St Mary, Banham, Norfolk
A massive, affluent south Norfolk village, excess fat and sleepy like an aged cat on this working day of higher warmth in August 2018, and the famous view of its parish church of St Mary is from the green – the village indication, the war memorial, and then that outstanding spire lifting to heaven. It rises far more than 40 metres, and is manufactured of ribbed guide, really comparable to the a single around the border at Hadleigh in Suffolk. It had been a extensive time due to the fact I last frequented Banham church, lengthy adequate ago for its measurement and existence to have stunned me. The building is pretty a lot all of a piece, early 14th century. The Victorians brought the east window, which Sam Mortlock considered somewhat abnormal in its exuberance, but the wealth of flowing tracery elsewhere in the church retains up very well in opposition to it.
You move into a massive, perfectly-held jewel. Despite the fact that, inevitably, there was a significant Victorian restoration below, there is even now a sensation of simplicity, with brick flooring and somewhat cluttered furnishings, all overshadowed by a wonderful west conclude organ. Large higher than, the roof bears the day 1622, and the minimal George III royal arms glance like a postage stamp previously mentioned the significant tower arch. The star of the display is the luscious variety of 19th and early 20th Century glass, much of it the work of Powell & Sons. The 1857 east window, unusually, is a cavalcade of geometric patterns in pressed glass, with at its centre a crucifixion. The artist was John Clayton, a vigorous scene, his watchers hunting up in an agony, exhibiting what he was able of in advance of Alfred Bell arrived alongside and created him really serious. It is reminiscent of the operate of Robert Bayne in the exact same 10 years.
The other 19th Century Powell & Sons glass is to the models of the good Henry Holiday. The earliest echoes the design and style of the east window, with medallions of the Baptism of Christ, the Adoration of the angels at the Nativity, and the Ascension of Christ. The greatest, in the south aisle, depicts gorgeously rich figures of the four Evangelists, every in their individual light-weight about two windows.
The richness of these was echoed 50 percent a century afterwards by a Powell & Sons window of 1936, which is likely the freshest and most unforgettable issue in the full church. The risen Christ stands between two lights, one depicting spring with sheep grazing beneath an apple tree in blossom, the other autumn with the tree in fruit previously mentioned rabbits and birds. It would be intriguing to know who the artist was. The window beside it of the Presentation in the Temple is by Kempe & Co, and seems curiously out of location as if merely not talking the same language, but then I have in no way been a fan of Kempe glass.
The earliest English glass is in the chancel, a variety of the twelve disciples and a Tudor arms all in a pre-Ecclesiological design. It likely dates from the 1830s, and has not worn properly, the painted information have extended considering the fact that pale and all that remains are mosaics of colored glass suggesting human figures. However, there is a pretty excellent 16th Century continental graphic of the Blessed Virgin and child in the north aisle, collected from elsewhere and set right here in the 1960s. In the east window of that aisle is a solitary 19th Century panel depicting Christ with Martha and Mary at Bethany, which looks so odd to locate in isolation that I think it may possibly far too have arrive from somewhere else.
At the east finish of this aisle lies a wooden knight, life-sizing and instead intense in his simplicity within his tomb recess. He is popularly considered to be Sir Hugh Bardolph, founder of the church, but as Pevsner drily notes, supplied that Bardolph died in 1203 and this effigy is early 14th Century, it is a bit as well substantially of an afterthought. Woodwork of a later time surmounts the font on its stepped pedestal, a grand gothic font protect of the 1860s that could get its inspiration from the Albert Memorial. The display screen came up coming, and by the close of the century the two richly carved reredoses in the sanctuary and the north aisle chapel.
On this working day of vibrant sunshine on a day in superior summer, the temperature dipping up into the thirties, this felt a very pleased, assured put, a authentic assertion of 14th Century self esteem coupled with 19th Century piety and vitality. But I remembered staying listed here when just before, some fifteen decades ago, late on a December afternoon. The lower sunlight produced the shadows very long, and within the church the south aisle windows glowed as if they were on hearth as the nave and chancel darkened. And as I sat there, the day pale. I could rarely see the settings on my camera any a lot more, but Christ in the apple orchard nevertheless glowed fiercely, the brightest of the jewels, as if on its have keeping back the sinking sunlight. And then, as the afternoon deepened, the home windows around darkened, like stars fading, and this was the very last to go out.
Posted by Simon Knott on 2018-08-13 07:00:13
Tagged: , Banham , Norfolk , East Anglia
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