Ugborough Church of St Peter Description
- Once a major church now quietly basking in past glories
- A wonderfully tall tower
- Beautiful stonework on the 14th century arcades
- Astounding paintings on the remains of the Late Medieval rood screen
- The rood screen carving rocks too
- More great carving on the parclose into the bargain
- Two fine fonts, Norman and Victorian
- Powerful medieval roof bosses in the north aisle
- A fine structure with space and grace
Ugborough parish
Ugborough parish stretches northwards deep into Dartmoor as far as Red Lake Mire, and southwards its boundary includes WItchcombe and Marriage Cross, all names redolent of cultures past, pregnant with stories now just whispered in the wind.
The church itself rests inside a prehistoric earthwork, older histories echoing, where back in the nineteenth century it was surrounded by apple orchards for cider making, which probably helped in the telling of ever more taller tales…
And to quaff the thirst of weary travellers, for it was a cosmopolitan parish in its day, the main Plymouth-Exeter route running right through the parish; folk constantly coming to and fro, and, for the dream-filled young, big temptations.
So deep history and deep geography,
But they did build a cracking church, a very big and lovely one into the bargain.
Ugborough Church of St Peter
The village square is to the North, thus a north entrance, and a ginormous tower catches our attention at first sight. The nave and chancel are no slouches size-wise either.
The main part is fourteenth century, with alterations as ever, though the first mention of a church on this site dates from 1121; there was probably a building before that, though how far back we do not know.
That tower is sixteenth century, built on or extending an older one, but it was struck by lightning in 1872 and…
received such great damage that an opinion was yesterday expressed by an expert that it will have to be entirely rebuilt. One of the pinnacles fell upon the roof of an adjacent house and broke it in, but happily no person was injured
Hampshire Advertiser: 07/12/1872
Which must have happened a fair amount the further back we go, what with lightning conductors only starting in the nineteenth century.
And not fully accepted at that.
It was only twelve years ago that at a vestry meeting at Ugborough, it was proposed to protect the church by a lightning conductor, but the parishioners objected on the ground that as it had stood for 500 years, it might be as likely to go 500 years longer without injury. So much for the present spread of electrical science.
Letter, J. N. Hearder, Plymouth. Dec.6th. 1872
Ooops!
But wonderful as the exterior is, this church is about the interior.
Inside Ugborough Church
Because Ugborough Church inside is a veritable peach; texture, design, colour, spaces… probably even acoustics if I dared sing; the tower has already been flattened once, it would be a shame to do so again.
Those arcade piers (pillars) and arches are straight out of the fourteenth century, and that beautiful stonework is just the icing on the cake. Here too they are presented as they were meant to be seen, with plastered walls ending at the special stonework to really show it off.
In fact they were so loved that when the aisles were rebuilt in the next century they kept these intact.
Beautiful stonework
And part of the why is clearer here.
The stonework with that artful use of various colours surely gives a very pleasant buzz.
Ugborough Church rood screen
Wandering up the nave, taking enchanted joy in these arches and piers, the fifteenth century rood screen entices our attention. The middle portion has been cut down to the wainscoting, but the aisle parts are still up and running, though severely altered to conform to post-Reformation demands.
As an aside, the Rev Sabine Baring-Gould, a famous nineteenth century writer, said of the vicar who cut down the middle bit:
A pity he was not decapitated instead
Which coming from a priest of a religion of love and compassion… well, we all have our sins, there is that.
The tracery and the cornice carving
Though sins evaporate when a closer look comes into play, because the carving is just gorgeous.
That tracery, flowing upwards with little leaves elegantly sprouting off the inside of the mouchettes, or bigger leaves, and the stylised church windows at the top.
Then there is the intricate frieze, so well carved, dropped down from its higher position when the vaulting was taken down but still with the wow factor. Brilliant.
The colouring is more recent, but is just as tickety-boo as the older material.
Did I say brilliant?
Saints and real life on the wainscoting
Which is word I could use for the wainscoting paintings below, only I would have to double and redouble it. They are extremely so.
