Category Archives: Gresford

Part 3: Misericords in the Chester-Wrexham area – Miracles, myths, demons, and the occasional grin

Selecting the misericords

How were the topics selected and by whom; who carved them; and who paid for them?

How themes were selected

Scene showing in both the main scene and the supporters St Werburgh’s miracles. Source: Dominic Strange, World of Misericords

Each misericord showed a different subject matter, and whether there were 48 (as at Chester) or 14 (as at Gresford) there could be great diversity in the themes selected. The patron saint of an abbey or church might dictate the subject matter in a single misericord, like the miracle of St Werburgh at Chester, but this accounts for only one misericord of any one corpus. Some themes are commonly found throughout misericord collections and are evidently part of a popular repertoire or corpus of themes. As Anderson says in his survey of gothic art, “The subjects of misericords did not have to be consistent, so any good design, from whatever source it came from, could be used on them,” but particular themes and ideas were probably favoured in each different establishment, leading to a different character and ambience from one set to another. The enthusiasm for certain themes will have changed over time, reflecting both popular and intellectual fashions, but all were chosen from similar types of source material.

Folio 49v from the Smithfield Decretal showing a fox, with mitre and crozier, preaching to a flock of birds. Source: British Library

Manuscripts were an obvious source of ideas. Bestiaries such as the beautiful MS Bodley 764, referred to in parts 1 and 2, provided a wealth of ideas, as did travelogues. Both Old and New Testaments, missals and hagiographies (biographies of saints, often at least partly fictional) were also alternative sources. The Golden Legend by Jacobus de Voragine in the 13th century was a particularly popular account of the lives of saints, which even today is a good read. The marginal scenes shown on various religious illuminated manuscripts including psalters (books of psalms) and books have hours (personal books for private worship) probably supplied others, which included so-called drolleries and grotesques. The Luttrel Psalter and the Smithfield Decretals are good examples. Contemporary chivalric romances, popular narratives and collections of stories like the 14th century French Cy Nous Dit (which contained versions of the tales of Tristan and Isolde, Alexander carried over the edge and the exploitsof the knight Yvain – all of which are at Chester) were good sources of stories with a moral thread. Towards the end of the Middle Ages it has been demonstrated that some themes were inspired by woodcut images that were circulating in Europe following the success of the printing press in the mid-15th century.

Image and supporters copied from earlier examples. The model for the central image was first carved at Lincoln in the 1370s (top), then reproduced with much more gusto and exuberance at St Werburgh’s Chester in the 1380s (middle) and finally, with much less energy than either, at St Mary’s Nantwich in the 1390s (bottom). All sourced from Christina Grössinger, The World Upside-Down, p.47 (see Sources at end)

Carvers almost certainly brought ideas with them from other abbeys, cathedrals and churches, which they could share with their new employers. Some topics are clearly copied from one ecclesiastical establishment to another, probably introduced by carvers who moved to new building projects as they became available. Sixteen designs in Chester were based on those from Lincoln, and six in the the impressive parish of St Mary’s church in Nantwich, were copied from Chester. The herons on a misericord in St Werburgh’s, for example, were very nearly clones of a misericord at Lincoln Cathedral, although the supporters are different. An even more striking example is a crowned head with wild hair and beard, flanked by two heads in profile. This appears first in Lincoln Cathedral, then at St Werburgh’s Abbey in Chester.

Although St Werburgh’s may have been expected, by virtue of its proximity, to have provided the inspiration and basic model for the later examples at Gresford, Malpas and Bebington, none of the misericords are copies of surviving Chester examples. There are indeed shared themes, but there are no attempts at replication. This suggests that in each case the choices made drew on other sources for their ideas, perhaps reflecting the time gap between the Chester and later misericords, or otherwise reflecting local choices or preferences.

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Who would have been involved in the choice of themes?

Abbot with staff and book. MS. Ludwig IX 6 (83.ML.102), fol. 222v. Source: Getty Museum

It is not known exactly how the topics depicted on individual misericords were chosen, but there are a number of possibilities. At an abbey or independent priory, the superior (abbot or prior) and the senior personnel may have dominated the decisions, but individual monks from the larger monastic community may have contributed to the selection process too. External patrons, whose financial input would have been necessary for a project on the scale of the Chester quire are likely to have wanted to contribute to their own favoured themes. In a parish church both the senior clergy and the bishop would probably have dominated the decision process, but external, private financial contributors such as local landowners may also have had a vested interest in the selection of themes. Multiple sources of finance, each perhaps buying a vote in the selection process, would help to explain the diversity of the subject matters chosen both within a single choir, and the differences from one church to another.

It is sometimes suggested that misericords were the brainchildren of the craftsmen who carved them, indulging themselves with creative and sometimes (to the Victorian mind) off-colour designs without any direct input from the clergy. Being confined to the choir in the most sacred part of the church, however, it seems unlikely that anything could have been selected and installed without the permission of a head cleric, such as the abbot in the abbey, or a parish priest (or his bishop) in a church. It also seems implausible that an abbot or bishop would sit back and allow expenditure to be used unchecked on fantastic frivolities that would have to be accounted for to both superiors and inferiors alike. Although carvers probably suggested certain popular themes based on their own experience, the misericords and their themes must have been sanctioned at the highest levels.

Who carved the misericords?

Stained glass portrait, thought to be Master Carpenter Hugh Herland. Source: Upchurch Matters

Remarkably little is known about the wood carvers who created these remarkable vignettes. For prestigious projects carvers seem to have moved from building to building. Christina Grössinger identifies a single London workshop as having been responsible not only for the Chester and Lincoln wood-carvings, but also for those that at St Katherine’s in Stepney (London) and the former Carmelite friary in Coventry. John Harvey had formerly identified the hand of famous Master Carpenter Hugh Herland, who worked on a number of royal and prestigious college projects in the 14th century, at Lincoln and particularly Chester, but Grössinger rejects this suggestion, and a quick look at Herland’s list of responsibilities for the decades in which the Lincoln and Chester misericords were made (1370s and 1380s respectively), suggests that he was probably far too busy on prestigious works elsewhere to oversee these two projects as well. Present in Chester between 1377 and 1411, however, was William Newell the king’s chief carpenter who was probably involved with the work on the choir, at the very least in an advisory capacity. For a Benedictine monastery like St Werburgh’s it was important not merely to raise the status of the individual abbey, but to contribute to the prestige of the Benedictine order as a whole, particularly in a period when monastic orders were becoming much less influential in society and politics. Whoever was responsible for overseeing the project, many carpenters will have contributed to the misericords and canopies, and both the designs and the work are certainly exquisite.

St Andrew’s, Bebington

The preference for the most prestigious carvers available in the country suggests that where prestige was important and the finance available, only the best carvers would do and could be hired from places at considerable distance from the institution concerned. The impressive churches of Malpas, Gresford and Bebington would not have had the same scale of financial resources, nor the same ambitions for national prestige reached for by the abbot Chester abbey, but quality was still important. Carvers were more likely to have been sourced closer to home, but even so the skills required may still have required importing specialists to oversee and ensure high quality. In his paper on the carvers of the Oxford colleges, Gee says that during the 14th century the pay for a Master Carpenter, was around 4d monthly. For a nationally recognized and prestigious Master Carpenter of whom the above-mentioned Herland is an example, this rose to around 1s. There was therefore a wide scale of pay for different levels of skill and creativity. work.

Who paid for them?

Canopies above the choir stalls in Chester Cathedral

Elaborate choir stalls with misericords were luxury items for a church, raising the prestige of the incumbent clergy and the establishment as a whole either nationally for an abbey or cathedral, or regionally for a collegiate or parish church. They were, in functional terms, unnecessary but for some monasteries and churches, the investment may have been important for institutional and social reasons, reinforcing the position of the church in the wider community at a time when ecclesiastical influence was in decline. Status and vanity projects always come with a substantial bottom line, and the funds would have been acquired from a number of different income streams and one-off sources.

A monastic establishment like St Werburgh’s might have any number of income streams. The Benedictines, the longest established monastic order of the Catholic tradition in Britain, had been endowed with enormous estates and resources. Monasteries were amongst Britain’s greatest landowners, owning huge swathes of the rural landscape. This level of royal and significant magnate investment had trailed off by the early 1300s, so monastic establishments were forced to make the most of the property they already owned and attempt to secure smaller but still significant bequests and investments, and one-off donations for special projects. Ongoing sources of funding included tithes (funds appropriated from churches that it adopted), the often impressive output of produce sold from a network of monastic farms, private bequests in wills, and contributions by living benefactors. Appropriating churches, and securing their income, was increasingly important throughout the later medieval period. Chantries were also an excellent source of income for urban monasteries. These were financial foundations set up by individuals to pay for an ordained monk, or several monks, to recite multiple prayers for himself/herself after death, as well as for his or her family and ancestors; These were invaluable income-generators for monasteries. Pilgrim shrines could also be very lucrative for monasteries with appropriate relics, particularly if they were reputed to perform miracles.

