Church Heritage Cymru 3642

A clas church once covering most of northern Ceredigion – a parish of 622 square km (240 square miles) and lasted as such until the C19.  The church was founded by St Padarn in the C6, the present church is C13 with a C15 chancel and is the successor to the foremost Celtic foundation in Wales – the site of the monastery founded by St Padarn, a missionary from Brittany in the mid C6 and its first bishop.  The bishopric lasted until c720 and the monastery was destroyed by Vikings in 987 and again in 1038.  In the C11 as a centre of learning Rhygyfarch wrote his ‘Life of St David’.  Its importance declined with the coming of the Normans in C12 and it was under royal control from mid C13.  Thomas Bradwardine was vicar in the early C14 and he went on to be Archbishop of Canterbury.  It was given to the Vale Royal Abbey in Cheshire and remained under its control between c1360 until 1538.  The Medieval Welsh Poet Dafydd ap Gwilym wrote his poem, ‘The Ladies of Llanbadarn’, in the 1340s.  In the C16 William Morgan who translated the Bible in to Welsh was vicar here. Repairs were carried out in 1813-16 during which time the Medieval screen probably was lost, the church was divided into the Capel hir (nave), Capel y dre -Capel Aberystwyth (North Transept), and Capel Clarach (South Transept).  By the middle of the C19 the church was in need of repair, R K Weston suggested repairs in 1848 but the work was not initiated.  In 1862 Revd John Pugh became vicar new plans were drawn up by W Butterfield, however, he resigned in 1867 rather than work again with the vicar of Aberystwyth Revd E Phillips.  It was not until 1868-84 that restoration took place by J P Seddon who had grandiose ideas but on a more down to earth level the nave walls were largely rebuilt and the porch replaced during the first phase, Thomas Williams of Cardiff being the contractor.  In the second phase 1878-80 the tower and transepts were restored and a short spire, similar to the original but slated not oak-shingled was built.   Roderick Williams was the contractor.  William Morris on behalf of SPAB had written to the vicar asking for less restoration.  Between 1880 and 1884 the chancel was restored.  Repairs and fittings were the work of Caröe & Passmore 1933-6 with further work by George Pace in 1960.  Peter Lord created an exhibition in the south Transept making use of the two C9-C11 crosses and a number of notable crafts people.

Reference
Buildings of Wales – Carmarthen and Ceredigion 2006

Cadw Listings Notice

The Penguin Book of Welsh Verse1967

The church was built from rubble stone with ashlar quoins and windows, a slate roof with coped gables.  There a fish scale pattern to the roof, the slates coming from Whitland Abbey.  The church is on a large scale with plan unbuttressed walls.  A Nave and chancel, north and south transepts, a large cross tower with a C19 recessed slated spire.  Strangely it is the porch which commands most respect made from Llanddewi Brefi Bluestones and the steps are Radyr stone.  The voussoirs are Anglesey Grit Stone and the inner arches are cut with Dundry Stone.  With the rebuilding and restoration fresh stone has replaced the original, the east window has jambs of red sandstone from the West Midlands and much of the tracery is Hollington Stone from Staffordshire, this has not stood the test of time and much has been replaced  with cream-coloured Grinshill stone (Shropshire).  The windows in the C13 tower are of yellowish Cefn Stone.

Reference

Buildings of Wales – Carmarthen and Ceredigion 2006
Cadw Listings Notice
Welsh Stone Forum No 7

The whitewashed plaster walls with large plain arches at the crossing.  All beneath roofs by Seddon, these become increasingly elaborate as they move into the chancel.  The nave roof is of 8x12 panels, boarded with bosses and brattished wall plates.  There are red marble steps to the crossing which has a chamfered angle to the northeast where there is a door for the tower stair.  The complex oak roof is in 9 panels with heavy beams and pendant bosses, the corner panels have fan vaulting on corbels while the other outer panels slope and the centre has a moulded roundel.  The transepts have boarded ceilings with heavier ribs 3x6 panels, each subdivided into four.  The ornate chancel roof has smaller panels along the ridge with a moulded rib and carved bosses and a brattished cornice to each side above a row of fan-vaults separating seven half-round panels with shield-bearing angels.  The north and south windows are in C15 red stone inscribed with the rebus and name of William Stafford abbot of Vale Royal Abbey.  The roof as is now seen is said to hide C15 arch-braced collar-trusses. 

