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English Church Architecture.
WORTHAM,
St. Mary
(TM 085 788),
SUFFOLK.
(Bedrock:
Upper Cretaceous, Upper Chalk.)
A church
retaining the stump of what was formerly the largest round tower in
England,
where
much of the remaining work is attributable to 'the Master of
Stowlangtoft',
carried
out during the reign of Richard II (1377-99).
![](C%20-%20suffolk%20(ms)%20-%20wortham%201.jpg)
The question
of whether or not it is pertinent to talk about 'the
mediaeval mason' is a subject that has fiercely
divided architectural historians in recent decades,
with many taking the view that the very concept of
'authorship', defined as the consideration of a work
of art as an expression of an individual's creative
skill and personality, had no currency before the
Tudor period. This supposition has coincided
with the passing from fashion of connoisseurship as
an approach to art history more generally, whereby
the identity of individual artists was previously
sought by stylistic analysis, in favour of such
modern obsessions as understanding art as an
expression of ethnicity, colonialism, gender, 'the
male gaze', or similar issues, and since some
academics have built their reputations on the basis
of these new studies, they naturally seek to defend
them vigorously.
This shift in
the focus of art history has not gone completely
unchallenged however, albeit that some of the
greatest champions of 'the old school' have since
passed away too. One such was Dr. John Harvey
(1911-97), whose biographical dictionary English
Medieval Architects
(Gloucester, Alan Sutton, 1987) identified some
1,700 men of varying importance, who appear to have
been responsible for buildings or part-buildings in
England before 1550, and who argued that the only
reason the men who designed mediaeval buildings are
so little known is that no-one makes the effort to
discover them. This theme was subsequently
taken up at a local level in Suffolk by the late
Birkin Haward (1912-2002), who tried to group
Suffolk's mediaeval churches on the basis of their
aisle arcades (Suffolk Mediaeval Church Arcades,
Hitcham, Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and
History, 1993) and who, in particular, went on to
pick out on stylistic grounds, a dozen churches in
mid Suffolk that appear to have been part-built by
the same master mason, referred to by name in a
building estimate for work at Wingfield church as
'Hawe[s], mason of Ocolte' (Master Mason Hawes of
Occold, Ipswich, Suffolk Institute of
Archaeology and History, 2000). This led the
writer to attempt to apply a similar methodology to
another group of Suffolk churches with striking
similarities to one another and to the church of St.
George, Stowlangtoft, in particular, and by good
fortune, it subsequently proved possible to provide
a degree of support for ther findings through
documentary evidence. Readers wishing to
understand how this was done and the conclusions
reached - as well, of course, to judge for
themselves the validity of the exercise - should
first read the page for Stowlangtoft, then (in any
order) the pages for Brettenham, Holton St. Mary,
Norton, Preston St. Mary, Rattlesden, Rickinghall
Superior and Thrandeston, and then finally, in this
precise order, the pages for Sproughton,
Fressingfield, Wortham, Wingfield, Parham and
Brundish.
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![](C%20-%20suffolk%20(ms)%20-%20wortham%202.jpg)
This
building
presents a strange spectacle for it preserves the stump of what was formerly
the
largest round tower in England, now open to the sky, and surmounted today
by a little weatherboarded bell-turret covered with an ogee dome,
resting partly on the tower's
eastern rim and partly on the
extreme western end of the nave roof. The tower collapsed in 1789 and
is now scarcely higher than the nave ridge but sufficient features remain to witness its Norman
origins, most notably two blocked, round-headed east windows, visible
through the huge open space from the west (as shown left). The
tower is 29 feet (8.8 metres) in diameter and was reputedly once 62 feet (18.9
metres) high.
The rest of the church is Perpendicular externally and
takes us to another group of - this time wholly Suffolk - churches with
which this web-site is concerned, namely those that can probably be ascribed
to the 'Master of Stowlangtoft', discussed at greater length on the page for
that village. It consists of a
chancel, an aisled nave and a S. porch, from which the best work is clearly the nave
clerestory (seen at the top of the page), composed of six two-light, four-centred windows on each side,
with drop tracery, bricks tumbled-in around the arches, and
flint flushwork between, forming a frieze just below the springing level and
featuring motifs in squares, including various
geometrical patterns, the
sacred monogram 'IHS', and
a crowned 'M' for Mary.
However, the most pertinent features for
present purposes are the seven aisle windows and two easternmost windows
in the chancel (one on
either side),
of the type to be seen at a number of Suffolk churches and at Stowangtoft in
particular. (See the example in the nave S. wall, illustrated above
right.) These have lights linked by small subarcuations
beneath the
supermullioned tracery,
that are sufficiently distinctive to suggest they may be the work of the
same mason, in which case they may be dateable by association with St.
George's, Stowlangtoft, which was erected c. 1390. (Note: the
westernmost window on either side of the chancel adopts a similar but not
identical pattern which is not relevant to this discussion.)
Inside the church, the three-bay arcades comprise
double-flat-chamfered arches springing from octagonal piers (see the N.
arcade, left). However, the important features to notice here
are the outer flat
chamfers at the sides of the semi-octagonal responds at either end of the
arcade and on either side of the chancel arch, which terminate at the top in
a little incised trefoiled arch-heads in what proves to be another
diagnostic design element of this related group of churches. (See the
photograph of the chancel arch S. respond, below, viewed from the nave.)
![](2011_0324now0004.jpg)
[Other churches with round towers featured on
this web-site are Bartlow and Snailwell in Cambridgeshire, Quidenham, Roydon,
Rushall, Shimpling and Thorpe Abbotts in Norfolk, and Aldham, Brome, Hengrave, Higham,
Little Bradley, Little Saxham, Rickinghall Inferior, Risby, Stuston, Theberton
and Wissett in Suffolk.] |