St Mary's Church, East Brent

The church of St Mary the Virgin in East Brent dates from c1300, but it probably replaced an earlier church.  The tower and spire were added c1400.  John Selwood, who was Abbot of Glastonbury 1456-1493, was also vicar of East Brent 1467-1493.  He brought lots of carved medieval bench ends with him from Glastonbury Abbey.

The carvings on the bench ends include an amphisbaena (double-headed dragon) in the shape of John Selwood's initials (Ioannes Selwood); some primitive heads; the winged ox of St Luke; a pelican feeding her young with her own blood; the Annunciation; a lamb and the eagle of St John.

The font is a copy of the ancient font at Rowberrow, which is reputed to have originally come from East Brent.  The lectern dates from the 15th century and is a wooden sculpture of an eagle. The Jacobean pulpit was made in 1634 and is made of carved oak.  The stained glass window above the altar in the chancel was given in memory of Sarah Reed, the daughter of the Lord of the Manor of East Brent, who died in 1857.

The wooden west gallery was originally part of the rood screen which spanned the chancel arch.  It was converted into a gallery in 1824.  It wasn't wide enough, so the village carpenter inserted a middle section.  It is supported on 4 carved elm pillars.

The plaster ceiling of the nave dates from 1637 and features an unusual design - blackberry thorns with ribs that connect diamond shaped panels, which are in turn connected by three pendants.  

Reverend George Anthony Denison was Vicar of East Brent for 51 years 1845-1896.  After an epidemic of diphtheria in the parish, he provided the village with its first supply of clean drinking water by damming the stream on Brent Knoll.  Together with churchwarden John Higgs he also founded the East Brent Harvest Home in 1857.  It is still celebrated every year in late August.  A memorial to him is located on the wall of the  north aisle.

Three sculptures are located on the west wall of the tower representing the Virgin & Child, the Trinity and Christ crowning the Blessed Virgin.  There is a scratch or mass dial on one of the buttresses.

St Mary's Church

Decorated plaster ceiling

West gallery

One of the carved elm pillars holding up the west gallery

Pulpit

Sedilia - stone seats for priests

Wooden eagle lectern

Memorial to George Denison

Pelican feeding her young

John Selwood's initial with an amphisbaena forming the S for Selwood

Lamb

The Annunciation

Winged ox of St Luke

Primitive heads

Eagle of St John

Scratch or mass dial

Effigy in the north aisle

This may be 14th century priest or possibly Martin de Summa, who fought on behalf of the local monks 1160-70 against the unscrupulous Bishop Severac.

Chancel window in memory of Sarah Reed

Elizabeth Goudge, writer

Elizabeth de Beauchamp Goudge was born in Wells on 24th April 1900.  She was the only child of Reverend Henry Goudge and his wife Ida de Beauchamp Collenette, who came from Guernsey.  Henry Goudge was Vice Principal of Wells Theological College and they lived in Tower House (also known as The Rib) in St Andrew Street. Elizabeth was taught at home by a governess.

In 1911 Henry Goudge accepted the job of Principal at Ely Theological College and the family moved to Ely.  Elizabeth boarded at Grassendale School in Southbourne, Bournemouth and later studied at the art school at University College Reading.  

In 1923 Henry Goudge was appointed Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford University and the family moved to Oxford.  Henry bought a bungalow in Barton-on-Sea in Hampshire, as his wife was unwell and unhappy in Oxford and Mrs Goudge spent the summers there.  Elizabeth worked as a handicraft teacher in Oxford, but she began writing plays, poems and later novels in her spare time. 

Elizabeth's first novel to be published was Island Magic, which was inspired by her childhood holidays with her grandparents in Guernsey.  It was published by Duckworth in 1934.  In 1936 A City of Bells, which was set in Wells, was published.  Towers in the Mist, which was published in 1938, was set in Oxford.

Henry Goudge died suddenly at Barton-on-Sea in 1939 and Elizabeth and her mother moved to a bungalow in Marldon, Devon, where they lived for the next 12 years.  In 1944 Green Dolphin Country was published.  This novel was made into a film called Green Dolphin Street in 1947.   In 1946, Elizabeth Goudge's most famous children's novel, The Little White Horse was published.  It won the Carnegie Medal for children's fiction in 1947.