Probable burial places of some of the medieval abbots in the cloister at St Werburgh’s, Chester

The abbot and monks themselves, might contribute to prestigious projects. Although the earliest Benedictine monastic orders had been based on vows of poverty, and the reforming orders of the late 11th and early 12th centuries renewed these vows and intentions, by the late 14th century the Benedictine monks had lost their ambition for poverty, and were rarely self-effacing. Although it was a particular thorn in the side of Henry V in the early 15th century, abbots and their monks might well be considerably wealthy in their own right. This was in spite of St Benedict’s proscription against the ownership of private property in the Rule on which the Benedictines were supposed to base their monastic lives. An abbot’s subordinates too might have access to personal wealth. To ensure his own personal legacy an abbot of an important urban monastery might invest in a prestigious project that, in the case of St Werburgh’s included not only the choir stalls but the elaborate and intricate canopies above. The abbot would probably be able to secure contributions from his community of brethren as well, and would certainly attempt to secure donations from beyond the cloister. For those both within the community and those outside it, there was the hope that by contributing their mite to the glorification of God, they might serve less time paying for their sins in purgatory. Even where in-house monastic funding was available, the gifts of patronage might be important to elaborate monastic improvement, and for a project as immense as the St Werburgh’s quire, significant investment would have been welcome.

In an urban environment although there might be additional opportunities for securing funds, there might be competition with other establishments. For example, St Werburgh’s charged for burials within its cemetery, and was in competition with other ecclesiastical establishments in Chester to secure those payments. However, there was a particular prestige to being buried in a monastic context, and more importantly the possibility of being as close as possible to the divine. Any wealthy Chester resident who wanted to be buried within the of the abbey precinct, and particularly the abbey church itself, would have to pay a very steep price for the privilege.

Elaborate and costly wood carving on the screen at the entrance to the choir at All Saints’ Gresford.

Perhaps more intriguing are the sources of the investment for the three parish churches. These might also include tithes, which were a type of tax due from every household to fund the parish church (in the form of produce for much of the Middle Ages), if there was any surplus remaining after the clergy had been paid and church costs defrayed. Another form of income were chantries that were set up in parish churches as well as monasteries, particularly the more prestigious parish churches. These too might provide an income from which a surplus could be saved for special projects. A more promising source of sufficient funds for a was likely to be bequests and donations made by a number of particularly wealthy benefactors and patrons, either individuals, families or organizations. For parish, collegiate and cathedral churches crowd-funding by the congregation might have been a possibility. Although most of the congregation was excluded from the chancel, (within which the choir was located), Nicholas Orme makes it clear that wealthy and influential parishioners, as well as choristers, might be given access. These more privileged members of the congregation would have access to any work within the chancel to which they contributed either large one-off gifts or piecemeal funding, even if they were not primary benefactors or members of founding families. It is also possible that access to the chancel was an incentive for anyone who had the money to invest in ecclesiastical projects. Access to the chancel, and burial within its confines, were highly desirable as this was the closest that most people would come to the divine prior to death. If the parish priest was independently wealthy, he too much contribute to the costs, as might the bishop.

Little of the abbey church survives at Basingwerk

A different possibility is the purchase, wholesale or piecemeal, of the misericords from another building. If an abbey or priory church went out of use, a set of choir-stalls might become available for purchase at a fraction of the price of commissioning a new set from scratch. A parish church with wealth of its own, or with patrons who wished to make a mark, might benefit from the unexpected windfall. The Dissolution of the Monasteries under the reign of Henry VIII from 1535 to around 1540 liberated many church furnishings for purchase by less exalted establishments. In Lancashire, for example, choir stalls from Whalley Abbey found their way into a local parish church, whilst in Lancaster itself the misericords may have come from a nearby Premonstratensian establishment. There has been a suggestion that the Gresford misericords might have been sourced from Basingwerk Abbey at Holywell following its 1535/1536 dissolution. However, the impressive Monastic Wales research portal states that the choir stalls from Basingwerk actually went to St Mary’s on the Hill in Chester, presumably complete with misericords, a claim echoed in the ChesterWiki page for the church (but unsupported by any citation) as part of a general refurbishment. I have not seen the original sources and their arguments for either proposal. If the stalls were once at St Mary’s on the Hill they are not there now. Gresford All Saints’ seems, anyway, to have had both the ambition and the funds if it wished to comission its own choir stalls during the 15th century when the church was substantially remodelled.
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The role of misericords

A sense of meaning

All Saints’, Gresford

In spite of the genuinely fascinating and academically impressive work carried out on the subject, there are no definitive answers about how a corpus of misericords is best understood. There is so much variety and as Gombrich observes, for some of these images “[t]here are no names in our language, or categories in our thought, to come to grips with this elusive dream-imagery in which ‘all things are mixed’. . . It outrages both our ‘sense of order’ and our search for meaning.” The overtly religious themes on some misericords are accompanied by far less obviously appropriate scenes including on the one hand horror, myth, fantasy and the monstrous and, on the other hand, humour, farce, ribaldry, Colish’s “red thread” of satire and, perhaps, some very early forerunners of schadenfreude and even burlesque. Misericords are one of the few ecclesiastical contexts in which the lower echelons of society can be observed. The acrobats at Gresford have already been mentioned in Part 2, and entertainers and sports of various sorts are common.

St Werburgh’s Abbey, Chester

In spite of the difficulties it is irresistible to try to address some of the questions. For example, why was highly irreligious imagery, some of it very funny, included in the most sacred of ecclesiastical spaces? Why were naked human private parts, women beating men, foxes lecturing geese, upright cats, writhing dragons, strange beasts, wildmen and ugly monsters shown side by side with, on the one hand, lowly peasants and jesters and, on the other hand, saints, angels, kings and heraldic symbols of the nobility?

Whilst parts 1 and 2 demonstrated how individual misericords can successfully communicate certain stories and convey specific ideas, an entire corpus of misericords is rather more interesting as a sum of the various parts, presumably containing somewhere within it the religious, ideological and cultural motivations, the very heart of why these carvings existed in the first place.

A framework for living

Alchemic approach to four humours in relation to the four elements and zodiacal signs. Book illustration in “Quinta Essentia” by Leonhart Thurneisser zum Thurn (gen. Leonhard Thurneysser). Source: Wikipedia

From today’s perspective, the world of the Middle Ages encompassed a very different set of experiences, and this has to be factored into any attempt to understand medieval imagery. These many challenges of the Middle Ages were understood within a descriptive and explanatory framework that helped to give a sense of order. As well as the overarching structure provided by Christianity, there was a framework for neatly organizing existence into manageable chunks. The natural world was divided into four primary elements: air, fire, earth and water, with air opposite earth and water opposite fire. The human body was divided into four “humours,” and the human condition was divided into four “states.” All were characterized in terms of heat and moisture, and were influenced by both the four seasons and the 12 astrological points of the zodiac. In Christian terms, the presence of the devil and his demons, the reality of purgatory and hell, and even the performance of saintly miracles were all aspects of a world that for most people, were a reality in which the supernatural was entwined with the everyday. Structuring the world in this complex way formed a model for understanding it and operating within it.

There were also less structured but equally useful mechanisms for coping with a life in which more nebulous anxieties and worries did not fit neatly within the conventional framework. The supernatural had its own role, which did not always dovetail smoothly with other explanatory models. Superstition, the rumblings of magic and divination and the presence of evil in the dark corners of the supernatural all had a role to play.

The realities of medieval life

The central theme of this misericord is a two-bodied monster with a single head. The supporters are also monsters, their tails connecting them to the misericord.

Everyday life in the later Middle Ages, and the 14th century in particular (the century in which the Chester misericords were carved) was hard. The 14th century was not merely a matter of political change and social unrest, but incorporated the Great Famine of 1315-17 the arrival of the terrible Black Death of 1348-1350, and the recurrence of plague outbreaks in 1361-2, 1369, 1374-9 and 1390-3 during which thousands of people died and entire villages were permanently abandoned, and following which economic challenges inevitably occurred. Other notable events included the relocation of papal power from Rome to Avignon in 1309; the Ordinances of 1311, which imposed limits on Edward II’s power; Robert de Bruce’s defeat of Edward II at Bannockburn in 1314; a period of political and military turmoil followed by Edward II’s forced abdication and probable murder in 1327; Scottish independence in 1328; the beginning of the 100 Years War in 1337 under Edward III, which brought with it periods of purveyance and heavy taxation; the 1341 parliamentary crisis; the 1351 Statue of Labourers (Edward III’s attempt at wage-fixing); the death of Edward III in 1377; the Papal Schism of 1378; John Wycliffe’s anti-Catholic writing (inspiring his Lollard followers) and his vernacular English editions of the Bible in the mid to late 14th century; the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381; and the removal of Richard II from the throne in 1399. For Cheshire and northeast Wales, the appointment of Edward III’s son the Black Prince as Earl of Chester in 1333 and Prince of Wales in 1343 were also particularly relevant. A great many more dates could be added to this brief and selective list, but this is probably sufficient to highlight the social and political turbulence of these decades. The late 14th century misericords in British monasteries and churches, with their often threatening and subversive themes may say as much about social anxiety as spiritual fervour.

