Built (or, rather, rebuilt) in about 1400 in the English Perpendicular style, it features an architectural specialism of East Anglia: a ceiling decorated with carved wooden angels:
"Angel roofs" are not common, but nor are they rare as hen's teeth. Lynn's example is particularly fine.
Each of the individually carved angels has its own personality:
Each is a delightful late Medieval sculpture in its own right:
However, I have to concede that my home town's angel roof is by no means the finest in the land. That honour may well go to St Wendreda's, in the heart of The Fens in the tiny town of March:
I have to say, from the outside St Wendreda's looks like a bog standard High Victorian lumpen confection, but from the inside...
Yeah, that angel roof is in a different league:
While the individual carvings at Lynn may be finer, the sheer volume of March's Heavenly Host simply overwhelms the opposition -- there are no fewer than 120 carved angels here.
John Betjeman described the roof as being worth cycling 40 miles against a head-wind to see. I think he was right.
4 comments:
It's a bit of a worry that angels are aerodynamically impossible: a three metre wingspan will support only about two kilograms of mass in the air. Unless, of course, angels, being spiritual entities, have no mass; in which case why do they need wings at all? Google was no help. Clearly there's an opportunity for a PhD in aeronautical engineering here.
But, yes Mr Betjeman, I agree.
I love these buildings which are one thing on the outside and something much more interesting or outrageous on the inside. And you've certainly got one there!
Now I wouldn't want to desecrate it or anything, of course - but it would look good as a vampire location!
Fantastic. There must have been a lot of trees in Norfolk in the XVth century.
thanks so much for this post! :-)
I wasn't even aware of the existence of this kind of ceiling. your blog always does it for me. thanks :-)
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