After her mother's death in 1951, Elizabeth moved to Rose Cottage, Dog Lane, Peppard Common near Henley-on-Thames.  She continued to write novels for adults and children.  Her final novel, Child from the Sea was published in 1970.  Her autobiography, Joy of the Snow, was published in 1974.  Elizabeth Goudge never married and she lived in Rose Cottage with her female companion Jessie Munroe until her death on 1st April 1984. 

A blue plaque on Rose Cottage was unveiled in 2008.  There is also a blue plaque on Tower House/The Rib in Wells. 

Blue plaque on The Rib, St Andrew Street, Wells

The Rib

Rose Cottage, Peppard Common

Memorial to Bridget Thomas, Crewkerne

On the wall of St Bartholomew's Church in Crewkerne there is a brass memorial.  It says on it:

"To the memory of Bridget, the daughter of John and Bridget Thomas who was buried near this place Aug 1723 in the 4th year of her age."  

At the top of the brass there is a clock face showing the time of nine minutes to seven.  This is believed to be the time at which little Bridget died.  A skeleton holding an hourglass in his right hand and a scythe in his left, is engraved to the left of the clock.

The brass also commemorates "Biddy Thomas, who died the 20th December 1741 aged 14 years."

Memorial brass

Coronation Commemorations

Many Somerset communities have celebrated coronations with one-off events, such as street parties and bonfires.  Some have chosen to commemorate the occasions with more permanent features, for example community halls, seats, fountains, promenades, stones, gardens and public parks.  There are also many roads named after various coronations.

Coronation Hall, Bleadon

Note the crowns on the flower barrels

Coronation Road, Worle

Coronation Close, Ruishton

Judging by the age of the houses in this road, I think this road must have been named to commemorate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

Coronation seat, Holford Bowling Green

Fountain in Westcombe to commemorate the Coronation of King George V and Queen Mary

Coronation Fountain, Somerton

This was built in 1902 to celebrate King Edward VII's coronation.  It was manufactured in Coalbrookdale for the Somerton ironmonger T.C. Head.  It provided water for people, horses and dogs and also incorporated a lamp.

Coronation Stone at the top of Brent Knoll

Coronation bonfires were held here in 1902 for the Coronations of King Edward VII in 1911, King George V in 1911, King George VI in 1937 and Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

Jubilee Stone, Backwell

This also commemorates the Coronations of King Edward VII and King George V & Queen Mary

Jubilee Stone, Backwell

This side of it also commemorates the Coronations of King George VI & Queen Elizabeth in 1937 and Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

Coronation Promenade, Knightstone Island, Weston-super-Mare

Plaque commemorating the re-opening of Coronation Promenade by Queen Elizabeth II on 20th July 2007

Wellington Park

Wellington Park was presented to the town by Fox Brothers & Co Ltd at the time of the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902

Wellington Park Plaque

Pulpit and Rood Screen, Holy Trinity Church, Long Sutton

Holy Trinity Church in Long Sutton has an unusual coloured wooden pulpit on a wine-glass stem with a fly approach stair.  It dates from c1455-58 and is older than the church, which dates from 1493.  The pulpit was restored and re-coloured in 1872 by Mr W King Lucas.  It took him 13 weeks to restore it. The wooden statues of the apostles in the niches were obtained by Mr W. King Lucas and put into the niches in 1910. The pulpit bears the initials of Abbot John Petherton of Athelney and Vicar William Singleton.

The wooden rood screen, which runs across the chancel and aisles, is ornately carved and dates from the late 15th century.  It has been painted in red and blue with the slender tracery painted dark blue and white.  There is a small green owl in the vine above the centre arch.  This may be a pagan symbol relating to the Athena/Minerva, who was the goddess of wisdom.  Alternatively, it may be there to frighten bats.

Pulpit

Pulpit

Statues in niches on the pulpit

Rood screen

Side of the rood screen

Green owl in the centre of the rood screen

Angel roof

Holy Trinity Church

Sundials

A sundial is an instrument used outdoors for determining the hour of the day, when the sun is shining.  The shadow of an upright object (known as a gnomon) falls on a flat or curved surface, which is marked with the hours.  The earliest known sundials were used by the Egyptians in around 1500 BC.  In medieval and early modern Europe the sundial was the most popular way of telling the time.