Lion fighting a dragon flanked on each side by a wildman (wodehouse), one riding a wyvern and the other killing some form of dragon-like creature. St Werburgh’s Abbey, Chester

Writing about the monsters, hybrids, wildmen and grotesques populating the margins of the Luttrell Psalter (dating to the 1320s-30s), Michelle P. Brown could also be commenting on the 14th century misericords when she says: “They reflect the neuroses of a society in flux, one rightly concerned in the face of political corruption, international warfare, civil war, famine and demographic decline.” Some of these anxieties and concerns are translated into analogous images on the misericords, which became vehicles for representing the extreme aspects of both familiar realities and potential realities that link life as it is lived and the “other.” Here the familiar meets the unfamiliar in the liminal, teetering right on the edge of the unknown beyond where mermaids, dragons, wyverns, unicorns, strange humanoid beings and the unknown lurked. These territories on the edges and margins of observable reality are places of high risk, where strange beings and actions are not only possible but plausible.

This was obviously not a simple matter of juxtaposing conventionally opposing ideas like saints-and-angels versus devils-and-demons. In the medieval period the there was a recognition of the border spaces between the sacred and the profane, the religious and the domestic, a blameless life and a misspent one, good and evil, life and death, death and rebirth. This in-between existence is space that is neither hell nor purgatory and might act as a reminder that between this world and that occupied by the divine, there was significant uncertainty.

Bearded man at St Andrew’s, Bebington. Source: Dominic Strange, World of Misericords

Although the unusual, the mythical and the allegorical stand out, ordinary people may also be represented. They do not feature prominently at either St Werburgh’s or Gresford’s St Oswalds, where most of the original misericords are present, but ordinary people occur on misericords outside the Chester area. The obviously religious themes interlock with scenes of everyday life, some allegorical, some empirical, some scurrilous. Michael Camille suggests that misericords are like the Mystery plays in that they allow “anecdotal details and the depiction of social manners” including folk stories and fables and scenes of domesticity and seasonal activities. The inclusion of peasants engaged in hard work, such as those shown in the Labours of the Months, (the most complete example of which is at a church in Ripple, Worcestershire, shifted there from Whalley Abbey after the Dissolution) may represent a dependence on the annual cycle, but may equally capture the nature of the social order itself, with saints at the top and serfs at the bottom, all equally important at least in God’s eyes.

Woman as a tornado of anger with cowering man, flanked by two very cross characters. Chester St Werburgh’s

As Grössinger says, however, most of the everyday people shown on misericords are engaged not in the domestic realm or in serious pursuits, but in “a subversive view of everyday events that can both entertain and teach.” These depictions include acrobats, contortionists, hunting, wrestling, feasting, brawling, bear-baiting and music making. When ordinary people begin to behave in a challenging way, there may have been a great deal of unease about the reality of God’s creations humans being less than perfect specimens who were unable or unwilling to use free will for good. Misericords depicting women beating men, foxes preaching to geese, gymnasts displaying their private parts, may well represent the use of derision and humour to mediate the uncomfortable realities of everyday social discord, another aspect of the subversion of an idealized view of life. This was perhaps just as true of medieval creative thinking as it is of today’s, and ties in with an explanatory framework in which both monsters and monstrous behaviours were part of God’s creation, and should be included in any understanding of reality as it is perceived and the liminal areas beyond our immediate vision or geographic location.

The lovers Tristan and Isolde. St Werburgh’s, Chester

Heroic, chivalric and romantic tales bear testimony to the rewards of idealized behaviour in the face of such challenges, but clearly comment too on the risks confronted by good people who encounter evil, temptation and other dangers. These narratives offer approaches to handling danger and mechanisms for defeating fear and the fearsome.

Interestingly, the misericords do not tend to focus on the image of death itself and only rarely give death a voice, unless it is to remind the onlooker of Christ’s sacrifice for humanity. Demons, hell and people being delivered to the hellmouth are certainly represented, but these are more a threat to the living, teetering on the edge of the abyss, than a characterization of death itself. Depictions of skeletons, the personifications of death, fairly unusual, even in the 15th century when the Danse Macabre (and John Lydgate’s derivative Dance of Death) and cadaver monuments, and in particular transi tombs, became popular.

Fox preaching to cockerel and geese. All Saints’, Gresford

Finally, there is always the matter of tradition. Whilst the 14th century misericords at places like Lincoln, Chester and Nantwich may have been a response to the difficulties of the times, it is quite likely that much later misericords were seen more in the light of a connection with the historical integrity of the church, the honouring of an ecclesiastical tradition and a form of validation of more modern works, as well as a resistance to ecclesiastical change, by reference to the past.

Why were carved misericords incorporated into sacred spaces?

View of the choir from steps to the central altar, Gresford All Saints’. The carved screen divides the sacred space of the choir, the choir-stalls and the misericords from the public nave beyond.

In a church the choir is divided from the long nave, where the congregation gather, by a screen. Perhaps the dangerous and threatening was best contained and restricted within the choir, where religious rituals were concentrated, and where the clergy and monks could contemplate and learn from the disruptive and unsettling scenes before (and under) them. It must have been accepted at some point that the inclusion of irreverence and crudity sitting alongside religious themes had a useful role and would not, most importantly, be offensive to God. If the themes were essentially a coping strategy consisting of fashionable morality tales and derisive warnings against bad behaviour, such forms of expression probably needed to be safely contained, segregated from those who might misinterpret them and retained for the benefit of those who could contemplate them and understand their role. Acknowledging risk and conceptualizing it in the form of margins and misericords was a way of bringing a wit and energy to the unknown world of the “other” that sat beyond the edges of medieval life, but it was not suitable for everyday consumption.

One of the Victorian replacements at Chester St Werburgh’s showing one of Aesop’s fables, the fox and the stork.

It is worth remembering that at least in the context of monastic establishments and collegiate churches, and probably in the greater majority of the parish chancels, the choir was the domain of men alone. It is all too likely that the more risqué of these themes were considered far too warm and witty for delicate female sensibilities and, in the majority of cases, for their inferior intellects too. Confining such scenes to the choir would normally guarantee an exclusively male audience.

Context: Themes that reflect the misericords in other forms

Delightfully grotesque creature, one of many clinging to the walls of All Saint’s, Gresford. Its beautifully chosen red sandstone skin against the pale yellow masonry makes it particularly ghastly!

Very briefly, where misericords are found, it is worth having a look around to see what other types of similar imagery may exist both within the church and on the exterior. The subject of architectural gargoyles and related grotesques has already arisen on this blog in connection with Gresford All Saints’ church, where the twisted, deformed, ugly and bizarre look down on gathering congregations and passers by, marching in sequence along the string-course, spewing out water, or apparently poised to pounce from window corbels and string courses. There was no limit to medieval imagination, and the exteriors of many medieval churches display some of the most extraordinary and creative monsters anywhere in the late medieval world.

Pilgrim and bench end, St Werburgh’s Abbey, Chester

Interior imagery includes choir-stall arm rests, bench-ends and bench-end carvings and sculptural components such as corbel supports. In some big ecclesiastical establishments the ceiling bosses and vaulted arch corbels are also used to capture the mythological, the fantastic and the entertaining. Camber bream ceilings may be accessorized with sculptural components in wood or stone where the ceiling beams meet the walls. Baptismal fonts sometimes display elaborate imagery, and where original medieval floor tiles remain, these too often display images and symbols. Medieval stained glass, where it survives, although better known for its display of the great and the good sometimes captures subjects from the margins. These may or may not be contemporary with misericords, but add to the story that successive generations of clergy and congregations could read in their place of worship.

Together, all these carved forms, whether in wood or stone, formed a complex ecclesiastical world in which miracles, judgement, purgatory and the apocalypse were the stuff of fact, and in which saintly shrines channelled divine power, and where the unregulated performance of domestic solutions were probably manifestations of harmful superstition and demonic magic inspired by the devil. The messages of risk and uncertainty, coped with by following Christ’s example and ameliorated by belief in the love of God, were carried throughout the church, inside and out.
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Final Comments

Over the three posts in this small series I have barely touched the surface of what misericords meant to churches and their clergy and why they merited their cost. That is partly because the topic is so rich and the corpus in Britain alone so massive. There have been many attempts to get to the root of what the misericords, in each corpus, are intended to do, what role they are designed to perform. It is possible in each place to pick out key themes in misericords, including religious and miraculous scenes; domestic, seasonal and everyday activities; kingly and knightly pursuits and adventures, many of them referencing popular chivalric romance and courtly love; the fantastic, monstrous, mythical and legendary; and the seriously crude and scatological. The medieval interest in the “other” is very conspicuous.

