Caring for over 60 places of worship in England and Wales means that from a few of our churchyards you can see some varied sights.
From 20th century infrastructure to cultural landmarks, the fabric and fate of our churches has been shaped by their localities.

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📷 Sutterby On the Welsh border, in the remote fields of Herefordshire stands St Peter's, Llancillo. Adjacent to the church is an 8 meter high earthen Motte, which is all the remains of Llancillo Castle. This fortification was originally constructed in the 1090s by Richard Esketot.

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Red and yellow and pink and green ... most children can tell you that rainbows contain seven colours, and many of us use 'ROYGBIV' to remember them. But people haven't always seen rainbows this way. Rubens' 'The Rainbow Landscape' of 1636 was painted just three decades before major new scientific theories about colour and light emerged. The rainbow lights up surrounding clouds with highlights of lemony yellow and blue.

© The Wallace Collection

The church at Skeffling was built from glacial clutter and recycled masonry in the 1400s. It sits in Holderness. A landscape of mudflats and salt-marshes washed into existence by the North Sea.

Here ‘leaves unnoticed thicken, hidden weeds flower, neglected waters quicken’. Those are the words of poet, Philip Larkin. Larkin explored this area after he moved to Hull in 1955 to take up the position of librarian at the Brynmor Jones Library at the University of Hull. He lived there and held that job for thirty years, until his death in 1985.

The next time you're lying in bed counting sheep, you might like to try out the counting system that was used by shepherds In medieval Lincolnshire.

From 1-20, the numbering sequence ran as follows: Yan, Tan, Tethora, Pethera, Pimp, Sethera, Lethera, Hovera, Covera, Dik ... ... Yan-a-dik, Tan-a-dik, Tethera-dik, Pethera-dik, Bumfit, Yan-a-bumfit, Tan-a-bumfit, Tethera-bumfit, Pethera-bumfit, Figgit.

In about 1300, five massive oak legs were pushed into the soil at Boveney to raise a belltower out of the clay tile roof of the 12th-century church. Inside, in the 1800s fielded panelling was installed, hiding those hardworking legs.

#thread Perfect as that panelling looked, it obscured the most important timbers. Noticing that the bellcote was somewhat slumped, our architect removed some panels, and we found the legs were rotten. Boveney church was *almost* without a leg to stand on.

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Between 1666 and 1680, the English parliament sought to protect the wool trade, by requiring the dead to be buried in nothing but a shroud of English sheep's wool. Plague victims and the destitute were the only exceptions. The 'Burying in Woollen Acts' required an Affidavit within 8 days of burial, proving before a JP that the law had been complied with. Those who didn't comply were fined £5, half of which went to the poor. This blog has some terrific examples of affidavits:buff.ly/3YkB33B

St Patrick was ripped from his home as a teenager. After six years as a slave in the west of Ireland, he trekked the breadth of the island to get home to Britain. He would become the patron saint of Ireland, yet at the end of his life, he felt he had failed.

#thread Patrick lived in the 5th century. Upon leaving Ireland in his early 20s, he devoted his life to Christ. He returned to Ireland after hearing Vox Hiberionacum – the voice of the Irish – in a dream.

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From 22-24 February 1797, a church on the Pembrokeshire coast was caught up in the last ever invasion of Britain.

1400 French soldiers, under the command of Irish-born American Colonel William Tate, landed on the coast at Carreg Wastad, Pembrokeshire. 1/8 Tate had fled the new United States of America for France in 1795 to escape being arrested for treason, and was now fighting for Revolutionary France. 2/8

It's almost time for the Pancake Bell!
Traditionally, on Shrove Tuesday morning, a distinctive chime of a church bell signified the final day of Shrovetide, a festival which one clergyman condemned in 1571 for its 'Great gluttony, surfeiting and drunkenness'.
1/4 #PancakeDay The bell called folk to church for Confession before Lent & prompted them to use their last fats, eggs and milk before 40 days of fasting — usually turned into pancakes. Unsurprisingly, the shriving bell became known as the Pancake Bell, and its ringing set mouths watering.
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We are endlessly fascinated by the array of materials used to construct our churches. Hopefully you do too! Today we are championing our FLINTIEST churches.

… A post we hope will spark your interest...

#thread Geologically flint is pure silica that petrifies in chalk beds. It's knobbly, and not a "natural" building material, yet many of our churches are built using it including flint rubble at Wickham Bishops, Essex and chequerboard knapped flint at Papworth St Agnes in Cambs.

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From holy wells to lapping tides, water is an important part of the setting of our churches, but sometimes that water gets a little too close for comfort...

Today we take a look at some of our WETTEST churches.

