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Open Research Online The Open University’s repository of research publications and other research outputs An Exploration of Four Sixteenth-Century Artefacts from St Helen’s Ranworth: Conformity, Decency, Moderation and Memory in the Post-Reformation era. Thesis How to cite: Garrard, Nicholas James Havelock (2019). An Exploration of Four Sixteenth-Century Artefacts from St Helen’s Ranworth: Conformity, Decency, Moderation and Memory in the Post-Reformation era. PhD thesis The Open University. For guidance on citations see FAQs. c 2018 The Author https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Version: Version of Record Link(s) to article on publisher’s website: http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21954/ou.ro.00010457 Copyright and Moral Rights for the articles on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. For more information on Open Research Online’s data policy on reuse of materials please consult the policies page. oro.open.ac.uk 1 The Open University An Exploration of Four Sixteenth-Century Artefacts from St Helen's Church, Ranworth: Conformity, Decency, Moderation and Memory in the Post-Reformation era. Thesis submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences of the Open University Nicholas James Havelock Garrard September 2018 2 Abstract. The impact of the sixteenth-century English Reformation on parish life is an academically fertile and contested subject. The growth of interdisciplinary studies and material culture studies in particular has shed new light on the extent to which ordinary peoples’ faith and world-view changed in response to official reforms. This thesis brings a fresh perspective to these issues. Through close analysis of four early Reformation-era artefacts from one rural Norfolk parish, a composite view has emerged. The artefacts from St Helen’s Church, Ranworth, owed their existence to official injunctions or reformist pressures and have been interrogated from a range of material, liturgical and textual perspectives drawn from the disciplines of material culture studies, art, church and social histories. The examined artefacts are a printed volume of Erasmus’ paraphrases on the gospels and Acts of the Apostles, an Elizabethan communion cup, a wall monument of 1579 and the late Elizabethan parchment transcript of the Ranworth parish register. Attention has been given to the ordinances that instigated them and ways in which they were adopted, used and adapted by a sixteenth-century community that they were imposed upon. This visual and materially-based investigation throws new light on a number of current areas of academic focus in Reformation studies. Examining artefacts from different genres that are joined by a shared location and chronology have yielded insights into their surrounding culture and themes of conformity, decency, moderation and memory which predominate current academic debates. 3 Acknowledgements. Researching and writing this thesis has felt like an extraordinary privilege that has been made possible by the generosity, patience and understanding of those around me. I would particularly wish to express my profound gratitude to my supervisors, Dr Kim Woods and Prof. Alec Ryrie. Their supervision has been an education in itself. They have shared their scholarship with great generosity and humour. I have learned much from their wise words and meaningful silences during our regular phonelink supervisions, their helpful comments on my drafts. I am also grateful for their patience when work or family issues have needed to take priority over studying, and above all their wealth of knowledge and incisive approach. The reason I am writing an art history thesis is due to the love and support I have received from my wife, Helen. Helen has been my creative muse and has helped me to see issues more clearly. She has also borne the weight of family life and parochial ministry many times to enable me to study and has endured years of boxes of art history books mysteriously appearing on family holidays. Our daughters Jessica, Rebecca, Cecily and Eve have been remarkably positive and an inspiration to me. I am also very grateful to my superiors, Graham, Bishop of Norwich and Alan, Bishop of Thetford for granting me time to study, periods of leave and Revd Canon Keith James, Clergy Ministry Development Officer, for his facilitation and help in finding financial support. There are many others who have helped me in this six-year journey, among them I would particularly wish to acknowledge the following for their generous and willing assistance: Dr Spike Bucklow Mrs Natalie Butler The late Mr Nigel Bumfrey Dr Rodney Edrich Dr Mary Fewster 4 Dr Andrew Gordon Dr Victor Morgan Miss Caroline Rawlings Mrs Deborah Taylor Mr Tom Townsend and his colleagues at the Norfolk Archive Centre Dr Gudrun Warren I would also wish to apologise to those who are equally deserving of my gratitude but have not been acknowledged by name. 5 Table of contents. Chapter page List of plates. 