All Saints’, Gresford

Misericords did not shy away from even the most bawdy elements of human existence, challenging the binary, recognizing the complexities of Christian lives. Rather than simple black and white contrasts of good versus evil, the misericord vignettes capture an entire kaleidoscope of social and cultural perception and commentary. It does not matter in which order the overall message is read, but it does matter that it incorporates a deeply felt form of reality beyond the immediately observable, which may offer both opportunity and risk. Whether amusing, tender or shocking, misericords have the ability to tell a moral tale, carrying real impact in their didactic role, encouraging introspection and self-awareness.

Arm rest. St Andrew’s, Bebington

Between life as it was lived every day, the the supernatural as it was imagined, and those strange foreign lands and invisible realities with with strange monstrous beings, there was plenty to worry medieval people. These are sources of potential anxiety and stress that paid no respect to social standing. Misericords represent the diversity and unending variability of living things and their experiences, both natural and supernatural along the entire continuum of human and divine life. Although sometime based on stories captured in manuscripts, and sometimes loose copies of paintings and prints from northwest Europe, the misericords have a voice of their own. Approaching them as embodiments of layered meaning can add depth and richness to each individual piece, but they are equally appealing for their visual splendour, and can be appreciated simply for their beauty, mischief, boldness and charm.

Visiting (as of December 2023)

The layout of the choir stalls and description of their misericords. Source: Stephen Smalley 1996 (see “Sources” at end)

On my multiple visits to Chester Cathedral in 2022 and 2023 the misericords have usually been available to view. Although they are sometimes roped off, particularly when an event is upcoming, you can usually go between the lower choir benches to lean over and see some of the misericords, and there are usually cathedral staff around to ask if you can get a little closer. On my visits to Gresford and Malpas, the misericords were accessible to view when the church was open to visitors and not being used for services and events. St Andrew’s in Bebington can only be visited by appointment (see below) but again the three misericords are on unrestricted display.

None of the locations have obligatory entry fees, but Chester always has someone at its reception requesting a voluntary donation into a big perspex box (or by swiping a debit/credit card). There is also a gift shop and very good café in the former abbey refectory, which is a wonderful space in its own right.

Swordplay. St Oswald’s, Malpas

Gresford, Malpas and Bebington do not have reception staff, but as village churches they are even more in need of voluntary donations. Given how beautifully these churches are maintained, it is well worth giving them support.

Gresford All Saints’ and Malpas St Oswald’s are still open for services, weddings and funerals, as well as community activities, but are generally also open daily for visitors. You can park outside All Saints’ on the road. At St Oswald’s it is better to find the car park, just five minutes away, and walk.

Bebington St Andrew’s is only open for Sunday services and other formal events, and visiting is by appointment only. My thanks to the office for making arrangements for me to visit. I’ll be writing up the entire church on another occasion. There is plenty of parking on the road when the church is not in use for services, weddings etc.

I have included the What3Words location for those with the app installed (it works beautifully with the free Google satnav). Check the individual websites for services, opening times and other details:

Chester Cathedral (formerly St Werburgh’s Abbey)
- Located at What3Words ///torn.trying.snow
Gresford All Saints’s Church:
- Located at What3Words ///pegs.embedded.poppy
Malpas St Oswald’s Church
- Located at What3Words ///clues.intention.dusty
Bebington St Andrew’s. The church’s main website is here, but does not have a heritage section. Instead, the church’s own heritage pages at can be found here, but are not working properly at the time of writing (December 2023)
- Located at What3Words ///title.online.roses

Sources

My thanks again to Dominic Strange and his World of Misericords website for allowing me to use so many of his images. He is an absolute star, and his website is a fabulous resource, one of the best examples of how websites can really contribute to research projects.

Each of the three posts in this short series was originally a lot longer, and some of the references below relate to those chunks that I cut out, but in case the full bibliography is of interest, I’ve left it unaltered. I have not managed to track down all the references that I might have found of use, so there are gaps. If you are looking into misericords and want the references that I have noted down for future reference but have not used here, just let me know and I will email them over.

Books, booklets and papers

Anderson, M.D. 1954. Misericords. Medieval Life in English Woodcarving. Penguin

Anderson, M.D. 1971. History and Imagery in British Churches. John Murray.

Asma, Steven T. 2009. On Monsters. An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears. Oxford University Press

Avilés, Alejandro García 2019. The Visual Culture of Magic in the Middle Ages. In (eds.) Sophie Page and Catherine Rider. The Routledge History of Medieval Magic. Routledge, p.402-431

Barber, Richard. 1992. Bestiary. MS Bodley 64. The Boydell Press

Baxter, Ron. 1998. Bestiaries and their Users in the Middle Ages. Sutton Publishing
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340870845_Bestiaries_and_their_Users_in_the_Middle_Ages_Sutton_Publishing_1998_ISBN_0_7509_1853_5

Bench end “poppy head,” Gresford All Saints’

Beal, Timothy K. 2002. Religion and Monsters. Routledge

Bennett, Carol. 2015. Lincoln Cathedral Misericords and Stalls in St Hugh’s Choir. Lincoln Cathedral.

Bildhauer, Bettina. 2003. Blood, Jews and Monsters in Medieval Culture. In Bildhauer, Bettina and Mills, Robert (eds.), The Monstrous Middle Ages. University of Wales Press.

Bildhauer, Bettina and Mills, Robert. 2003. Introduction: Conceptualizing the Monstrous. In Bildhauer, Bettina and Mills, Robert (eds.), The Monstrous Middle Ages. University of Wales Press

Broughton, Lynne. 1996. Interpreting Lincoln Cathedral: The Medieval Imagery. Lincoln Cathedral Publications

Brown, Michelle, P. 2006. The World of the Luttrell Psalter. The British Library

Burne, R.V.H. 1962. The Monks of Chester. The History of St Werburgh’s Abbey. SPCK.

Camille, Michael. 1992. Image on the Edge. The Margins of Medieval Art. Reaktion Books

Chunko Betsy L. 2011. Vernacular Imagery on English Misericords: Framing Interpretation. St Andrew’s Journal of Art History and Museum Studies, 2011, vol.15, p.5-12
https://ojs.st-andrews.ac.uk/index.php/nsr/article/download/255/264/

Clifton-Taylor, Alec. 1974. English Parish Churches as Works of Art. B.T. Batsford Ltd.

Colish, Marcia L. 1997. Medieval Foundations of the Western Intellectual Tradition 400-1400. Yale University Press

Davies, Owen. 2012. Magic. A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press

Dickinson, John. 2008. Misericords of North West England. Their Nature and Significance. Centre for North-West Regional Studies, University of Lancaster.

Fry, Nick. 2009. Chester Cathedral. Scala

Fudgé, Thomas. 2016. Medieval Religion and its Anxieties. History and Mystery in the Other Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan

Gee, E.A. 1953. Oxford Carpenters 1370-1530. Oxoniensia, vol 17-18, 1952-3, p.112-184

Gombrich, E.H. 1979, 1984. The Sense of Order. A Study in the Psychology of Decorative Art. Phaidon Press Ltd.

Green, Richard Lancelyn (revised by Roberts, Alan) 2018. St Andrew’s Bebington. St Andrew’s Heritage Committee

Greene, J.Patrick. 1992. Medieval Monasteries. Leicester University Press

Grössinger, Christa. 2007. The World Upside-Down. English Misericords. Harvey Miller Publishers

Hardwick, Paul. 2011. English Medieval Misericords. The Margins of Meaning. The Boydell Press, Woodbridge

Hardwick, Paul. 2017. Chaucer’s Friar John and the Place of the Cat. The Chaucer Review, 52(2), p. 237-252

Harte, Jeremy 2003. Hell on Earth: Encountering Devils in the Medieval Landscape. In Bildhauer, Bettina and Mills, Robert (eds.), The Monstrous Middle Ages. University of Wales Press

Harvey, John. 1947. Gothic England. A Survey of National Culture 1300-1550. B.T. Batsford

Hiatt, C. 1898. The Cathedral Church of Chester. A Description of the Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See. George Bell and Sons. Available on the Internet Archive

Jones, Bethan. 1997. All Saints Church Gresford. ‘The Finest Parish Church in Wales’. The Friends of the Parish Church of All Saints Gresford.

Jones, Malcolm Haydn. 1991. The Misericords of Beverley Minster: A Corpus of Folkloric Imagery and its Cultural Milieu, with Special Reference to the Influence of Northern European Iconography on Late Medieval and Early Modern English Woodwork. Unpublished PhD thesis.
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/29816745.pdf

Laird, Marshall. 1996. English Misericords. John Murray

Luxford, Julian. 2005. The Art and Architecture of English Benedictine Monasteries, 1300-1540. A Patronage History. Studies in the History of medieval Religion Volume XXV. The Boydell Press

Orme, Nicholas. 2021. Going to Church in Medieval England. Yale University Press

Page, Sophie. 2017. Medieval Magic. In: Davies, O, (ed.) The Oxford Illustrated History of Witchcraft and Magic, Oxford University Press, p.29-64

Riches, Samantha J.E. 2003. Encountering the Monstrous. Saints and Dragons in Medieval Thought. In Bildhauer, Bettina and Mills, Robert (eds.), The Monstrous Middle Ages. University of Wales Press.

