My Pet Church (and more)

We have the keys to the pet church!

Today, E and I were invited along on a field trip to some of the 'churches over the water', which was part of a continuing ed. class from UEA, which our friend at the NHCT is taking (and at the same time, we were allowed the keys to St. Clements!). I am quite disappointed to have missed taking the class actually, as it would have fit into my non-travel schedule this Spring so beautifully. Alas, and alack.


First location of the morning was St. Clement's (at a cloudy and cold 10.30). No photos were taken, since I am a snob and think one can get better images when there aren't a load of people milling about, which will be possible during the hours we open the church to the public (although hopefully not emtpy the whole time).


There was a short lecture by the class leader, after which a brief milling about. It is thought that St. Clement's may well be the oldest church site in Norwich, it being in the ancient section known as 'Northwick' (hence, Norvic and then Norwich). The church as it stands now is 14th century. There is no proof, but it may be that St. Clement was named such as a result of Danish influence, the Danes being particularly taken with St. Clement. I got to practice locking up procedures under eye of our coordinator, Michael :) I passed! He also let people go up the church tower, and I am quite looking forward to venturing up myself (i like climbing things, esp. if my mama is at the bottom telling me not to).


We moved down Colegate to St. George's Colgate, which is the last remaining functioning church over the water (on the north side of the River Wensum). The nave dates from 1459, and it has an amazing collection of memorials. This font was moved from St. Saviour's. Detail to (L) shows some gargoyle faces; on some fonts these faces are matched at the tops of the columns above with angels, which represent them crushing the demons of hell.


We were not able to go into the next 3 churches.


From here, trip continued down Colegate, across Duke Street to St. Miles (hmm. I was glad to be with the group, or I might've gotten lost!). St. Miles is actually St. Michael and All Saints or St. Michael Coslany. Coslany was the village, named after an island of reeds in this section of the Wensum. In case any readers have forgotten what it looks like, here is a photo (one of my pseudo-daily records) showing the fog that has been a regular meteorological occurence lately.


St. Mary Coslany is directly to the rear of my house, and is the oldest round-tower church in Norwich. There are only 4 in Norwich. (For more diatribe on round towers, memory [which is dubious, as evidenced by previous post] hints at previous exuberance on subject.)


From St. Mary's Plain, we turned the corner into Oak Street to St. Martin at Oak. This is now an artist's studio (rented from the NHCT), and there is always an annoying and unattractive red truck pulled up the front sidewalk and yard-parked next to the door. How tacky! I took no photos, because I was annoyed. It is quite obvious that someone lives there, although Michael said that he was not supposed to be... We were supposed to be able to go inside, but the artist(s) would not answer the door and also appear to have changed the locks. This was disappointing, because it was the church I was most looking forward to seeing inside.


Lastly, we crossed the ring road (St. Crispins), walked up Quakers Lane through Gildencroft to St. Augustine's. It is the only medival church outside the ring road, and is the only church in the City of Norwich from which you cannot see another church (although it was pedantically pointed out that the tip of the Cathedral spire weathervane was just visible over an office building roof). It is not known whether it is named for Augustine of Hippo or for Augustine of Canterbury. From the Gildencroft side, the tower rebuild is most evident; both E and myself assumed this was post-WWII, but it is, in fact, 17th century!


Along the western side of the churchyard, is the longest row of Tudor houses in Britain.


Redundant since 1999, St Augustine's interior still looks like there will be a service on the Sunday, although someone might want to dust :)

Detail of the organ pipes, avec fleur de lis. Although coming from Louisiana, one might think that this signifies a love of all things French for some strange reason, the fleur de lis is variously representative of the Holy Trinity, the angel Gabriel, and the Virgin Mary.


Most of the windows are simple geometric designs, but this monument to Leonard Harry Pert, 'killed in battle in France May 3rd 1917' is quite splendid in comparison.