restored by J. L. Pearson in 1884).
Note also the examples at Oakley, Bedfordshire (imported), and St Margaret’s, Herefordshire.
46. Crossley and Ridgway, Screens. Lofts and Stalls, ‘Part five. Montgomeryshire and Carmarthenshire’, 99.2
(1 9 4 7 ), PP- 2-3G 2 33.
47. J. Newman, Gwent/Monmouthshire, The Buildings of Wales, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 2000, p. 119 .
 CHARLES TRACY 37

48. Crossley and Ridgway, Monmouthshire, p. 3 1 .

49. ibid.
50. C. Tracy, English Gothic Choir-Stalls. 14 0 0 - I J 4 0 , The Boydell Press, Woodbridge, 1990, p. 70.
5 1 . C. Tracy, English Gothic Choir-Stalls. 12 0 0 -14 0 0 , The Boydell Press, Woodbridge, 19 8 7 , pp. 5 9 -6 1, where
Nantwich is incorrectly described as having been collegiate. An insightful new account of the choir-stalls is
contained in the article by Joanne Allen, ‘The choir Stalls of Lincoln, Chester Cathedral and St M ary’s Church,
Nantwich’, Journal o f the British Archaelogical Association, Leeds, 1 6 1 , zoo8, forthcoming. The author
stresses the close interest in the church and county taken by Richard II in the late-i390S. This would explain,
she claims, the refreshment of inspiration found in the monument in the late-i4th-century examples of micro-
architecture in London and Canterbury.
52. Joanne Allen has challenged my thesis on the stylistic influences of the Lincoln stalls, placing more weight
upon complementary north-country sources. See Allen, Choir-stalls o f Lincoln Cathedral.
53. Six iron clamps or ‘crampons’ were purchased in 1 3 5 0 from master Andrew the smith to hold the stalls to
the walls in St George’s Chapel Windsor, an important but lost set of medieval choir-stalls. See W. St. John
Hope , Windsor Castle, An Architectural History, 2 vols, Country Life, London, 1 9 1 3 , p. 1 3 3 .
54. J. M . Maddison, ‘Decorated Architecture in the North-West Midlands - an investigation into the work of
provincial Masons and the sources’, Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, University of Manchester, 19 7 8 .
55. The impressive sequence of Gothic monuments at Carlisle, c. 1 4 3 3 , Ripon, 14 8 9 -9 4 , Manchester, before
15 0 6 and Beverley, 15 2 0 -2 4 .
56. N . Pevsner, Cambridgeshire. Buildings o f England, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 19 70 , p. 295.
57. For further details on Sleford’s career, see Emden, A.B., 19 6 3 . The Biographical Register o f the University
o f Cambridge to 15 0 0 , Clarendon Press, Oxford, 19 6 3 , 5 3 3 , and P. J. Heseltine, The Figure Brasses o f
Cambridgeshire, Solo Publishing, St Neots. 1 9 8 1 , p. 17 .
58. W. N . C. (Canon Bill) Girard, ‘Balsham Parish Church. A Guide to the Brasses’, 1998.
59. ibid.
60. See W. N . C. (Canon Bill) Girard, ‘John Blodwell, Rector of Balsham’, Monumental Brass Society Trans,
XV, Pt 2, 19 9 3 , 1 1 9 - 3 6 and Heseltine, Brasses o f Cambridgeshire, p. 18.
6 1. For the standard works on Easter Sepulchres, see V. Sekules, ‘The Tomb of Christ at Lincoln at Lincoln and
the Development of the Sacrament Shrine: Easter Sepulchres Reconsidered’, Medieval and Architecture at
Lincoln Cathedral, B A A Conference Trans for 1 9 8 2, Leesds, 19 8 6 , pp. 1 2 3 - 2 5 , and P. Scheingorn, The Easter
Sepulchre in England. Early Drama, Art and Music Reference Series, 19 8 7 , pp. 18 , 19 , 22, 26, 3 1 , 3 3, 34.
62. In particular the group of stone Easter Sepulchres in Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire.
63. At Long Melford Roger Martin discusses the use of John Clopton’s tomb as a receptacle for a small
portable Easter Sepulchre, see below. Dymond and Paine, The Spoil o f Melford, p. 4, note 15 .
64. It has been pointed out that elsewhere in Europe the Easter Sepulchre was usually sited in the nave. Kroesen
and Steensma, Medieval Village Church, p. 293.
65. Dymond and Paine, Spoil o f Melford, 4, n. 15 . On the ceiling of the empty canopy at Melford there is a
painting of the Resurrected Christ. For the tomb at Hadleigh, see C. Tracy, ‘Master William Pykenham, LL.D
(0 ^ 425-9 7) Scholar, Churchman, Lawyer, and Gatehouse Builder’, Suffolk Institute o f Archaeology and
History, X LI, Part 2, 2007, 296 -9 9.
66. F. Bond, The Chancel o f English Churches, OUP, Oxford 1 9 16 , p. 232 .
67. Lord, Visual Culture o f Wales, Fig. 3 16 , p. 203.
68. Cox and Harvey, English Church Furniture, p. 77.
69. C. Herbert, ‘Permanent Easter Sepulchres: A Victorian Re-creation?’, Church Archaeology (20 03-0 5), p.
10, n. 20.
70. E. Duffy, The Voices o f Morebath, p. 77.
7 1 . Dymond and Paine, Spoil o f Melford, pp. 3 -4 .
72 . See N . Pevsner and E. Radcliffe, The West Riding, The Buildings o f England, 2nd edn, Penguin Books,
Harmondsworth, 19 6 7, p. 1 7 2 , pi. 3ra ; S. Glynne, ‘Notes on Yorkshire Churches’, Yorkshire Archaeological
Journal, X X V I, 19 2 2 , pp. 2 7 2 -7 2 ; and L. Butler, St Michael’s Church, Cowthorpe, North Yorkshire, The
Churches Conservation Trust, London, 1999.
7 3 . ibid.
38 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A ND W E L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

