A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



Chancel Arch, South Side. — Centre Capital, tree with winged dragon on each side ; ' 

 Right Capital, two beasts with their tails over their backs; Left Capital, foliage. 



Nave Arch, North Side. — Centre Capital, grotesque head with foliage issuing from the 

 mouth ; Right Capital, ditto ; Left Capital, bird pecking at the eye of a serpent whose body is tied 

 in a Stafford knot in two places. 



North Arch, South Side. — Centre Capital, foliage ; Right Capital, two birds pecking at 

 fruit ; 2 Left Capital, foliage. 



North Transept Arch, East Side.' — Centre Capital, winged dragons with scaly bodies, 

 teeth and claws, having their tails knotted together ; Right Capital, man and two beasts (restored) ; 

 Left Capital, man bending down and cutting branch of tree with pruning hook.'' 



North Transept Arch, West Side. — Centre Capital, foliage; Right Capital, beast; Left 

 Capital, foliage. 



Capitals at Wakerley Church 



South Transept Arch, East Side. — Centre Capital, man with basket in his right hand 

 gathering fruit from tree with left hand ; ^ Right Capital, beast biting its tail ; L'ft Capital, beast 

 with human head and dragon with its tail tied in a Stafford knot. 



" Perhaps this may have the same meaning as the tree with a beast on each side of it already referred to 

 when describing the font at Harpole. 



2 Possibly intended for a pair of doves and a bunch of grapes, as on the font in Winchester Cathedral. 



5 These capitals have been much restored (Sweeting, Parish Churfhcs in and around Peterborough, I 868, 17). 

 * This resembles one of the labours of the twelve months or four seasons taken from the ecclesiastical 



calendars. 



6 Notwithstanding the crude way in which this subject is treated, it is evidently the lineal descendant of the 

 vintage scenes which are so common in early Christian art of the first four centuries, and which in their turn 

 were evidently borrowed from pagan classical sources. It will be noticed that although in the process of suc- 

 cessive copving the proper form of the vine leaf has been entirely lost, yet the bunches of grapes (being the more 

 essential feature) are still represented with sufficient realism to be easily identified. Any doubt that the tree 

 here shown is really intended for a vine will be removed by comparing the scene depicted on the capital at 

 Castor with an exactly similar subject sculptured at Vezelay in France (see the Builder, 20 December, 18S4), 



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