Rider, Catherine. 2012. Magic and Religion in Medieval England. Reaktion Books.

Roberts, Alan. 2018. St Andrew’s Bebington. Church and Churchyard Tours. St Andrew’s Heritage Committee

Ryands, T.M. (no date). An Illustrated History of St Oswald’s Malpas.

Smalley, S. (with additional research, Fry, S.) 1996. Chester Cathedral Quire Misericords. The Pitkin Guide. Chester Cathedral

White, Carolinne. 2008. The Rule of Benedict. Penguin.

Williams, David. 1996. Deformed Discourse. The Function of the Monster in Medieval Thought and Literature. Liverpool University Press.

Woodcock, Alex. 2018 (2nd edition). Of Sirens and Centaurs. Medieval Sculpture at Exeter Cathedral. Impress Books

Websites

All Saints’ Church, Gresford
https://www.allsaintschurchgresford.org.uk/about-us/our-history/

Bodleian Library
MS Bodley 964 (Bestiary)
https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/e6ad6426-6ff5-4c33-a078-ca518b36ca49/

British History Online
Chester Cathedral – A History of the County of Chester: Volume 3. Originally published by Victoria County History, London 1980, pages 188-195
https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/ches/vol3/pp188-195

The Camelot Project, University of Rochester (New York)
The Legend of Yvain. By Dongdong Han, 2010
https://d.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/text/han-the-legend-of-yvain

Clwyd and Powys Archaeological Trust
Church of All Saints, Gresford (although note that his has no mention at all of the misericords)
https://cpat.org.uk/Archive/churches/wrexham/16785.htm

Internet Archive
Liber monstrorum. A translation of the Old English text. By Andy Orchard, taken from Pride and Prodigies: Studies in the Monsters of the Beowulf Manuscript, University of Toronto Press; 2nd ed. edition (19 April 2003)
https://web.archive.org/web/20050118082548/http://members.shaw.ca/sylviavolk/Beowulf3.htm

The Medieval Bestiary. Animals in the Middle Ages
https://bestiary.ca/

The National and University Library Slovenia
The Elaborate Details in a Medieval Manuscript. Treasures of the National and University Library of Slovenia
https://artsandculture.google.com/story/the-elaborate-details-in-a-medieval-manuscript-national-and-university-library-of-slovenia/aAXhCkz6RxgiIw?hl=en

San Francisco State University
Ywain and Gawain. (Editors: George W. Tuma, Professor Emeritus of English, and Dinah Hazell, Independent Scholar, hosted by the English Department, San Francisco State University)
https://www.sfsu.edu/~medieval/romances/ywain_gawain_rev.html

St Oswald’s Church, Malpas
https://www.malpaschurch.co.uk/st-oswalds-malpas/

Princeton University
The Elaine C. Block Database of Misericords
https://ima.princeton.edu/digital-image-collections/collection/block/intro

World of Misericords
https://www.misericords.co.uk/ by Dominic Strange

Misericords in situ within choir stalls at St Werburgh’s Abbey (Chester Cathedral)

Part 2: Miracles, myths, demons and the occasional grin: Misericords in the Chester-Wrexham area

——–
Chester, Gresford, Malpas and Bebington (continued)

Basic data about the misericords at the four churches

The misericords carved for St Werburgh’s Abbey (Chester Cathedral) were discussed in Part 1. All Saints’ church in Gresford, St Oswald’s at Malpas and St Andrew’s in Bebington were considerably more modest in scale than St Werburgh’s Abbey, but all were impressive when measured against other parish churches in the region, and obviously had access to relatively substantial funding. The table above was also posted in part 1 and provides some of the vital statistics of all four sets of misericords.

All Saints’, Gresford

All Saints’ Church in Gresford

All Saints’ Church in Gresford is unexpectedly big for such a small and unimposing village. The stone church was founded in the 13th century and underwent a major revamp in the 15th century, and is still busy today. I have written about All Saints’ on two previous posts, one about the history of the church in general, and the other about the 15th century gargoyles and grotesques that inhabit its exterior. It has been suggested that the misericords were sourced from Basingwerk Abbey at Holywell in north Wales and added to All Saints’s after the abbey was dissolved in the early 1500s, but although this remains a possibility, it is also probable that All Saints’ was sufficiently well provided for to pay for its own misericord carvings.

Choir stalls at Gresford All Saints’

Neither the All Saints’ guidebook nor the CPAT survey suggest a date for the misericords, and the church’s web page does not mention them. Based on the presence of a preaching fox, a theme thought to represent mendicant friars who were only present from the 14th century, they must have carved after the late 14th century. It is also very probable that they post-date those at St Werburgh’s (1390) as there was nothing else nearby to provide a model. Although the Gresford misericords could plausibly have been associated with the major rebuild of the church in the 15th century, when two new aisles were added and many other changes were made, Dominic Strange’s misericord timeline places the misericords in the late 15th or early 16th century, over 100 years after the Chester misericords. If correct, it demonstrates the durability of themes that were popular in earlier periods.

Sketch plan of the Gresford misericords.

The choir stalls provide a good example of a three-sided arrangement in a squared U-shape. In total there were originally fourteen misericords, four on the north, four on the south and two lots of three on the west. The latter flanked the entrance from the nave to the choir. Today two are blank, either because they were never completed, or because they were removed due to inappropriate content or severe damage (I can find nothing to help determine which). Some are quite badly damaged, but the entire group indicate great skill and include some varied topics.

The choir, Gresford All Saints’

The misericords are separated by arm rests that curl up the sides of the chairs and along the backs, each one featuring a small human figure at the front of the arm rest. Exceptions are at the corners between the north and west rows and the west and south rows, which feature fantastic beasts.

As in St Werburgh’s, a fox is dressed as a friar but this time he is in a pulpit preaching to chickens and geese, demonstrating that this theme was of interest not merely to monastic establishments but to churches as well. The allegedly venal of some elements of the mendicant cause may be the theme here. The earliest mendicant friars were poor and itinerant, begging for alms. By the later middle ages they were comfortably established in friaries of their own, the recipients of patronage, gifts and wills. The apparent hypocrisy was a source of grievance for the clergy beyond the seclusion of the cloister. The parish priest may also have felt threatened by the powerful public sermons and the more evocative style of engagement with the general public delivered by the friars. In the parish church, as well as in the heart of the monastery, friars might be seen as a threat to the role of the conventional clergy, to be satirized, derided and, if possible, undermined.

One of the more puzzling themes that occasionally appears on misericords (but is missing from Chester, possibly due to removal in the Victorian period) is the revealing of male nether regions. At Gresford this is given a context. The misericord shows an acrobat hanging over a pole held by two men, ostentatiously exposing his undercarriage, apparently during a performance, possibly a form of slap-stick entertainment. Quite what these were doing on misericords is uncertain, although there is a lot of speculation on the subject. Whilst there may have been a warning against lewdness and impurity, it is difficult to deny that at least some of these depictions were intended to include a degree of crude humour.

A badly damaged misericord shows two cats, both standing on their hind legs in front of something that is now missing but appears to show a mouse hole at the base, with a tiny mouse with pointed ears to its right. The cats are holding hands, with one apparently leading the other. The leading cat seems to have been holding something in its outstretched paw. Perhaps the upright stance reflects the cat’s commanding, self-possessed and often self-satisfied view of its position within its own universe. An alternative interpretation is that when animals are shown adopting human behaviour, it is a reminder of human failings. Similarly standing on their hind legs are the cats in MS. Bodley 764 (folio 50r), which also shows cats on the hunt.

Cats from MS Bodley 764, folio 50r. Source: Medieval Bestiary

Wheelbarrows feature quite frequently in misericords, and one of the Gresford misericords shows two women seated side by side in a wheelbarrow being pushed towards the open jaws of a monster’s head by a creature with staring eyes and a forked tail. The cavalcade is followed by a man. All the participants in the scene stare out at the onlooker. The open jaws of the monster represent the gateway to hell. This is a much simpler version of a well-known example at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, which shows two monks being wheeled towards the hellmouth by either a demon or the devil himself, leading to the suggestion that the two wimpled women on the Gresford misericord may be nuns (but bearing in mind that wimples were not exclusive to nuns). The supporters appear to be small rodents, but it is difficult to see how they might relate to the central narrative.