KEY:

A. L ady C iia p e l B. C lopton C h a n try C . P r ie st 's V estry w ith solar above

F. M o n u m en t to S ir W il l ia m C o rdell , (1,1580 (B u il t ex tan t M elford H a ll ) G. C hoir V estry

I. R ood T u r r et J. J esus or M artyn C h a pel (f a m il y bu r ia ls ) K. S it e of F ormer R ood S creen

, , , , , ,f
S c a l e or
 CHARLES TRACY 39

D . H igh A ltar E . M o n u m en t to S ir J ohn C lopton , d.1497

H . C lopton C h a pel (F a m il y bu ria ls in c lu d in g S ir W il l ia m C lopton , d. 1446)

L . P er pen d ic u la r F ont M . P orch N . W est T ower

1. L o n g M elfo rd , Su ffolk. G rou n d plan after E. L . Con d er

C hu rch o f the H o ly Trinity, L o n g M elfo rd , Su ffolk (London 1 8 8 7 ) , Pi. 1
Drawing: Max Howard
4 0 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H AND WE L S H PARISH C H U R C H E S

2. Great Tew, Oxfordshire. Bench-end

Copyright: English Heritage
 CHARLES TRACY 41

3. Haddenham, Buckinghamshire. Nave bench end. Detail

Photo: author

4. Haddenham, Buckinghamshire. Rood-screen. Detail of dado panel

Photo: author
42 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D W E L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

5. Altuman, Cornwall. Bench-end with bag piper

Photo: author
 CHARLES TRACY 43

6. Poughill, Cornwall. Bench-end with mermaid and fantastic beast

Copyright: English Heritage
4 4 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARISH C H U R C H E S

7. Llananno, Montgomeryshire. Rood-screen from west

Photo: author

8. Llanwynog, Montgomeryshire. Rood-screen. Detail of bressumer beam ornament

Photo: author
 C I I A R I 1- s I R A ( 'i 4>

9. Llananno, Montgomeryshire. Rood-screen. Detail of soffit panel ornament

Photo: author

10 . Bettwys N ew ydd, Monmouthshire. Rood-screen from west

Photo: author
4 6 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

ii. Bettwys Newydd, Monmouthshire. Detail of rood-loft tympanum from west

Photo: author

12. Bettwys Newydd, Monmouthshire. Detail of bressumer beam

Photo: author
 CHARLES TRACY 47

13 . Mamhilad, Monmouthshire. Detail of loft front from ancient rood-screen,

used as west gallery front
Photo: author
48 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARI SH C H U R C H E S

14 . Llanelieu, Breconshire. Rood-screen from west

Friends o f Friendless Churches. Copyright: Charles and Patricia Aithey

15. Llangwym Uchaf, Monmouthshire. Rood-screen. Detail of east side

Photo: author
 CHARLES TRACY 49

1 6. Nantwich, Cheshire. Detail of north-west end of choir-stalls

Copyright: Courtauld Institute o f Art
5 0 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARISH C H U R C H E S

17 . Chester Cathedral. Choir-stalls. North side

Copyright: Courtauld Institute o f Art
 CHARLES TRACY 51

18. Balsham, Cambridgeshire. Choir-stalls. North side. Detail of seating

Photo: author

19. Balsham, Cambridgeshire. Choir-stalls. North side. Detail of ‘fen fowler’ on standard elbow
Photo: author
52 F U R N I T U R E IN M E D I E V A L E N G L I S H A N D WE L S H PARISH C H U R C H E S

20. Cowthorpe, North Yorkshire. North-west end of nave. Easter sepulchre

Photo: author