Historical evidence comes in many forms: written records, memories, landscapes, artifacts, and memorials.
Kent has more remaining brasses showing the human form than any other county, almost 400. All parts of the county provide examples. Particularly numerous series are at Lydd, Dartford, Margate, Biddenden, and Cobham, the last having more brasses than any other church in the world. In addition, there are some 350 inscriptions without effigies. The period covered is wide. An early head of a priest at Ashford may date from the late 1200s, while the last brass made before the 19th century revival shows Benjamin Greenwood in his Georgian frock coat of 1773 at St. Mary Cray.
Evidence exists to be used. Brasses show us the evolution of language among the articulate classes with Norman French on early inscriptions at Cobham and Mereworth. From the late 14th century onwards, Latin becomes the normal language to be supplanted gradually by the English of Piers Plowman and Chaucer, evolving to the usage of the 18th century.
Calligraphy students were studying the Lombardic lettering on a fine brass in King's Lynn when I visited recently. Students in Kent would find the same lovely medieval lettering at East Wickham, Cobham, and Cliffe at Hoo (where only the letter shapes remain). By 1350, another alphabet was superseding the Uncial or Lombardic. Black letter scripts were at first somewhat rounded as at Saltwood in 1370. By 1426, the inscription of Richard Ecclesly at East Peckham was straight lined as it would remain throughout the century. The late Tudor period showed a more rounded but still Black Letter script as at Nonnington, next Sittingbourne. At Boughton under Blean, a 1591 inscription to Cyriac Pettitt provides another example of the script together with a few words in Roman lettering which by the time of James Craddock's cross at Ightham in 1626 was in general use.
Evidence of theological change is also shown by brasses and absence of brasses. The total absence from Canterbury and Rochester cathedrals is not the work of time and wear alone. The remaining indents provide clues that the iconography of many brasses was not acceptable to Protestant thinking. Memorials of monks and nuns vanished with the dissolution of the monastic houses in the period 1530-40. A clue to what had been was recently provided by the recovery of a single letter from a former brass at Lillichurch Priory, Lower Higham. At Cobham, Dame Joan offers indulgence to those saying appropriate prayers for her soul. Numerous inscriptions begin with 'orate pro anima', a sentiment unlikely to commend itself to Puritan England. The prayers to saints clearly seen at Upper Hardres where John Strete asks for the help of St. Peter and St. Paul were also a feature of medieval piety made obsolete by the new thinking. Realistic representation of bodily decay accorded better with Reformation teaching. Were Richard Notfield's skeleton of 1446 at Margate or Joan Marey's at Sheldwich, 1441, in a shroud following the new pattern of realism or are they evidence of the survival of Lollardy in Kent?
Differences of manufacture are represented in Kent. The beautiful brasses at Minster in Sheppey are probably of Flemish workmanship. London workshops, however, were responsible for the great majority of Kentish brasses. These range in quality from the restrained dignity of the early knights at Addington and Seal to the later down-market products at Snodland and Brenchley. A workshop probably functioned at Canterbury between 1525 and 1555. Its products, in which Kent can take little pride, can be seen at Mersham and Leeds among many other places.
Easier to recognize are sequences of the costume of men and women, from East Wickham in 1325 to St. Mary Cray in 1773. The quite extraordinary styles of ladies' head-dresses and the rapid change in men's dress in Tudor times are features of particular interest. No less fascinating is the evolution of armour. That of Sir William Septvans, 1325, at Chartham, is not so very different from the armour shown on the Bayeux Tapestry. At Ulcombe, Sir Ralph St. Leger wears plate armour at its most exaggerated. The fine brass of Sir Edward Filmer at East Sutton shows armour of the Civil War period in great detail. Space restricts mention of the interest brasses hold for art historians, genealogists, and students of heraldry.
Any or all of these facets of this Kentish treasury provide a reason for a series of summer journeys of discovery to include the more remote and least known corners of the county.
A sample of brasses from Kent and almost every other county in England can be seen at my exhibition at Rochester Cathedral (South Transept) from June 1st - 7th inclusive. Philip Lawrence