A splendid winged griffin, facing left, is positioned between two delicate unicorns, one of which is missing its head. The griffin has the head and wings of an eagle, the body of a Lion and is four-legged. Like the lion, which can exert its power for either good or evil, depending on the context. When Alexander the Great encounters the enclave of griffins in his voyage to the end of the world, the creature is a true monster, ugly, frightening and vicious. On the other hand it is a pair of griffins that carried Alexander over the edge of the world. The griffin is often used to represent rival ideas and can, in different contexts, represent such opposing individuals as Satan and Christ. The griffin also represents the combination of the opposing elemental forces of air (eagle) and earth (lion). It is difficult to know what, in this context, the griffin is intended to convey. The presence of unicorns, which are often associated with Christ, may either be supportive companions, opposing forces, or hapless victims, and there is nothing to help determine which. The supporters are decorative flowers.

Another misericord, also quite unlike its companions, seems to refer to the gargoyles and grotesques so strongly featured on the exterior of the building. It may have had no specific symbolic meaning. It is a monster’s face with vaulting emanating from its head. The vaulting may be intended to evoke the magnificent screen that separates choir from nave at All Saints’, although the flowers at the intersections on the misericord are not present on the screen. Perhaps it is intended to bring indoors the collective message that the gargoyles and grotesques were communicating from the exterior of the church (discussed briefly in an earlier post).

Some of the All Saints’ misericords are very badly damaged, leaving the core subject matter very difficult to identify. A particularly frustrating example is the misericord whose central subject matter is completely missing. Flanking it there is a wonderful winged angel on the left and, on the right, a lady in an elaborate dress kneeling before a personal altar with the soft folds of her dress flowing behind her on the floor. Perhaps this was either the Annunciation or the Coronation of the Virgin, particularly as there are no other overtly religious stories included in the All Saints’ corpus.

Another badly damaged misericord shows a woman on a four-legged animal, the head of which is missing and is therefore unidentifiable. It is short, has particularly bandy legs and ill-defined feet, none of which suggest a horse. Two carvings, one in front of the woman and animal, and one behind, are lost. The one behind is almost certainly another figure in a long garment, but the one in front may or may not be.

Some of the misericords contain no narrative or obviously symbolic component. One misericord has no central subject matter and no obvious sign of damage, with just two images as supporters, right on the edge of the underside of the seat. These are two three-quarter partial heads, almost sketches, looking towards one another. The meaning of this, if there was any, is lost. If there was a central carving, there is not even a shape left to suggest a subject matter. It is possible that it was carved at a much later date to replace one of the original misericords that might have been damaged or whose subject matter was considered inappropriate. These lost stories are very frustrating.

All of the misericords at Gresford are shown on the World of Misericords website at https://www.misericords.co.uk/gresford.html, with short descriptions at https://www.misericords.co.uk/gresford_des.html.

St Oswald’s, Malpas

St Oswald’s Church in Malpas. Photograph by Alan Marsh. Source: Historic England

St Oswald’s Church in the village of Malpas was founded in the late 1300s. The church underwent a similar modernization in the 15th century to that at Gresford, including a similar camber beam roof. It has a great many features that continue to impress, particularly the spectacular tomb effigies of the 15th and early 16th centuries, but its remaining misericords are disappointingly confined to three choir stalls.

There is a set of three choir stalls with three misericords, in a single row, still displayed in the choir area in St Oswald’s. The visitor guide to the church says that there were “at least twelve” 15th century choir stalls with misericords, with only nine surviving and six “much restored.” Given that there are only three on display, it is something of a puzzle as to what happened to the remaining six of the nine surviving. There are no descriptions of any of the misericords, and nor does the booklet say where the surviving misericords (other than the three still in the choir at Malpas) are located today.

The remaining row of choir stalls at St Oswald’s with the misericords hidden beneath the seats.

The choir stalls have carved armrests, although they less elaborate than those at Gresford, and have no carved bench ends. This may suggest that carved choir stalls were never a very important component of the chancel at St Oswald’s, or that the funds required for a more ambitious project were not available. All three remaining misericords are described here, with the disclaimer that they represent only a very small sample of the original corpus. Two of the three are damaged.

I particularly like the mermaid. Mermaids appear on many misericords in Britain. Mermaids resembled Greek sirens, representing both the temptation and lust that men might find hard to resist on the one hand, and the dangers represented by the deformation of the human image in the form of a hybrid creature on the other. They were usually shown, as at Malpas, with bared breasts, with a comb in one hand and a mirror in the other, warnings not merely of seduction but of the vice of vanity. The Malpas mermaid looks down and seems to be moving gently to her right. Her tail has been lightly carved to suggest fish scales. Her bare chest is distinctly flat and smooth, unlike most misericord mermaids, perhaps to avoid encouraging carnal thoughts amongst the Malpas choristers. She holds the comb in her left hand, which rests on her thigh (separated from her upper arm by breakage), and the mirror in the other, overlapping one of the supporters. Both supporters are three-lobed leaves.

A winged monster has one head, shown facing outward, but two bodies that are shown in profile either side of the head. This is probably the simplest and least worked of all three, with minimal details carved into the image, although there are shallow markings to suggest the scaled nature of the wings, and clawed feet. The face is shown in more detail, with three protrusions from the head, which may or may not depict serpents. It is clearly a monster with affinities like the wings, tails and claws that are shared with dragons. Dragons, wyverns and related monsters may represent paganism, power, uncontrolled violence or lust, the Devil himself and unspecified evil and sin that must be confronted and neutralized, or at the very least rationalized. As such creatures are usually associated with remote, often hostile landscapes, they may also represent fear of the unknown. It may also offer a shifting geographical component, so that the dragon may be feared in the remote landscape but is only confronted when it threatens human habitation and safety. The three-lobed leaf supporters are nicely done, with clearly defined edges. A much more elaborate version of a single-headed and double-bodied monster is shown in the Luttrell Psalter (folio 195v), but is evidently part of the same family of images familiar and available to medieval illuminators, carvers and sculptors.

Single-headed two-bodied monster from the Luttrell Psalter (Add MS 42130 f.195.v). Source: Groteskology

Finally, two knights are shown engaged in an athletic, almost balletic fight with swords. Of the three this is by far the most complex, compositionally. At first glance it is very difficult to see exactly what is going on, and whose limbs belong to whom, vividly capturing movement. The pointed shoes, generally confined to the well-to-do, emphasize the mobility and athleticism of the figures. Perhaps it refers to a scene from a chivalric romance, such a the Chester examples that show scenes from stories of Yvain and Tristan and Isolde. Again, the supporters are foliage.

St Andrew’s, Bebington

As I was just about ready to hit the Publish button on this post I had a whizz through Dominic Strange’s Timeline and Gazetteer, which revealed that St Andrew’s in Bebington on the Wirral possesses misericords in three choir stalls, plus two that have survived being separated from their choir stalls, now serving as corbels. Although the church is not open except for Sunday services, weddings etc., Karen from the church office very kindly arranged for me to visit when volunteers were working there.

Choir stalls in St Andrew’s, Bebington

It is particularly nice to have found these misericords because, as with St Oswald’s in Malpas, the misericords at St Andrew’s rarely appears in books about misericords, always overshadowed by Chester Cathedral and Gresford All Saints’. It is clear that they should be included here not only because they are local and under-sung but because they show some themes that are not shown in the misericords at the other locations discussed in these posts.

The pelican in her piety

Dominic Strange places all five misericords in the 15th century. The guidebook to the church, by Richard Lancelyn Green, says that there were originally twelve of them, with six surviving until 1847 when they were split up due to damp and dry rot. Presumably the other six were discarded. Initially, in 1871, they were split into pairs and then, in 1897, three of them were reassembled into the row that survives today in the chancel, just to the side of the main altar. Two of them have been removed from their original choir stalls and are deployed as corbels but there is no mention of the sixth 1847 survivor.

At the far left of the choir stall is the pelican in her piety plucking her breast (shown above), already described in connection with Chester in part 1, but flanked here with foliage.

Bearded man. Source: Dominic Strange, World of Misericords

The head of a man with beard and hat or other form of head covering may or may not be a portrait. Many misericords show human faces, some characterized by particular expressions or actions, but many contain no clues about the significance. The supporters feature pomegranates. Pomegranates are associated with numerous ideas from antiquity onwards. The symbolism attached to them ranges from fertility, regeneration and good luck to representing the shedding of the blood of Christ and as a symbol of the church and its congregation. Without knowing quite what the man’s head represents it is difficult to interpret the entire message of the misericord.

The third in the row is a splendid dolphin flanked by equally splendid seahorses, presumably designed by someone who had seen neither dolphin or seahorse. The dolphin is a rather terrifying looking creature, but there seem to be no negative narratives associated with it. The bestiary in MS Bodley 764 includes the dolphin, but attaches no special meaning to it, stating that “they follow men’s voices, or gather in shoals when music is played . . . if they go in front of the ship, leaping in the waves, they appear to foretell bad weather.” The only other misericord dolphins that I’ve seen in my online travels are at Norwich Cathedral and St Laurence’s Church in Ludlow.

