Saturday 11 August 2012

A Month in the Country



Another day, another crap photo.

Having transcribed the memorial of the previous two posts, I was strolling around the cemetery of South Wraxall church, waiting for H.I. to wrap up the final Summer School of 2012, when I came across this 19th century gravestone.

This inscription is on the side of the Forest of Dean sandstone slab, and the main inscription has sheared off the face in one thin piece, and is currently leaning up against the back.

It reads, 'Lloyd Bedwyn'.  That is not the name of the deceased, it is the name of the maker - Lloyd of Great Bedwyn, whose memorial masonry business is still running from behind the wonderfully eccentric shop-front in the village of Great Bedwyn, set in the heart of the ancient Savernake Forest, about 35 miles from South Wraxall and just the other side of Marlborough.


Over the years, the various generations of Lloyds have bolted interesting bits and pieces to the brick front of their shop and created a sort of roadside museum.  The only criteria for the collection is that the items are all made from stone, and include a massive slab which is the fossilised print of the foot of a huge dinosaur which stepped in the Jurassic mud of millions of years ago.

I was about to say that these rare set-ups are so English, but then I remembered having seen similarly eccentric establishments at the sides of roads in places like France, Eastern Europe and America in the past.  We certainly don't have the monopoly on eccentricity.

What is definitely uniquely English though, is the countryside in which the churches are set, and the churches themselves.  I can understand why the The Ragged Society of Antiquarian Ramblers spend most of their free time in them - I am always at peace and in a state of unhurried tranquility when wandering around the musty interior of a medieval church, despite having none of the convictions of a modern-day Christian, let alone the old, post Henry V111th, fire-breathing anti-Papist ones.

I have never quietly enjoyed myself at work so much as when I helped H.I. out with the Doom-Board restoration at Dauntsey, and we were both very sad when the work came to a close.

Even the architect commented that the work was very 'Month in the Country'.

9 comments:

  1. Surprising that Mr Bedwyn didn't use a more simple 'logo' to advertise his prowess. 11 letters must have been time consuming!

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    1. Simple logos were bonded mason's-marks and - as such - were never used my free men.

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    2. Oh, and by the way, it was Mr Lloyd - Bedwyn is the name of the village.

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  2. Why is it that when you click to enlarge certain pix, they stay the same bloody size? And always when you want to READ something!

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    1. In this case, it is because I ripped the photo of Lloyd's from Flikr, ignoring the dire warning about not doing so. I had to email it to myself, then drag it off. It wouldn't enlarge either.

      How dare someone claim the exclusive right to a crappy photo like that, of a high street shop which I could have taken a much better one of, had I been there? People are so arrogant, as I often say to the owners of shitty old cars which the alarm goes off on for no reason. "Who the HELL would want to steal this old heap?!" I shout at them.

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  3. Interesting Tom that you like churchyards because there are plenty of old gravestones for you to read and admire. I like them because of the wild flowers and wild life that might be found in them if some church official has not deemed it a good idea to have the grass cut every week.

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    1. I enjoyed the wildlife at South Wraxall too - not too well manicured, thankfully. I spent half an hour looking at the butterflies around the white buddleia, whilst listening to children playing nearby as House Martens flittered overhead. It's not all death and stone, you know.

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  4. You reminded me how I toured round Wales for quite a long time assuming Mynwent was a place and wondering why there were signs to Mynwent cemetery all over the country. I am definitely slow on the uptake.

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