6 Introduction. 10 1. ‘Reading, marking and bearing it away’: assessing the impact 31 of the English Paraphrases through examination of the Ranworth copy and others held by the Norwich Dean and Chapter’s Library. 2. The 1567 communion cup and its role in the process of Reformation 95 in Ranworth. 3. Amate Invicem: Thomas Holdiche’s monument, his social position 155 and his legacy. 4. The Ranworth parish register and changing patterns in parish life 197 and worship in the period following the Elizabethan Settlement until 1604. Conclusion. 231 Appendices. 236 Bibliography. 287 6 List of plates. Plate I. Paraphrases (1548), Ranworth copy. St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate II. Paraphrases (1548), Ranworth copy, on cantor’s desk (c. 1450), painted oak. St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate III. St Lawrence and God creating Eve initials, Paraphrases (1548), Ranworth copy. Plate IV. Front cover, Paraphrases (1548), Shipdham copy. Norwich, Dean and Chapter’s Library. Plate V. Harvest accounts, Paraphrases (1548), Bacton copy. Norwich, Dean and Chapter’s Library. Plate VI. Marginal image of schoolboy, blind marking (highlighted in red), Paraphrases (1548), Paston copy, Mark fol. 57v. Norwich, Dean and Chapter’s Library. Plate VII. Plinth marginal marking, Paraphrases (1548), Ranworth copy, Mark fol. 8v. Corbel bracket, limestone, fourteenth century, St Catherine’s Chapel, Norwich Cathedral. Plate VIII. Top, Smear mark, bottom margin, John fol. 93r. Paraphrases (1548), Paston copy, Norwich, Dean and Chapter’s Library. Bottom left, Diagonal blind left margin graffiti, Paraphrases (1548), Ranworth copy. Bottom right, Graffiti marks on south door jamb, St Mary’s Church, South Walsham, fifteenth-sixteenth centuries. Plate IX. Ave Maria monogram and marginal inscription, Luke fol. 16r. Paraphrases (1548), Paston copy. Norwich, Dean and Chapter’s Library. Plate X. Lectionary inscription, Paraphrases (1548), Ashby St Mary copy. Plate XI. Ranworth cup, silver, William Cobbold (Norwich, 1567), covered by paten, silver, undated (medieval). 7 Plate XII. Hallmark detail, Ranworth cup, silver, William Cobbold (Norwich, 1567). Plate XIII. Ranworth and Whitlingham cups, silver, both William Cobbold (Norwich, 1567). Plate XIV. Parcel gilt inscription and rim detail, Upton cup, silver, Peter Peterson (Norwich, 1567). Plate XV. Comparison of shape between the Ranworth Cup, (Norwich, 1567), and a Gothic style chalice, (twentieth century). Plate XVI. St Lawrence’s South Walsham Communion cup, silver, William Cobbold, (Norwich, 1567). Plate XVII. chalice, gilt, (London, 1527), sceptre mark. Royal Scottish Museum, Edinburgh. Plate XVIII. Representations of the Virgin Mary and St John the Evangelist, detail, in Matthias Grunewald, Isenheim Altarpiece, (1515), oil on panel, Musée d’Unterlinden, Colmar, and Rogier Van Der Weyden, Altarpiece of the Seven Sacraments (c. 1445-50), oil on panel, Koninlijk Museum, Antwerp. Photograph © Bridgeman Education. Plate XIX. Administration of communion, woodcut on paper, A Book of Christian Prayers (London: Day, 1578), fol. 62r. Plate XX. Communion of the sick, woodcut, A Book of Christian Prayers (London: Day, 1578), fol. 62v. Plate XXI. a. Ledger stone with inlaid brass memorial to Robert Fevyr, Rector of St Nicholas, Salthouse, Norfolk (1519). Photograph © Simon Knott 2015.b. Ledger stone of Thomas Sheffield? (1509), Vicar of St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate XXII. Monument to Thomas Holdiche (1579), stone, St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate XXIII. Easter sepulchre (fourteenth century), stone and oak, St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. 8 Plate XXIV. Sepulchre tomb of Sir Robert Herling, Kt, (fifteenth century), stone, SS Peter and Paul’s Church, East Harling. Sepulchre tomb, stone, (fifteenth century), St Mary’s Church, Kelling. Photographs © Simon Knott, 2007. Plate XXV. Inscription detail, monument to Thomas Holdiche (1579), stone, St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate XXVI. Escutcheon detail, monument to Thomas Holdiche (1579), stone, St Helen’s Church, Ranworth. Plate XXVII. Monument to Edward Warde (1583), stone, St Wandregesilius’s Church, Bixley. Photograph © Caroline Rawlings, taken after fire damage in 2004. Plate XXVIII. Escutcheon, helmet and crest detail, monument to Edward Warde (1583), stone, formerly in St Wandregesilius’s Church, Bixley Plate XXIX. Family group detail, monument to Edward Ward (1583), stone, St Wandregesilius’s Church, Bixley. Photograph © Caroline Rawlings, taken prior to fire damage in 2004. Plate XXX. Monument to Robert and Elizabeth Suckling