The remaining two misericords, now used as corbels, show what may be a bull’s head, and a sow with a litter. You can see them on the World of Misericords website. The sow with a litter is a theme also featured on one of the St Werburgh misericords. MS Bodley 764 is quite clear on the negative connotations: “The sow that was washed and returns to her wallowing in the mire is filthier than before; and he who weeps for his admitted sins, but does not desist from them, earns a graver punishment, condemned by his own misdeeds which he could have prevented by repentance; and he descends as if into murky waters because he removes the cleanness of his life by such tears, which are tainted before the eyes of God.” Sows represent unclean spirits and are often associated with gluttony and, more disturbingly, heresy. And in the medieval mind, where heresy lurks, paganism may be lurking nearby.

Contributors to knowledge

Even in such small numbers, the churches at Malpas and Bebington contribute to the body of information about Medieval misericords, helping to build up a database of knowledge about the themes that were of interest to those who commissioned them for the most sacred parts of their monasteries and parish churches. Unless an early report describing or illustrating some of the other misericords emerges, the legacy of those who commissioned, funded and carved the misericords at Malpas and Bebington are confined to just these three and five examples respectively. Although the themes were represented elsewhere, none of the topics shown replicate any of those surviving at St Werburgh’s.

Other churches in the region with misericords

Grapevine misericord at Nantwich St Mary’s. Source: Dominic Strange, World of Misericords

The above are the only churches with misericords in the Wrexham-Chester area, but there are others in the general region. For example, there is a set of fourteen dating to the late 14th century in St Mary’s Nantwich to the east, in the town centre. There are 20 dating to the late 15th century in St Asaph’s Cathedral to the west in north Wales. Another set of sixteen dating to the late 15th century can be found in St Bartholemew’s in the village of Tong to the southeast (where the A41 meets the M54). Finally, there are two fine sets of 15th century misericords (the first of sixteen in 1425 the second of twelve in 1447) in St Laurence’s church in Ludlow.

The distinctive Nantwich examples can be seen on Dominic’s World of Misericords, as can those at St Asaph’s, but the Tong ones have yet to be added to the site, and I cannot find images of more than one or two of them elsewhere. There is a section of the Ludlow Palmers website dedicated to the St Laurence’s misericords in Ludlow, and you can see sixteen of them on World of Misericords.

Part 3 wraps up the series, looking at who was involved in the creation of misericords, how they were paid for, and why they featured so frequently in the most sacred part of a church, often hidden from view but containing a mixture of messages that in each case contributed to the sense of a church’s identity. Visitor details and references are also added at the end of part 3.

Gresford All Saints’ Church – exterior gargoyles and grotesques

Sources:

Camille, Michael 2019 (2nd edition). Image on the Edge. The Margins of Medieval Art. Reaktion Books.

Fudgé, Thomas, 2016. Medieval Religion and its Anxieties. History and Mystery in the Other Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan

Woodcock, Alex, 2011. Gargoyles and Grotesques. Shire Publications

Big and bold: All Saints’ Church in the small village of Gresford

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All Saints’ Church in Gresford is such a short hop from my parents’ home in Rossett that I should have visited years ago, but somehow never got around to it. I tried a couple of times earlier this summer, but the church was busy in its role as a community resource, which was good to see. The church is big. Although it is difficult to imagine when driving along the Chester-Wrexham road, Gresford was originally a small village, noted in the Domesday survey as part of Duddestan in the Cheshire Hundred. A sense of village life still remains in the buildings that surround the churchyard, together with the charming village pond just down the road, complete with lazy ducks sunbathing on warm summer days. All Saints’, reaching most of its present extent in the 15th century, was an imposing presence, and must have been a source of considerable local pride.

The location of the Church of All Saints in Gresford. Source: streetmap.co.uk

For a detailed account of the church’s history, see the history page on the Gresford All Saints’ website. This post provides a short overview of some of the key features, with photographs. First, a note on the name. Most churches in the area are named after particular saints, but All Saints refers, as it name suggests, to all Christian saints. The saints represented by “all,” however, include not only those who are known but those who remain unrecognized. All Saints’ Day is celebrated in Catholic and some Protestant churches on 1st November annually. The owner of the Church of England Saint Dedications web page calculates that it is the second most popular church dedication in England, after St Mary. Although Gresford is in Wales, just over the border, it switched hands between England and Wales throughout its earlier history.

The Grade 1 listed All Saints’ is unexpectedly impressive for its understated setting. Much bigger for example, than Worthenbury’s St Deiniol’s, with which it shares a sense both of ambition and commitment. Today both are clearly much-loved by their communities, and both vie for the title of the finest parish church in north Wales. The significant difference between the two is that whereas St Deiniol’s was built between 1736-9 by Richard Trubshaw with real Georgian panache, All Saints’ is thought to have been founded in the 13th century and was in almost continuous use from at least the 14th century. The 11^th century Domesday survey mentions a church and priest, but this church was apparently replaced by the establishment of the Gresford church, either in the same or slightly different location. All surviving walls are made of local high-quality Cefn yellow sandstone, which is used for many of the municipal buildings in Wrexham. A separate post about the exterior gargoyles and grotesques has been posted on the blog here.

The late 13^th and 14th centuries were a period of energetic church building in England and Wales. It is thought that the remarkable gothic architectural projects carried out at two notable sites created a tidal wave of enthusiasm for architectural projects in religious establishments. One was the new and remarkable shrine created for Archbishop Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral, murdered on 29^th December 1170, who was canonized only three years later and therefore required a shrine worthy of his status, into which his remains were transferred (translated) in 1220. The other was the ambitious shrine built by Henry III for St Edward the Confessor at Westminster Abbey, completed in 1269.

When All Saints’ Church was built in the 13^th century, prestigious contemporary religious buildings included, for example, St John the Baptist Church in Chester founded in 1075, St Werburgh’s Abbey, founded in 1093 and Basingwerk Abbey founded 1132.

Subsequently All Saints’ underwent many alterations and embellishments in the centuries that followed, including the 14^th century addition of the tower to a lower level than today, together with a south aisle. There was an almost total rebuild in the 15th century and the upward extension of the tower in the 16^th century. The dominant style, following the 15^th century rebuild, is known as Late Gothic Perpendicular, a peculiarly English style that emphasized the tall and thin aspects of the Gothic, mainly exhibited in the stone tracery of the stained glass windows, which make up an enormous part of the interface between interior and exterior.

The only clue to the original appearance of the church lies in a 16^th century document that claims that it had been “strangely and beautifully made erect,” which is intriguing but not particularly helpful. The church is rectangular in plan with a tower protruding at the west end and two porches.

All Saints’ sits within a churchyard. The earliest grave marker dates to 1696, and there are some from the 18^th century. Most date to the 19^th century. There is a good mixture of chest tombs and gravestones of different designs and styles of engraving. The churchyard’s oldest occupant is in fact a lovely yew tree (Taxus baccata), estimated to be 1600 years old. The other yew trees were planted in 1726. Often associated with churchyards, yews have a mixed reputation, seen both as symbols of immortality and indicators of impending disaster, the latter association perhaps because of its toxicity. In this context, it seems clear that the yews are intended to represent life everlasting.

The exterior features of the church include crenulations, and follows the gothic tradition of adding gargoyles, which draw water away from the roof, and decorative sculptural elements, including small beasts, real and imaginary, and tortured faces, usually referred to as grotesques, as well as floral themes. Some of these sit on the stringcourse, a few of which are positioned under hood-moulds (projecting reliefs to protect the underlying features from rainwater). They are worth a post in their own right, if only to capture some of them with a telephoto lens so that they can bee seen much more easily than with the eye, which I will do in the next month or so.

Internally, the church is divided into traditional sections. The nave (the main body of the church where the public sit in pews) is flanked by two side aisles at ground floor level, marked by two 7-bay arcades. A clerestory (row of windows above the level of the aisle) provides the nave with much more light than the stained glass alone. A screen, erected in the 15th century, divides the nave from the sacred end of the church, the chancel with the choir and high altar. The chancel is flanked by two chapels, which can be reached from the aisles. The north aisle, shown above, used to run directly into one of the two chapels that flank the choir and altar, but is now partially interrupted by a 19th century organ.

The church has seen continuous use since the 13^th century. The main surviving feature of the 13^th century is the crypt, closed to the public but accessed via the north chapel. The 14^th century is represented by a number of key internal features. In the south aisle, the effigy of Madog ap Llywelyn ap Griffith, who died in 1330, lies in a niche, shown in full armour with a lion rampant on his shield. The inscription reads HIC IACET (here lies) MADOC AP LLYWELYN AP GRIFFI

Almost opposite, and dating to the same period, is another niche, this time showing the beautifully engraved gravestone of Goronwy ap Iowerth.

