A Brass once in Biggleswade Church

Abstract

The fine large church of St. Andrew, Biggleswade, in Bedfordshire, is described in the V.C.H. of that county (i, 213). In the course of last century it suffered a devastating restoration, one of the results of which was the almost total destruction of an interesting monumental brass which was lying in a large Purbeck slab in the midst of the chancel, being the memorial of a distinguished cleric who had the prebend of Biggleswade in Lincoln Cathedral. This brass had attracted the attention of Gough, who devotes a page of his second volume to illustrating it. This page is reproduced without its margin in pl. XLVIII. The margin only shows the reference at top to pl. CII, and to the page 273 of the volume, and below notes that the drawing was done by Schnebbelie and the engraving by Longmate. The slab as shown is very large, being 11½ ft by 5½ ft. Haines in part ii of his Manual (1861) describes the brass, stating that though the effigy and canopy with SS. John Baptist, Anna, Elizabeth, and Mary of Egypt were lost, yet figures of death, angels, etc., inscription in sixteen Latin verses and mutilated marginal inscription in ten Latin verses remained, and that the slab had been powdered with crescents and escallops, all lost but two. Sir A. W. Franks, in Proceedings, vi, 311, notes that the effigy was kneeling.