By C. H. Talbot, Esq. 357 
have been a deanery, and the religious character of the ornaments 
is so far in favour of that supposition, but not conclusive without 
other evidence. The whole of the work is Perpendicular, and prob- 
ably of one date. 
There is, in the street of Mere, what it is comparatively rare to 
find, a medizval shop,? of plain Perpendicular character. 
In Zeals House there remains a very fine roof, of the same date 
and class as in the two halls above noticed. The wind-braces, as at 
Woodlands, are foliated, and the cusps tipped with carved foliage, 
but this example is richer than the former, as the triangular spaces 
included by the principals, purlins, and wind-braces, are also foliated, 
which I do not remember to have seen in any other such roof. 
Stourton Church is a small one, principally Perpendicular, in a 
pretty situation. It retains a gable cross, of Early English character, 
at the east end of the nave. There is an effigy of a lady, of the 
fourteenth century, in the north aisle. It might easily be overlooked, 
as it is enclosed in a sort of a box, by one of the windows, and can 
only be seen by lifting the lid. The principal ornament of the 
-ehureh is the fine monument of Edward, fifth Lord Stourton, and 
his lady, Agnes Fauntleroy, 1535. It is an altar-tomb, with their 
effigies upon it. The architectural features are of that mixed Gothic 
and Renaissance character that came in in the reign of Henry VIII. 
Very near the church, just within the grounds of Stourhead, 
stands the old High Cross of Bristol, altered whilst it continued on 
its original site, and, when it was taken down, removed to this spot 
for preservation, but as it is not a local antiquity I do not give any 
description of it here. 
!T am informed by Mr. T. H. Baker, of Mere Down, that this barn, till within 
the last ten or twelve years, continued to be church property. Together with 
the yards adjoining it, and the farm house attached, it formed the homestead of 
the Parsonaye Farm. This makes it extremely probable that it had been 
originally the rectory house or deanery. This, together with other property in 
Mere, was sold by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and purchased by Miss 
Chafyn Grove, of Zeals House. 
2J think the name of the occupier is Maidment. Probably the finest specimens 
of such shops remaining in England are those in the Butcher Row at Shrewsbury, 
figured in Parker’s “ Domestic Architecture of the Middle Ages,” vol. iii., Part 
i, p. 36, 
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