Wednesday 9 October 2019

St Margaret South Elmham

This is the church I visited after the book sale a couple of weeks ago. I'm glad I had a map as there are so many little lanes in the area.



A small church
With a two storey porch, the upper storey was often used to store the churches silver and parish records


Flint everywhere of all colours, the tiny window are for the stairs going up into the tower

Inside it's just a small plain church

 The reason this church gets a mention in the 100 treasures is because of this feature. The Easter Sepulchre. An arched recess in the wall of the sanctuary with a shelf where every Good Friday, some of the consecrated bread from the Mass was placed and then brought back to the altar on Easter Sunday morning , symbolising the burial of Jesus in the tomb or sepulchre.


Even small village churches have beautiful stained glass

There are often small doors in churches, this one leads up to the tower. The bell ringers stand at the base  of the tower to ring the bells in this church.


And John Sellynge  left his mark with C16 graffiti on the stonework above the door

 Old well carved font with Harvest Festival decorations

Small stairs going up inside the wall leading nowhere now and too small for modern day people to climb. Maybe this church had a rood-loft at one time (A gallery, or platform, at the top of a rood screen, used for the rood (crucifix) and sometimes for musicians or singers. Most rood lofts and most roods, were destroyed during the Reformation.)


In the porch a reminder of village punishment from earlier times  - The Stocks


Back Tomorrow
Sue

9 comments:

  1. Those tiny stairs look just like the staircase leading up to the bell chamber in our local bell tower {which stands independently of the cathedral} Definitely not built for people today. It is bordering on claustrophobic climbing up.

    ReplyDelete
  2. For a small church it has a lot of interesting features.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Another fascinating church full of history. The work they used to put into these buildings, both big and small was incredible.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Lovely pictures of the church Sue I can almost smell that lovely "old building" smell which I love. People must have been so much smaller years ago those stairs are incredible and there is certainly no room for the bell ringers to put on weight! xx

    ReplyDelete
  5. I really enjoy the posts of your visits to Suffolk churches, Sue. They are really wonderful places and full of history. Your photos are lovely too! Thanks for another tour

    ReplyDelete
  6. Such a lovely church. You find the most interesting places to photograph and share with all of us.

    God bless.

    ReplyDelete
  7. What a pretty church. I miss the flint walls of Wessex so nice to see your Suffolk examples.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Thank you for sharing another wonderful church. Amazing finds in these parishes.

    ReplyDelete