#thread At Saltfleetby, the only surviving part of St Peter's stands lop-sided, like a Lincolnshire Tower of Pisa — partly sunken into salt marsh. St Helen's, Barmby on the Marsh in East Yorkshire stands precariously on flood meadows.

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As we near the end of the year, we thought it would be fun to highlight some of our churches based on some *completely random*, yet (we think) wonderful attributes.

So, first up, on Boxing Day, get ready to celebrate our boxiest churches!

#thread Of course, we would never describe any of lovely buildings as 'boxy' 😱, but many of them do contain box pews. The installation of these enclosed pews, often rented by a particular family, peaked in the 1700s and early 1800s.

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Plain, glazed, dust-pressed … No, this post isn’t about doughnuts. It’s about tiles.

Interest in medieval tiles was reignited by the Gothic Revivalists of the Victorian Era. They took tile-making to the next level.

#thread Basic machine-made tiles were dust-pressed and created by pushing damp, coloured clays between metal plates. One plate had a decoration cut into it. The top and bottom presses are brought together, flattening the clay, impressing the design. 

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Site visit diary:

Repairs are underway at St Michael & All Angels', Gwernesney, Monmouthshire. Last week we met with the architect, contractor and engineer to discuss the work.

The project was instigated by the need for structural repairs to a decayed timber roof truss.

#🧵 The woodwork embedded in the wall had rotted. As a result the surrounding stonework was displaced.

The project team has devised a flitch-plate repair: embedding a steel plate into the timber to restore structural integrity and retain as much historic woodwork as possible.

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The nave at St Baglan's is short and narrow. The limewashed roof timbers date to the 1300s. There are three collar-trusses. The main beams are chamfered. Thin blades of oak create wind-braces in lowest panels. The braced reinforcement is vital in this exposed coastal setting.

1/ Tacked to the trusses along the north wall of the nave are pieces of cut branches - almost like large hooks. The purpose of these is unclear, but locally, it's thought that they may have been used to hang fabric and help keep the interior warm in the winter months.

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Good news!

We are *delighted* to have been awarded a total of £62,824 through Cadw’s minor works grant scheme towards the repair of four churches in Wales!

The grant will cover 75% of eligible costs. We must raise the remaining 25% ourselves.

Diolch yn fawr iawn! 🥳

1/6 One church that will benefit is St Baglan’s, Gwynedd. A place that’s small, steeped in history and deeply special.

We will refresh its golden ochre limewash and undertake ironmongery repairs to hinges, pintles and handles on the south door.

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Felix Mendelssohn died on this day in 1847. The brilliant musician and composer was only 38 years old.

For more than 110 years, a small chamber organ he'd once owned provided the music for our church at Castlemartin in Pembrokeshire. Mendelssohn played and composed for the organ from the age of 11 until his death. His chamber organ was built in 1842 and was owned by Mendelssohn during visits to East Anglia.

Wood Walton church floats on a green island amid acres of churned dun fields and murmuring fenland.
No one is around for miles.

And in the 19th century, a lone bell rattling in the emptiness was the only way of alerting the living that you’d been buried alive. #thread Fear of being buried alive permeates through centuries, but perhaps achieved its tightest grip in the 18th and 19th centuries. This was aided by stories about the presumed-dead fighting their way out of airless coffins or grave-robbers waking up would-be corpses. 

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In some churches, you’ll find evidence of dual dating. This has nothing to do two-timing or anything polyamorous, and everything to do with popes, kings, and calendars.

You see, in 1582 Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian Calendar…

#thread His eponymous calendar had a leap year every four years and replaced the existing Julian Calendar, which comprised 365.25 days per year. While most of Europe adopted the Gregorian Calendar, adoption wasn’t universal. 

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Around the 4th century, a new writing system took off in Ireland.

Before long it travelled over the Irish Sea to Wales, Scotland and south-west England.
It’s called Ogham (or Ogam, and pronouced 'oh-um') and was used to write early medieval Irish, Welsh and Pictish. #OG_H_AM
#🧵 Ogham is unusual as its alphabet consists entirely of straight lines - strokes and notches - cut into the writing surface.
Compared with Latin, it was relatively simple to write (etch) in Ogham, so literacy in Ogham might have been widespread.

📸: Florian Thierry CC4.0

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Robert Roberts was a north-Walian quarryman. His death on 23 April 1888 resulted in a churchyard break-in by candlelight, an illicit burial, and the rise of a Prime Minister.

All because his final wish was to be buried beside his daughter at their local churchyard.

#thread The problem was Robert Roberts wasn’t a member of the Established Church of England – he was a Non-Conformist.

You see, in 1864, the churchyard at Llanfrothen was full, so a neighbour, Mrs Catherine Owen, donated part of her land to provide an extension.

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