The inscription, with thanks to the ArchaeoDeath blog of Professor Howard Williams (where you can find more 14th century engravings from the church) reads:

HIC:IACET:GRONW:F’:IORWERTH:F’:dd’.CVI’:AIE:DS’:/ABSO/LWAT
Here lies Goronwy son of Iorwerth son of David, whose soul may God absolve.

The raised 14th century sanctuary with the high altar, approached via a flight of steps, sits over the 13^th century crypt.

From the 15^th century are the fabulous misericords (carved scenes on the undersides of seating in the choir) and one of the church’s real treasures, the gorgeous wainscoted screens (the central panel of which was vaulted, photograph further down the page), and a very fine stained-glass window behind the high altar donated by Thomas Stanley, Earl of Derby and step-father of Henry VII. The font, at the west end, with its eight panels that include depictions of the Virgin Mary with the baby Jesus, the lion of St Mark, and possibly St Leonard, also dates to the 15^th century.

Don’t forget to look up. The ceiling is a particularly fine camberbeam structure, crossed with rafters, with painted panels and bosses. At the ends of the rafters are carved wooden angels.

So why was the medieval church so popular that it could afford a new tower in the 14^th century and a major rebuild to include new aisles and new features in the 15^th century? In her booklet about All Saints’, Bethan Jones suggests that the gifts showered on the church, including furnishings, might suggest that it had acquired a relic and had become a pilgrim destination. Relics generated considerable incomes for cathedral, monastery and church alike. In Chester, the Rood of St John’s Church was a popular pilgrim destination, and in the 14^th century the shrine of St Werburgh in the Chester abbey had become popular. To the west, the shrine of St Winefrede at Holywell and the church at St Asaph were also on the pilgrim circuit. No record survives of such a relic at Gresford, but it is difficult to account for the size of the church in any other way, other than a major investment by a donor who wished to make his mark on the church during the period of the Reformation, but neither is there any record, documentary or material, of such a benefactor.

16^th century features include the fine stained glass windows in east and north walls of the Lady Chapel, reached via the north aisle. In the Trevor Chapel there is a superb painted 1589 memorial to John Trevor (Sion Trefor), lying as though still alive, with his head propped thoughtfully on one hand. His coat of arms is above and a winged skull beneath. An inscription conceals the central portion of his body.

The church continued to be well used throughout its history. Dating to the 17^th century, the Trevor Chapel a charming memorial to John Trevor’s daughter-in-law with her daughters dates to 1602, and another, rather more monumental piece, shows her with her husband (shown further down this post) and dates to 1638. Other memorials in the church also date to the 1600s.

In the 18^th century, a number of additions were made. The two chandeliers in the nave date to the mid and late 18^th century. The south porch (the main entrance to the church today) had stained glass panels added in the 18^th century to commemorate local deaths during the First World War. The first mention of the bells is in 1775, when three of the bells were mentioned I the parish register having been returned after being recast at Gloucester, meaning that there were at least three bells in the tower at that date, the tenor, third and treble bells, although in 1873 six bells are listed so it is possible that there were six bells in 1775.

In the 19^th and early 20^th centuries a number of alterations and additions were made, mostly sympathetic to the original structure. The 15^th century east window was restored during the 19^th century, using additional glass, but has remained true to the original. In St Catherine’s Chapel, better known as the Trevor Chapel, there are two hatchments for George Boscawen (who died in 1833) and Thomas Griffith (who died in 1856), both shown immediately below. The Hill and Son organ was installed in 1912. The addition of the north porch in 1921 to serve as a war memorial included old fragments of glass. A painting in the Trevor Chapel commemorates the Gresford Colliery Disaster of 1934 and serves as a memorial to the 266 men who died. This is shown at the very end of the post, following the list of sources.

An intriguing object in the church is a short square column, made of stone and carved with a figure holding a pair of shears. It may date to the Roman occupation, and it is possible that one face represents Atropos, one of the three Moirai or Fates, responsible for cutting the “thread of life” (the metaphor for a human lifespan). It was found during excavations at the east end of the church.

Final Comments

There is too much to say about Gresford All Saints’ on a single post, and I will revisit the church on future posts to look specifically at the choir and misericords, the gargoyles and grotesques that accessorize the exterior of the church, and the churchyard itself. Apologies for the highly granular photographs of the interior, including some which are slightly blurred around the edges, both of which were caused by having to photograph in very low light. I hope that the images are good enough to give a sense of the magnificence of the church and some of its features.

Here are a few more photos, in completely random order, and please see Visitor Information below them.

Visitor Information

The church is open daily, but is a living church and may not always be available for visitors. It has services on a Sunday and on Thursday mornings, marriages and funerals during the week and on Saturdays, and may be used as a community resource for events such as the annual craft fair. Check the church website for it’s opening times and events. It took me three attempts to find it free of activities, which is great news for the church and its future, and no bother for me as I live locally, but check the website for information, and it may be worth emailing the contact address on the website if you are coming from further away.

There are plenty of information boards throughout to explain the key features, but not so many or so big that they intrude on the atmosphere of the church. If you are interested in the history, the colour booklet by Bethan Jones provides a tour of all of the key features. It can be purchased (cash only) at the church, where there are a number of leaflets and postcards available on the shelves to the right as you enter, including one devoted to the bells.

The Trevor Chapel on the south of the church (right as you look towards the altar) is used for private prayer, but is accessible to visitors when it is not in use. The crypt, with an entrance from the Lady Chapel, is closed to the public.

For those with unwilling legs, it’s an easy to access church, with no steps needed to negotiate the entrance via the porch on the north side. The nave, the choir and the chapels can all be accessed without using steps. Being an active church, there are plenty of pews in the nave on which to sit down and absorb the atmosphere.

Sources

Books and booklets

Bethan Jones, 1997. All Saints Church Gresford. ‘The Finest Parish Church in Wales’. The Friends of the Parish Church of All Saints Gresford.

Hubbard, E. 1986. The Buildings of Wales: Clwyd (Denbighshire and Flintshire). Penguin Books

Roberts, F.H. 2013. All Saints’ Gresford. Tower and Bells. All Saints Church, Gresford

Wooding, J.M. and Yates, N. (eds.) 2011. A Guide to the Churches and Chapels of Wales. University of Wales Press

Websites

All Saints Church Gresford
Home Page
https://www.allsaintschurchgresford.org.uk/
History Page
https://www.allsaintschurchgresford.org.uk/about-us/our-history/

ArchaeoDeath blog by Professor Howard Williams
Gresford’s Medieval Monuments
https://howardwilliamsblog.wordpress.com/2018/03/04/gresfords-medieval-monuments/

Clwyd and Powys Archaeological Trust
Church of All Saints, Gresford
https://cpat.org.uk/Archive/churches/wrexham/16785.htm

Church of England Saint Dedications
https://blanchflower.org/cgi-bin/qsaint.pl

Imaging the Bible in Wales Database
Church of All Saints, Gresford, Wrexham
http://imagingthebible.llgc.org.uk//site/188

Based in Churton

A Londoner living in West Cheshire

Category Archives: Gresford

Part 3: Misericords in the Chester-Wrexham area – Miracles, myths, demons, and the occasional grin

Selecting the misericords

How themes were selected

———
———–
Who would have been involved in the choice of themes?

Who carved the misericords?

Who paid for them?

The role of misericords

A sense of meaning

A framework for living

The realities of medieval life

Why were carved misericords incorporated into sacred spaces?

Context: Themes that reflect the misericords in other forms

Final Comments

Visiting (as of December 2023)

Sources

Books, booklets and papers

Websites

Part 2: Miracles, myths, demons and the occasional grin: Misericords in the Chester-Wrexham area

——–
Chester, Gresford, Malpas and Bebington (continued)

All Saints’, Gresford

St Oswald’s, Malpas

St Andrew’s, Bebington

Contributors to knowledge

Other churches in the region with misericords

Next

Gresford All Saints’ Church – exterior gargoyles and grotesques

Sources:

Big and bold: All Saints’ Church in the small village of Gresford

Final Comments

Visitor Information

Sources

Books and booklets

Websites

Selecting the misericords

How themes were selected

——— ———– Who would have been involved in the choice of themes?

Who carved the misericords?

Who paid for them?

The role of misericords

A sense of meaning

A framework for living

The realities of medieval life

Why were carved misericords incorporated into sacred spaces?

Context: Themes that reflect the misericords in other forms

Final Comments

Visiting (as of December 2023)

Sources

Books, booklets and papers

Websites

Share this:

——– Chester, Gresford, Malpas and Bebington (continued)

All Saints’, Gresford

St Oswald’s, Malpas

St Andrew’s, Bebington

Contributors to knowledge

Other churches in the region with misericords

Next

Share this:

Sources:

Share this:

Final Comments

Visitor Information

Sources

Books and booklets

Websites

Share this:

———
———–
Who would have been involved in the choice of themes?

——–
Chester, Gresford, Malpas and Bebington (continued)