Our December meeting was postponed for a month due to the excessive cold temperatures at night, so we were pleased to welcome in person Christopher Parkinson to talk about Collections of Stained Glass in Essex from late 12th Century to 1800. Christopher is the Essex recorder for the international CVMA project to record medieval stained glass, and as such has gained access to sites not normally open to the public. We started in Rivenhall, which was remodelled in the Gothic style in 1838-9 and gained a set of French stained glass dating from 12th Century to 16th Century after the Vicar, on a visit to France, purchased them from a parish church to facilitate roof repairs! Locally at St Mary’s Sheering, there is an example of complete glazing still insitu from 14th Century showing 8 out of 9 orders of Angels, the space precluding the 9th order! We then moved on to look at collections removed from their original buildings. These included Audley End House with heraldic glass from Chicksands Priory and former Audley End Almshouse with 15th to 17th Century glass. The local stately homes are another source of glass that has been collected and then dispersed and moved on, giving research challenges to recording provenance. Stisted All Saints has 14th to 16th century panels from Steinfeld Abbey in Germany that had been sold to an English dealer in 1530. Sir Thomas Neave of Dagenham Park had a Chapel of Ease built near the house and then filled it with his 16th -17th century continental glass collection. Hatfield Peverell has a set of glass thought to be from a Convent in the Netherlands. Old Harlow church suffered a bad fire in 1708 and to help reglaze the church local landowners donated their armorial glass panes but at a later date they were collected together in rear window. For Tolleshunt Major and Beckingham Hall it was a story of Essex’s loss as in 1550 the Beckenham family sold the hall and moved to Bishopsbourne in Kent, taking their glass with them and placing in their new parish church. He finished with just a peek of work from outside his timeframe. In a Colchester church there are panels by Pugin/ Hardman, obtained from a redundant Derbyshire church whilst Frinton obtained some 1862 William Morris glass from an auction. A very enjoyable evening with stunning photos of the glass windows scattered around the county and some remarkable stories of the panels history. We have no meeting in February but recommence with our short AGM and then a talk on Sworders history on Tuesday 21st March at 7.30pm. Quentin Spear
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