Here is St Sebastian, martyred around 282AD getting arrowed by, surprisingly, some sixteenth century archers. Not killed mind you, that would come later.
For the tale goes:
And the archers shot at him till he was as full of arrows as an urchin (hedgehog) is full of pricks, and thus left him there for dead. The night after came a christian woman for to take his body and to bury it, but she found him alive and brought him to her house, and took charge of him till he was all whole.
The Golden Legend, Jacobus de Voragine 1260
He then trotted back to the Roman emperor Diocletian, who had ordered his death, and who so very did not like Christians, to give him a soupçon of unsolicited advice about sinning.
Well, Seb was offed properly this time, no surprise there, but folk did talk. Who were these Christians, who preferred truth to death, caring to torture? And dare we be the same?
Pageants in Devon
The costuming is so well depicted, and the archer does seem in his sixteenth century Sunday best, which brings us to a fascinating point.
One thing that differentiates Devon rood screen paintings from Norfolk, the other main English region for painted rood screens, is that Devon tends more towards depicting pageants, playlets if you will. There is even a record or two of the painters being told to paint a pageant.
And these pageants, as well as the single figures, depict not so much the saints as people dressed up as saints to take part in religious procession processions or festivals.This is somewhat speculative, but would fit the paintings well, because the paintings were never prayed to as mini gods or goddesses, that would be heretical.
They were meant to call the saints to mind, so the faithful could meditate on their lives and pray for their intercession with the Divine. Never prayed to.
So what the faithful saw on the screens is what they saw in real life, which kinda makes sense as faith was life and vice versa, deeply and constantly.
Sybils and the end of the world
Apart from the pageants (yes, more than one) there are also these unusual figures surrounded, as ever, by superb carving.
They are generally thought to be the Sybils, pre-Christian prophetesses known in Greece and Rome and reckoned to have prophesied the coming of Christ, thus being high up on the Christian ‘Top ten things we adore about pagans’ lists. There were twelve of them, and all twelve are here.
Their identification as pre-Christian Christians, to put things a tad clumsily, had started by the fourth century, and was well off and running when Thommaso da Celano composed the Dies Irae in the thirteenth century (though he may well have been riffing off earlier versions).
It starts, in an English version somewhat artistically licensed:
Day of wrath and doom impending!
David’s word with Sibyl’s blending,
Heaven and earth in ashes ending!
How great will be the quaking,
When the Judge is about to come,
Strictly investigating all things!
Trans William Josiah Irons, 1849
And this is based on the prophecies of the Tiburtine Sibyl, just one of the band; somewhat hazily too, as there was a a lot of interpretative (to be kind) writing about her and the others in the Medieval.
They are not exactly rainbow and unicorns lyrics, which is lucky as they appear in the Requiem Mass (sung Mass for the dead).
Here too we see how the images and the prophecy all hang together, because the Sybils are holding Instruments of the Passion, things connected to Christ’s Crucifixion. From left to right: The Crown of Thorns, the Cross, a whipping post and a scourge.
Not forgetting that Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection were the sign of his true divinity and his future Kingship of the world…. Which would include him being that judge in the above prophesied Apocalypse. And whose crucifixion carving hung above this screen and loft, constantly reminding the faithful of the world to come.
It all holds together as a theology in images, and was surely meant to. This level of coincidence is mighty unlikely.
And it goes to show the sophistication and understandings that were in the deep rural here in Ugborough in the Late Medieval.
Even better, really, really bonny paintings to feed our love of the beautiful.
A parclose coat of arms
While up here, the southern Parclose, the screen dividing the south chapel from the chancel, is a proper wowser.
Just looking at the detailing on this coat of arms, the bird and snake either side and not forgetting our feathered friend on top of the helmet, as well as all the little critters on the shield. Original colouring too, I venture.
The tracery rocks as well, so take a gander when you can.
The arms are of the Fountain family a mile or so down the road.
