DERBYSHIRE FONTS I 57 



The next font, in order of date, to be noticed is that of 

 FFENNY BENTLEY. Fig. 4. 



This is a remarkably rude specimen of very late Norman 

 workmanship, for the carvers of Transitional days seemed to 

 have secured more or less complete mastery over their tools. 

 It is most unlikely that this font is earlier in date than the 

 specimen at Winster. 



The Rev. Richard K. Bolton, writing in The Reliquary for 

 1900, says \ — 



" The font is the despair of archaeologists. Its only carving 

 is a five-leafed fieur-de-lys, and it seems to me to be Norman, 

 though defaced in the other panels, probably by Cromwell's 

 Commissioners." 



What there is to " despair of " in this font it is hard to 

 imagine ; it is also equally difficult to guess why a lily in a 

 pot — the symbol of the Blessed Virgin Mary — should be 

 described as "a five-leafed fleur-de-lys." It certainly is not the 

 living image of a lily, but it cannot be said to resemble the 

 " fieur " in the least. Fig. 4. 



The base, on which this lily is carved very deeply, has other 

 equally deep depressions in its sides, which do not seem to have 

 ever been otherwise than they are now, i.e., plain and bare. 



The bowl is very irregularly surfaced and may have been 

 maltreated, though of this there is no absolute proof. 



EARLY ENGLISH PERIOD. 



The Early English period must now be considered, as to this 

 period belong two fonts of which Derbyshire may well be 

 proud, viz., Ashbourne and Norton. Other somewhat similar 

 instances are at Bradley, Kniveton, Norbury, and Doveridge,* 

 all near the valley of the Dove, and much resembling that at 

 Ashbourne rather than that at Norton. 



The extraordinary dissimilarity between the Norman and 

 Early English styles is one of the curious points of our 

 ecclesiastical architecture ; the Transitional-Norman style did 



* There are, of course, other specimens, of but little interest, which are 

 scattered about the county. 



