St Mary, Redenhall, Norfolk
I had not been again to Redenhall for 10 years, but its good tower is unforgettable, rearing out of the rolling hills to the north of the Waveney. As you get nearer, you see that spreading past the church is what will have to be one of the largest churchyards in Norfolk, and there is a cause for this. Though Redenhall is a small village, the parish involves the fairly sector city of Harleston, from which it is divided by the awful Diss to Yarmouth road. Harleston has a 19th century chapel of ease in its centre, but when you see St Mary even from a length you know that this is the one that signifies company.
Reminiscent of the towers at Eye and Laxfield over the Suffolk border, the tower was almost certainly the perform of the similar masons. It was bankrolled by the De la Poles, 1 of the richest family members in East Anglia in the 15th century, and the actuality that the elaborate flushwork is only in three sides of the tower, but not on the south aspect which are unable to be found from the road, shows that they ended up a very wily bunch when it arrived to splashing the cash. They experienced been beneficiaries of the pestilences of the preceding century, when the fatalities of about half the individuals of Norfolk and Suffolk resulted in the crack-up of the outdated estates and the increasing of wages and charges, enabling those with funds to obtain land cheaply. The emergence of a assets-proudly owning independent center course without having historic ties and loyalties to their parishes and people today would inevitably lead to the two excellent ideologies of the next 50 percent of the millennium, Protestantism and Capitalism.
But that was in the long term when the De la Poles and fellow proto-capitalists the Brothertons were being earning bequests to rebuild St Mary. Up went the tower and the clerestory, and the aisle home windows were being all replaced in the vogue of the working day. Only the chancel was still left on the lookout rather indicate and slight. Probably they would have bought to that way too had priorities not changed. All-around the foundation of the tower you can see their leopard and wild male symbols. You may possibly also spot tortoises, for this was the image of the Gawdy family. One particular curious element is the carving of farriers’ implements on the west door. These have been taken to indicate that the door was compensated for by the area farriers’ guild, but I see no rationale to suppose that the carving is modern, and I consider it is as probably to be the do the job of an idle 18th century hand.
Inevitably, the interior of the church was not heading to reside up to the exterior. I experienced occur listed here from the two churches of the Pulhams, both of those large barns of churches, and this one is a little bit of a barn much too, broad and echoey, but possibly a classier barn than the two I experienced previously frequented. It is genuine that the within of St Mary has been extensively Victorianised, and it is genuinely difficult to summon up any sense of its medieval existence. The significant dim woodwork of the case of the Holdich organ in the west gallery would have frowned on the acres of coloured glass in the naves at the Pulhams, but here there is somewhat apparent mild with only a handful of Ward & Nixon windows that can effortlessly be tuned out.
But there are intriguing corners which give the church quite much a character of its personal, for instance the Gawdy chapel at the east close of the north aisle which is made up of a spirited classical altar tomb of the late 18th century, a trace of Strawberry Hill Gothick about it, instead strange but extremely perfectly accomplished. The window of heraldic glass is by Samuel Yarrington, and is explained to have arrive from Gawdy Corridor in the north of the parish, demolished in the early yrs of WWII. An intriguing element in the chapel is a 16th Century Venetian linen upper body which is also said to come from Gawdy Hall. It stands open up, and you can see a depiction of the Annunciation with sailing ships over on the inside of of the lid, which is really curious and instead charming.
Redenhall church is famous for just one individual medieval survival. This is the stunning double-headed eagle lectern, the superb product or service of a 15th century East Anglian workshop. There is yet another in one particular of the Kings Lynn church buildings, and the one at St Mark’s in Venice is claimed to be from the exact workshop. I really like the small lions on the pedestals ideal of all. Remarkably, the church has a 2nd medieval lectern, a picket a person, and equally are solidly chained down to prevent theft.
You can stroll less than the terrific organ to beneath the tower, an outstanding space as huge as some churches. However no for a longer period utilized, you get an impact of the great processional entrance this ought to once have been, and perhaps an inkling of what St Mary was like in its late medieval heyday, a position at very last to mirror on the glory that when was listed here. As if to remind us of the passing of this sort of factors, a surviving painted plaque, likely from a missing 17th Century memorial, hangs beside the tower arch. Loss of life, it reads, behold thy selfe to me, this sort of a single was I as thou, and thou in time shall be even dust as I am now…
Posted by Simon Knott on 2018-08-06 19:32:31
Tagged: , Redenhall , Norfolk , East Anglia , church , churches
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