Sundials can be either altitude dials or direction dials.   With altitude dials the time of day is determined by the altitude of the sun.  Altitude dials can be sub-divided into plane, cylinder, scaphe and ring.  With direction dials, the time is determined by the sun's azimuth (compass direction) or hour angle.  Direction dials can be sub-divided into horizontal (including analemmatic), vertical, polar, equinoctial/equatorial (including armillary spheres), azimuthal and multiple/polyhedral.

Piles Mill near Allerford

This double-sided equatorial sundial was given by the Minehead and West Somerset Centre of the National Trust in 1984 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Richard Dyke Acland's gift of the Holnicote Estate to the National Trust in 1944. It was unveiled by his son Sir John Acland.  It is made from Limpley Stoke limestone and was designed by David Brown to look like a millstone and carved by the National Trust's stonemason John Salter. 

Piles Mill Sundial

Scratch dial, East Stoke Church

Scratch dials are also known as mass dials.  They are medieval (1100-1600) sundials found on the south side of many churches.  They are thought to have shown the times of mass and other church services.  There would once have been a metal or wooden rod or gnomon in the hole in the centre of the dial, which would have cast a shadow.

Scratch dial, East Stoke Church

Scratch dial, St Mary's Church, East Brent

Scratch dial, St Michael's Church, Creech St Michael

Scratch dial, St Michael's Church, Creech St Michael

Barrington Court

This is a dodecahedron dial with pentagonal faces. 

Barrington Court

Barrington Court

Armillary Sphere, Tintinhull Gardens

This is a type of equinoctial/equatorial sundial.

Analemmatic sundial, Peile Drive, Taunton

The inscription on the sundial reads "The light of learning cast its shadow here from 1939-1994.  Stand facing your shadow with toes on the date scale."  Bishop Fox School was located here until it moved to its present site on Calway Road in September 1994. Analemmatic sundials are a type of horizontal sundial in which the gnomon (in this case a human being) is vertical and hour markings are marked in an elliptical pattern. The position of the gnomon varies, depending on the month of the year.

Analemmatic sundial, Peile Drive, Taunton

Analemmatic sundial on Minehead seafront

This sundial was provided by West Somerset District Council with the support of Minehead Town Council to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of Her Majesty, The Queen in June 2002. The names of the towns in West Somerset (Minehead, Williton, Watchet and Dulverton) are arranged around the centre and further out the names of all the parishes in West Somerset are listed in alphabetical order in a ring.

Close-up view of the centre of the Minehead analemmatic sundial

Scratch dial, East Quantoxhead Church

Vertical sundial, Stapley Mill

Sundial House, Wheddon Cross

Vertical declining sundial on Sundial House at Wheddon Cross

This sundial dates from c1850.  It shows the hours from 5aqm to 4pm and the half hours are shown by fleur de lys symbols.  The Latin motto shown on it is tempus edax rerum, which means time devours all things.

Lady Smith Memorial Institute/Parish Rooms, Somerton

This vertical sundial was commissioned by Somerton U3A to mark the new millennium and was unveiled on 8th July 2000.  It was made by Peter Walker and features a dragon at the centre. It shows the hours from 7am to 5pm in hours and half hours.

Vertical sundial, St George's Church, Ruishton

The Latin motto engraved at the top of the sundial says "concito gradu", which means "with hurried step".

Scaphe sundials, Church of St Peter & St Paul, Bleadon

Vertical sundial on Ilminster Old Grammar School

This sundial is dated 1586.  The Latin motto above it says "Sic transeunt dies tui", which means "So passeth your days".

Vertical sundial above the porch of St Augustine's Church, West Monkton

This sundial is dated 1725

Horizontal dial in the Dunster Village Garden

Vertical dial over the porch door of St Nicholas's Church in Brushford

This sundial is a memorial to William Wood.  It shows the hours from 6am to 6pm, with 30, 15 and 5 minute intervals shown.  The motto Memor esto brevis aevi, which means "Bear in mind how short life is" is inscribed on it.

Market Cross, Ilchester

This is made of Ham stone and also features a weather vane and a sundial at the top of a Doric column.  The original sundial dated from 1792.  This was damaged in a gale in 1990 and was replaced in 1991.  The original motto was indecipherable and the current one is tempus orbis.