The Corpus of
ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE
in Britain & Ireland
The Corpus of
ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE
in Britain & Ireland
Dinnington is a village in the South Somerset district of the county, 5 miles E of Chard and on the Fosse Way(now just a minor road at this point). The village is clustered on the Roman road and a network of side roads. The church is on the E edge of the village, and comprises just a 2-bay chancel and a 3- bay nave, with a S porch and a bell-cote on the W gable, all in Hamstone ashlar. It is mostly 15thc in date and was restored in 1863. The only Romanesque feature is the font.
Siward, one of the king’s thegns, held the manor of Dinnington in 1086. It consisted of 3 hides of which 3 virgates were held from the church of Glastonbury, the rest directly from the king. It also contained 8 acres of meadow, pasture 3 furlongs by 2, and woodland also 3 furlongs by 2. It had been held by Eadmaer before the Conquest.
The font is located in NE corner of SW part of church defined by central aisle & an aisle from the S door. It is in hamstone or similar & in good condition: clean & tidy (just one of the rim billets cut out), except that the moulded base is somewhat disfigured by damp mould. The font surface is finely polished, there being no obvious signs of tooling.
The substantial square plinth has the unusual feature of an overhanging upper edge. Unfortunately, but not too disastrously, a small portion has been cut off to make room for flooring timbers. The moulded cylindrical base of the stem is a strong & handsome example in the attic form. The scotia is very boldly recessed to make a water-holding profile. At the top of the cylindrical stem, articulating the junction with the bowl, there is necking in the form of a toroid ring. The bowl carries around its middle a strong cable in very good condition. The top edge of the bowl has been neatly cut back at well-chosen intervals to make billets. The internal face of the cuts is at a chamfer angle, so that the billets are triangular in profile. I know of no local analogues for this decoration. There is no lead, although there is clear provision for it in the rebating of the inner edge of the rim. The internal sides of the bowl drop to a flat bottom. The external sides taper in at the bottom.
| Depth of basin | 0.23m |
| Height of base | 0.14m |
| Height of bowl (including torus below) | 0.38m |
| Height of plinth | 0.20m |
| Height of stem | 0.17m |
| Overall height of font | 0.93m |
| Circumference of base | 1.52m |
| Circumference of bowl | 1.80m |
| Circumference of stem | 1.00m |
| Exterior diameter of bowl | 0.59m |
| Interior diameter of bowl | 0.465m |
English Heritage Listed Building 264091
N. Pevsner, The Buildings of England: South and West Somerset. Harmondsworth 1958, 149.
Somerset County Council, Historic Environment Record 56686.
Victoria County History: Somerset, IV (1978), 147-51.
Comments/Opinions
The EH list description describes the font as 'apparently C13, possibly recut,' and it is not mentioned in Pevsner. It appears to this author to be typically Norman and 12thc. There is no clear indication of much, if any, recutting, and if this has been done, the original design has probably been respected.