Hemington, North Somerset

Hemington didn't seem to be hugely bigger than Hardington Bampfylde, but its church is just massive. It's got aisles, and a sort of chapel open to the south side of the altar. The latter was where we found the excellent Norman font with its petally scallops. Pevsner calls the decoration 'lobes'. Sometimes I think he just didn't care about Norman fonts at all :) But I mustn't feel too irritated by him as his books are essentially the reason B and I have found so many interesting places to visit. And at least we have the luxury of enjoying wherever we go. His explorations for the books must have turned into sheer slog. Monetarily rewarded slog of course. With the opportunity for the occasional sarcastic remark. But slog nonetheless. "Right let's go, we've got 15 more to do before teatime."

The chancel arch is Norman in style too, but very sharply carved, to the extent where we were doubting its age. It's not got the personalised soft variety of the carving of the font. But I was kind of swung by the slight asymmetricalness of the design of the capitals - the pairs to left and right don't quite match. Plus there are traces of bright paint on them - does that not indicate their Normanness? I don't know. The age of the foot of the columns seems easier to acknowledge, again asymmetrical with chevrons on one of them. And what's that... yep at the bottom of one of the ones on the left, there's a strange little head. It reminded us a little of the "minute face" at Maperton. 

 

What an unexpected and curious thing. What a nice thing that the carver of the columns stole the opportunity to add this little character. It rather humanises the otherwise quite severe archway. What did it mean to people of the time I wonder? It's tempting to read something un-Christian into it, something to do with spirits being in everything around us. But you can't imagine that would have been entertained at all, though is it possible that Evil spirits might be lurking about. I don't know. I liked the little face though. I gave it a proper dusting. In fact there were lots of interesting carvings in Hemington, a whole row of them along the south aisle, though not as old. 

And another thing we appreciated about Hemington was its toilet, unlocked. Such a boon to the fonting traveller. I'm not kidding. It was also nice to have a look through the ferns in the little well opposite the church. The watery theme continued as we drove up out of the village and spotted water pouring out of the roadside at the top of the hill. We had to stop. It was a liverwort jungle, and with such a soothing sound.