The grand chancel
The chancel is a grand creation, full of goodly soft light…
The altar back
With a fine stone altar back, here one of the two dynamic carvings, this one showing the Resurrection and a bunch of Roman soldiers having a chronically rubbish day.
A couple of powerful fonts
In the south chapel is this chunky monkey, the Victorian font put out to pastures. I reckon it is dead stellar, I love the thick carving and the overall power.
The Norman font
The Norman font on the other hand has been brought back into service, its remaining carving deep and powerful. The rest has been destroyed, the best guess is that the present carved bit was up against a pillar or wall where it could not be got at.
It is local stone, and sometimes we forget the impact of all this local material being used. It would have been bringing the landscape into the church and making it sacred in a very wonderful way.
A beautiful thought.
Very special roof bosses
And so to the north aisle, close-focus binoculars or a good zoom lens can help out for here be even more treasure.
This is a beam roof, so-called because it is held up by beams unsurprisingly, one piece of architectural jargon even I can get my head around. And at the join of the beams and ribs are our usual suspects, roof bosses.
Though maybe ‘usual’ is not quite the right word here.
More than maybe, very definitely more…
St Eligius the Blacksmith
Because look at this sweeting, a real darling.
St Eligius, or Eloy, or Loy, (active in the seventh century) was the patron saint of, amongst others, blacksmiths, cattle and horses, and folk involved with both, like carriers and carters. Nowadays mechanics as well.
Here obviously he is a blacksmith, forging a horse shoe, part of his legend.
He was popular in Devon apparently, but why there is very rare depiction here is open to question. Speculatively there was a guild (like a little semi-private club) dedicated to him that paid for a bunch of work in the aisle and the church.
He was popular in Devon apparently, but why there is very rare depiction here is open to question. Speculatively there was a guild (like a little semi-private club) dedicated to him that paid for a bunch of work in the aisle and the church.
Though that horseshoe is rarity too. Round these parts they were still using oxen for fieldwork and carting; oxen need shoeing but their shoes come in two parts as the animals are cloven hoofed.
A sow and sinning
A bunch of piggies too, being so easy to raise for small holders, but as ever with church art the meaning is much deeper.
But look at the background. Oak leaves and acorns, which is more than a coincidence because pigs were herded into oak woods (plenty in the moorland valleys) to feast on the autumn acorns before being slaughtered for the winter.
Still done in Spain and Portugal, where there is a a premium price for the meat because of taste.
But here a more Christian meaning takes precedence, unsurprisingly in a church.
According to Sue Andrews in her well-argued thesis, a lot of these Devon roof bosses were intended to help the viewer reflect on their sins and thus become better folk as they looked up to heaven and prayed.
And the pig? Well listen to II Peter
It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than to have known it and then to turn away from the holy commandment passed on to them. Of them the proverbs are true: “A dog returns to its vomit,”and, “A sow that is washed goes back to her wallowing in the mud.”
II Peter 2, 21-22
Along with this came the trope of the piglets returning to the unwashed sow equating to a sinner returning to their sins, and so refers to knowing the Path of Christ but then returning to old sins, asking the viewer to answer honestly if this applies to them.
Not, I hasten to add, to make them feel all judged and guilt-ridden, but to help folk know those behaviours that tempt them away from the Divine, aiding them to keep on the path of faith.
Pride and vanity
Not forgetting the poshos, a surprisingly common target for the Medieval Church considering the importance of donations and status politics back then.
Here a fancy headdress and lapdogs (only for the richer folk) show that we are on the road to vanity and pride, very tempting exit ramps from the highway to the heaven.
There are a fair few of these bosses, all quality work, really very quality work, and most all reinforcing the Way to the Divine.
Fun through the centuries
While back outside again, on the south side, this laughing lovely is definitely bringing fun to the funtastic.
Quite possibly part of an earlier church, it sums up Ugborough church too, which is just immensely enjoyable with its stonework, screen, paintings, quarry glass windows (look in the gallery), fantastic roof bosses and more.
Few things are better than leaving a church with laughter in the soul.
Very few.
