Other Interests

Not surprisingly (and in addition to earning a living trying to manage the vagaries of the aftersales services of an Engineering company supplying and supporting high tech equipment to food processors worldwide) there is a diminishing amount of time available for interests other than Stationary Steam Engines and their ancillaries.

Stained Glass

Stained Glass has long been a love, mediaeval glass, particularly that of the 15th Century Norwich School, which was one of the main centres of glass painting during this period, continues to hold a great fascination, the skill of the painters who had very little in the way of equipment and facilities, produced some superb work - mostly destroyed during the Reformation but from the few remaining jewels the glazing of churches during this period must have been magnificent.

Photographing these remaining fragments has been a long term project, can be extremely awkward and is a long way from being completed, often dirty and obscured by corrosion, remaining pieces are often in almost inaccessible lofty positions and require considerable skill, luck, patience, ladders and wasted (or sacrificed film) to secure.

This head of a young male saint (about 220 mm across) from the church of St. Margaret, Stratton Strawless, Norfolk, dates from between 1460 and 1480 and is the sole remnant of a window which was virtually powderised as the result of a nearby bomb blast during the Second World War. How this piece remained intact when the rest of the window was brushed up is a minor miracle in itself.

The black lining is in effect an enamel 'paint' made by mixing wine or urine with iron pin dust ( this was the iron oxide dust formed by the sparks which shower off hot iron being forged by blacksmiths and there are records extant showing it was bought from them by the glass painters) it is fired into the surface of the glass by bringing it to near melting point in a kiln.

The yellow colour which can vary from a pale lemon to a very rich coppery gold is a stain made primarily from silver nitrate, which was painted on, the glass was then heated to red heat in clay kilns fired by wood or charcoal, an uncertain process and one wonders at the number of failures resulting. The deeper toned stain may be the result of several applications of silver stain and several firings.

The characteristic 'Norwich ears', eyes and hair style all feature on this particular head and help distinguish glass painted in Norwich from that painted in York or other centres during the period.

Another glorious survivor of the Norwich painters is this Annunciation scene from All Saint's Church, Bale in Norfolk, which dates from 1450 - 80 but still holds its colour and crispness of painting even after almost 600 years and shows the colour variation possible with the silver stain, from a pale yellow to a deep rich amber, indicating that some of this glass had been stained and fired several times.

This St. Christopher from Saints Peter & Paul , Halvergate, Norfolk is somewhat earlier and dates from around 1350 - 70 a simple, bold style characterises 14th Century glass.

Similarly this Virgin and Child from St. John the Baptist, Fladbury, Worcestershire is also mid 14th Century.

This is possibly my all time favourite, a figure of Saint Catherine at Deerhurst in Gloucestershire. Painted around 1300 - 1320 it is a fairly early example of use of the silver stain used in producing the hair, crown and wheel. The painter has used very few brushstrokes on the head, hands and clothing but they all count. Despite being in a very rural location, age and atmospheric pollution has resulted in corrosion seriously pitting some areas of the glass, particularly the head and in the twenty years since this photo was taken, more has become obscured, sadly unless some new conservation technique is discovered soon, we are likely to be the last generation who will see this piece in its original form after nearly 700 years.

Many people miss this exquisite fine detail of the glass painters art, preferring to 'wallow' in the overall colours when a window is viewed as a whole - in my view there is only one way to appreciate it - either close up or through a good pair of binoculars.

Mediaeval bells

The love of stained glass and other church architecture is the result of visiting numerous churches as a bellringer (having started to learn this at the tender age of eight and still practicing at forty + !) in parallel with the love of mediaeval glass goes a love of mediaeval bells and their cast inscriptions, often in superb styles of lettering (or fonts as they are now called)

Perched high in dark, cold, windswept church towers and usually covered with centuries worth of pigeon droppings, many have been looked at and a few have yielded to the application of plasticene and subsequent pouring of epoxy resin to produce a facsimile of their lettering. Norwich was also a major centre of bellfounding and Norfolk having a higher concentration of mediaeval churches than anywhere else we still have plenty to visit as the years go by.

This is a not terribly good scan, of a photocopy, from an engraving of the inscription band on the second bell at Great Plumstead in Norfolk. Reading 'SANCTORUM MERITIS PANGAMUS CANTICA LAUDIS' it is generally accepted to have been cast by one Thomas Potter - Brasyer (or brassworker) somewhere between 1380 and 1420. The lettering style is known as Lombardic and within the letters a number of grotesque faces are to be seen. The three legged pot is a rebus - the visual puns so popular in these times (cooking pots were a major product of brassfounders) this and the lion's head and cross are made by stamps which were used by many succeeding generations of the Brasyer family, sadly the lettering was not.

Mediaeval Carvings

Some superb examples of Mediaeval painting and woodcarving also survive in the area, either on sanctuary screens, bench ends or choir stalls / misericords and with Kim - the other half - being interested in mythical beasts, particularly unicorns, we are steadily visiting to see what else 'them old boys' could accomplish in the 1300's and 1400's with minimal tooling and lots of skill and imagination.

This carving of a unicorn graces a bench end at Stowlangtoft in Suffolk, where centuries of polishing have produced a superb patina on the oak.

This unicorn is probably the finest quality carving of its type to be seen in East Anglia and is on a choir stall at East Harling, Norfolk - where an entire East Window of largely intact Norwich School Glass can also be viewed.

Elephants also featured amongst the fantastic beasts carved on pew ends, despite it being highly unlikely that one had ever been seen in Britain at the time, this example at Tuttington in Norfolk is quite realistic

However the carver of this rather naive elephant at South Lopham in Norfolk had problems. He was obviously given his orders as to what to carve and had to improvise, presumably never having seen either the animal or even a picture of one !

There are very few places in either Norfolk or Suffolk where a mediaeval church cannot be seen, even the humblest can return superb examples of craftsmanship from over the centuries, whilst the more remote churches are now locked for security they often contain the more original fittings and architecture and are well worth the time to visit.

Superb craftsmanship (oops that should probably be craftpersonship in these politically correct days) is still alive if you know where to look and to celebrate Kims 40'th birthday with a suitable unique commemorative piece, this earthenware green man in the style of a mediaeval roof boss was commissioned from local potter Tricia Francis.

Back to the Old Engine House Homepage