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some kind of leaf motif. The door was ‘stopped’ when
Glynne visited the church between 1829 and 1840, but it was open again by
the end of the nineteenth century. Scott Robertson believed the chancel
arch and, possibly, the priest’s door pre-dated the south portal and the
decoration at the east end. Livett disagreed and no later commentators
have dealt with the priest’s door in any detail. There are doors in a
similar position at Barfreston, Castle Hedingham and Cintheaux (Normandy).
The decoration of the doors at Barfreston and Cintheaux is similar in
style to our example, but that at Castle Hedingham is rather different.
There is a badly degraded figure above the priest’s door. The damage is
so great that it is not possible to judge whether it is likely to be
contemporary with the door itself or not. It was already in poor condition
when Hasted saw it towards the end of the eighteenth century, but he
thought it may be the Virgin. An alternative view, that the figure is
Thomas Becket, has nothing to support it other than that the church is
close to Canterbury and the main part of the building dates from around
the time of his assassination.
Three churches in southern England of a similar size and date
have wheel windows, each with eight decorated ‘spokes’: Patrixbourne
and Barfreston in Kent and Castle Hedingham in Essex. The treatment of the
inner windows is similar in each case but the surrounds are all different (Plate
VI). Each has lancets on a string course below the circular |
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window,
but all have been altered over the course of the centuries and so it is
not easy to determine how similar they were originally. At Patrixbourne,
the window fills the upper part of the gable, and the outer surround is
decorated with a simple geometric design and a head at the top. The head
is male with a long forked beard and looks as if it has horns.
The window at Barfreston does not fill the top of the gable
and the outer surround is decorated with grotesques and foliage; there the
wheel window is also set above three round-headed lancets, but these are
smaller and all of the same height. There is other sculpture around the
window but no figures on the outer surround, although at least some of it
was probably re-set in the nineteenth century.
The Castle Hedingham window is in a plain setting but the
window has been extensively repaired and many elements have been replaced,
rendering detailed comparison impossible. Its lancets are slightly pointed
rather than round-headed, implying that they are of a slightly later date
than those of the Kent churches.30
The similarity between the detail at Patrixbourne and
Barfreston is striking. Both have eight cylindrical ‘spokes’ meeting
similar circles in the centre: both have the same sort of cat mask
decoration on at least some of the spokes; and both have trefoil
decoration at the outer |