✠ Wot ye whi i stond
Here for i forswor mi fat ...
Ego Ricardus in
Angulo.
We made out the inscription without difficulty, all but the last word of the second line, which appears to begin “fat,” but the next letter or letters are undecipherable. We hazarded a guess that the missing letter might be “f” and that the word was intended for “faith,” but it might equally well have ended with the letters “her” and so have read “father.” At the time, however, we were inclined to the first rendering, and concluded that the head above was meant to represent a monk who had turned apostate, and, therefore, was placed there in the cold outside the church, and made, like a naughty boy, to stand in the corner.
This grotesque figure with the enigmatical inscription below greatly interested us, so much indeed that we resolved, if by any means it were possible, to obtain the correct interpretation thereof. But we found, somewhat to our surprise, that the few likely people of whom we inquired were not even aware of the existence of such a thing in their neighbourhood. However, after much searching, we heard of a certain learned Lincolnshire antiquary who had long and carefully studied the strange figure and legend; so on our return home we ventured to write and ask him if he could throw any light upon the subject. To our request we received a most courteous reply, an extract from which I hereby give, as it is of much interest, even if it does not actually determine the meaning of the curious bit of sculpturing: “It evidently records some local matter or scandal. Looking at the date of the building, and the history of the parish simultaneously, I find a Richard Welby, eldest son of Sir Richard Welby, lived then, and that for some unknown cause he was disinherited by his father and the estate went to his next brother. If he ‘forswor’ either ‘faith’ or ‘father,’ the disinheritance may be accounted for, and also its chronicle below this figure in a civilian cap (it may be either civilian or monkish, but I incline to the former). Of course this is only supposition founded upon dates and local history, and may be utterly wrong.”
A TOMBSTONE ENIGMA
The curious carvings and inscriptions that one comes upon ever and again when exploring rural England are a source of great interest to the traveller of antiquarian tastes, and there are many such scattered over the land of a most puzzling nature. Take the following tombstone enigma, for instance, to be found in Christchurch graveyard in Hampshire. Who will unravel the hidden import of this most mysterious legend? I have tried long and hard to arrive at some probable solution thereof but all in vain.
We were not slayne bvt rays’d,
Rays’d not to life,
But to be bvried twice
By men of strife.
What rest covld the living have
When the dead had none.
Agree amongst yov,
Here we ten are one.
H. Roger. died April 17. 1641.
I. R.
Then again in the church of Great Gidding—a village we passed a little to the left of our road before we reached Stilton—is another carved enigma consisting of the following five Latin words arranged in the form of a square thus:—
S A T O R
A R E P O
T E N E T
O P E R A
R O T A S