Ixxxiv. FORD ABBEY. 



Having finished reading Mr. Heath's paper,* Mr. PENTIN read 

 a short paper written by Mr. L. B. Clarence on the Ford Abbey 

 Chapel bell. 



FORD ABBEY CHAPEL BELL. 



In the little bell-cot on the roof of the chapel- tower hangs a mediaeval bell a 

 pre-Reformation bell. Bell-founders before the Reformation very seldom put 

 their names on their bells, much less the names of churchwardens, or the doggerel 

 rhymes which we find on more modern bells. The founders, however, can usually 

 be identified by the lettering of their inscriptions, and various ornamental devices, 

 some of them known as foundry- marks, also cast upon their bells. 



The inscription and the ornaments on this Ford Abbey bell tell us that the bell 

 was cast by one of a family of Norwich bell -founders, who bore the surname of 

 Brasyer, a name derived from their craft, and who cast very fine and handsome 

 bells in thai city in the 15th and 16th centuries ; perhaps also in the 14th. 



A William Brasyer, of Nottingham, was admitted to the Freedom of Norwich in 

 1376. A Robert Brasyer was Mayor of Norwich in 1410, and two Richard 

 Brasyers, father and son, were casting bells there between 1456 and 1510. This 

 Ford Abbey bell may have been cast by any one of them ; and it is noteworthy as 

 the only specimen of their handiwork known to exist in this part of England. In 

 those days, when roads or rather tracks were rough and " foundrous," it was 

 a difficult and risky matter to convey a bell any long distance from the foundry, 

 unless water-carriage were practicable. Sometimes, there is reason to think, a 

 founder may have brought his materials with him to a distant parish and cast a 

 bell there, in situ, but seldom, or never at any very great distance from his foundry. 

 In all probability this Ford Abbey bell was cast at Norwich and conveyed by sea 

 to Lyme or Bridport, and so to Ford Abbey. 



The inscription on the bell is Leonine or rhymed Hexameter, in very handsome 

 Lombardic capital letters : 



FAC MAEGAEETA NOBIS HEC MUNEEA LETA, 



showing that the bell was dedicated to St. Margaret. 



Between the two halves of the hexameter are two grotesque leonine heads, one 

 of them in the centre of a cruciform ornament. On the waist of the bell is a 

 shield, bearing the ordinary device, or "foundry stamp," of the Brasyers; 

 three bells on a field adorned with something like sprigs of some plant. 



* Reference may be made to Mr. J. S. Udal's " Notes on the History of Ford 

 Abbey, and of the families who have possessed it since the Dissolution of the 

 Monasteries," printed in the Club's Proceedings, Vol. IX. Also to Mr. Heath's 

 forthcoming book on Ford Abbey (F. Griffiths, London, 10s, 6d. net), 



