SUFFOLK CHURCHES 465 Thelnetham, St Nicholas (E3): This church roundel carved in walnut of the Flight into has a lovely setting in park-like surroundings Egypt. Probably of Italian origin, it was given on the edge of the village. The building dates to the church by a former rector in 1946. A from the early-C14 and, like nearby Rickinghall section of stone moulding with the figure of Inferior, its s. aisle is gabled and sits alongside an angel stands on a window ledge by the C19 the nave. Its heavy corner buttresses have hoods pulpit, and one wonders whether it once formed and the window tracery is Decorated, with carved part of the s. chapel retable. The chancel screen spandrels in the case of the s.e. window – an was installed in 1907 but the stairs leading to unusual feature which, again, can be seen at the old rood loft remain on the n. side (note that Rickinghall. There is a priest’s door in the s. wall the bottom doorway is C14 but the upper one of the chancel and another is blocked on the n. is Tudor). The chancel was restored in 1895 and side. The five-light e. window is remarkably wide given a new roof of Spanish chestnut. Apart for its height and, at the top, the intersecting from the fact that it has king posts, it is the same tracery is contained within an outer band of oddly design as that in the nave which was probably shaped mouchettes and trefoils. The nave n. put up in 1872. The whole of the chancel is windows also have Decorated tracery. The small floored with encaustic tiles and there is a C14 angle tower w. window is Perpendicular, with a deep piscina in the sanctuary, the larger arch trefoiled label, and above it is a niche with a crocketted ogee and an ogee head to the opening at the side. A arch. The bell openings have Decorated tracery large squint cuts through the wall between the s. and the sound holes are tiny quatrefoils. The tower aisle chapel and the e. end of the nave, no doubt houses a ring of five bells with a 7 cwt. tenor. to give a view of another altar (the church had The battlemented porch is modest; its little side three guilds before the Reformation). Below the windows have sharply pointed arches and the squint is the church’s only brass, a simple gothic inner doorway displays plain convex mouldings letter inscription asking us to pray for the soul and leafy headstops with a niche overhead. of Anne, the wife of John Caley, who died about Just within is a plain C14 font and beyond, 1500. Nearby, a section of medieval tabernacle an equally plain tower arch with no imposts. This work is fixed to the wall and may have formed style is to be seen again in the arcade between the part of the rood loft. Two pre-Reformation aisle and the nave, resting on octagonal piers. mensa slabs were uncovered in the churchyard in Edmund Gonville, the founder of Gonville the C19. They both measure some 8ft. by 4ft. Hall (Gonville & Caius College), Cambridge, was and, with their consecration crosses re-cut, they have a rector here in the C14 and the s. aisle was built been replaced on modern altars in the chancel in his time. There are fragments of the original and the s. aisle chapel. glass in the heads of the lancets of the e. window, In the churchyard, e. of the chancel, lies John with pairs of pheasants in the centre and winged Middleton Murray, who died in 1957. He was grotesques at the sides. Below the sill there was one of the most controversial figures in C20 once an elaborately carved retable but only English letters and was editor of The Athenaeum remnants remain. The angleSAMPLE piscina in the corner in its last and most brilliant phase, and of The has been subjected to over-elaborate and heavy- Adelphi in the 1920s. Husband of Katherine handed reconstruction, probably by R.M. Phipson Mansfield, the intimate of D.H. Lawrence, he when he carried out the general restoration in was the foremost critic of his day. The severely 1872, or possibly in the 1850s because it has simple stone, designed by his brother, describes much in common with the one at Rickinghall him as ‘author and farmer’ and adds a quotation Inferior. On the s. wall nearby is a monument from King Lear: ‘ripeness is all’. He is perhaps to Sir Henry Bokenham and his wife. He was better remembered in the parish for his barbed High Sheriff of the county in 1630 and died in and thinly disguised portraits of local characters 1648. In alabaster, and still showing traces of in his book Community Farm. colour, it has busts of the couple within a curtained niche, with figures of their two Thorington, St Peter (I3): The round tower is children in oval recesses below. Overhead is a an interesting example of the form, and there broken pediment enclosed in a cartouche of arms are a number of reasons for classing it as Saxon with a double crest, and the frame is garlanded rather than Norman. The tall, shallow arcading at the bottom – a handsome memorial for a which encircles it halfway up is formed in the family that were Lords of the Manor from the rubble of the wall, and the stone of the Norman C14 to the C18. By the n. door in the nave there lancets overlays typically Saxon flintwork. The is a stoup, and further e. hangs an attractive C18 height was increased and Norman bell openings © 2009 The Lutterworth Press 466 THE GUIDE TO were inserted – deeply recessed pairs of arches. 1880s oak reredos looks like French or Austrian Pretty stepped battlements were added in Tudor work – good panels in deep relief of the times, and the C19 contribution was a neo- Crucifixion, Christ walking on the water, and Norman w. window. Victorian also is the vestry the miraculous draught of fishes. The glass in built on to the s. door of the nave, and on either the e. window is one of the best Suffolk side of its roof ridge you will see sections of a examples of the early work of Heaton & Butler. large Norman arch decorated with chip carving. It illustrates Christ raising Lazarus, healing the Beyond, a small C16 sundial is set in the wall. sick, and his Ascension – lively design and good The chancel was largely rebuilt in the 1860s, but colour. The n. chancel window is by Thomas Decorated tracery survives in some of the side Baillie, whose other two Suffolk works are at St windows. A pair of worn corbel heads in the n. Mary’s Bungay and Wissington. The family wall of the nave may perhaps mark the line of firm made windows for many churches in the original roof level. The walls of the homely England, including Winchester Cathedral, and C14 n. porch lean outwards, and it is off-centre their style was based on the Georgian pictorial from the inner doorway. enamelling tradition. This window was Passing a C15 bench, one finds a few more installed in 1862 and it portrays the scene in inside, and there are remains of a seated angel on which St Peter declares that Jesus is the Christ an elbow. The Victorians inserted a large and very and is awarded the keys of heaven. Strangely, brash neo-Norman tower arch, and there is no Christ is shown bearing the post-Resurrection way of telling whether it bears any resemblance sacred wounds, and sheep in the background to the original. The opening above, uncovered in serve only to confuse the imagery further. The 1982, supports the claim for an early date, and strong colours and modelling are typical of suggests that the tower was used as a place of the artist. refuge. The font now stands within the tower and is an unusual mixture of styles and periods. Thorndon, All Saints (F4): The early-C14 The C13 Purbeck marble bowl has the usual pairs tower also serves as a s. porch and there are heavy of blind arches in its panels, and it rests on a C15 buttresses up to a single set-off at the second shaft which is supported by seated lions and stage. The bell openings have lost their tracery dogs. Nearby, the C17 chest is decorated with and the battlements were renewed in brick. attractive chip and scroll carving. A strange and Within the angle by the outer arch there is a apparently unique feature of the church is the stoup beneath a worn trefoil arch and overhead is way in which the walls of the nave were a single niche. A steep wooden stair leads up to hollowed out up to a height of 7ft., with a corbel the belfry and unfortunately the church’s ring course inserted to support the upper section – of six bells with a 13 cwt. tenor cannot be rung presumably to provide extra width for seating. at the present time. The porch’s inner doorway The steep, arch-braced roof has pendants bearing shows that the tower was stitched on to a nave angels below the ridge, and there are lateral braces dating from the early-C13. Lying within a blank between the wall posts. The 1862SAMPLE rebuilding arch matching the entrance, it has a plain included a new chancel arch, and a very dim set chamfered moulding and simple capitals.