The floors of the central aisle and the cross aisles are part of Seddon’s work – a fine mosaic floor with inset lozenge panels of fine encaustic tiles of a kneeling priest.  The chancel is entered over a red marble step with mosaics as in the crossing and encaustic tile panels of three-branch lamps, another marble step up onto the black marble chancel flooring in small paving slabs.  Three further marble slabs reach the sanctuary with paving of pink marble with black in square or zigzag patterns.  The fine reredos across the east wall is in red sandstone and white marble.  The red stone outer wall-panelling is in squares of rose and vine in a moulded frame.  There is a white marble shelf on brackets over pink marble framing behind the altar, the outer panels are white marble with a cross on a vine background.  A frame is stepped over the main reredos it is of 5 white marble inner panels which are separated by short half-octagonal red stone columns with ‘alpha’ and ‘omega’ at each end and three long panels, 2 of vine and on the central panel a passion flower.  Above these are three white marble lettered panels, two with ‘Laus Deo’ and the centre with ‘Gloria in excelsis Deo’. These are framed in a red stone.

The Fittings:

There is an octagonal C13/C14 ashlar bowl font with shallow pairs of pointed recesses on each face standing on a broad octagonal shaft and base also ashlar.  It has an oak and wrought iron C19 cover.

Seddon was responsible for the ornate pulpit from his 1879 work, it has a Beer stone ashlar Gothic drum with two cusped panels with carved stone reliefs of the Saints Jahn and Paul.  The carving being the work of H Stannus.  There are square rosettes and leaf-carving in flanking spandrels and a Gothic column with a large capital for a book rest.

The brass eagle lectern dates from 1906.

The pews in the nave are the work of Seddon in pitch pine with pegged tenon joins, the stalls in the crossing are more ornate with open-fronted kneelers and two reading desks with triple pointed arches to the fronts and scrolled tops to the uprights.

George Pace created the inner porch in oak with long narrow leaded lights from the 1960s.

Foster & Andrews of Hull built the organ in the south transept in 1885, it has a pine casing and painted pipes.

The timber altar is by Seddon with three panels each of 4 quatrefoils, round it the timber rails (also by Seddon) have an open grid within panels, the top openings cusped.

The lighting within the nave and transepts are the work of GG Pace.

In the north transept are fittings, the work of Caröe and Passmore and include a finely carved reredos with panelling on each side, altar, rials’ pews and kneelers, all in pale oak.  The caving on the reredos is of the Crucifixion, St Mary and St John

The south transept exhibition.

This area was designed by Peter Lloyd in 1989.  The pitch pine screen has etched glass panels of ‘winter’ and ‘spring’ with words by Dafydd ap Gwilym.  The white glazed tiled floor has a red border and surround two early crosses moved into the church in 1916.  The shorter one has crude roll-mould to a roughly hewn cross and probably dates between C9 and C11.  The taller Cross, the ‘Cross of St Padarn’ is of granite with Celtic interlacing in the panels down one face, the other more varied face is much eroded but has one crude human figure with a spiral across the body.  It is dated to C10.

There is a grey granite monolith seat, kneeler and altar, each of which are inset with gold-enamelled small tiles by Andrew Rowe.

There is an incised red line along the wall plaster with small enclosed chambers to each side, to the left an imitation pointed vault with a slate slab floor to the chapel of St Padarn with the St Padarn window, there is a porcelain panel by Gillian Still of St Padarn and the ordeal by boiling water.  Also, within the chapel is a low slate seat and a niche at the south end with etched red chi-rho symbols over a massive low slab altar with Alpha and Omega incised.

To the right are two small exhibitions room entered through a screen with 2 further etched glass windows by Peter Lord ‘summer’ and ‘spring’.  The Sulien room (a C11 Bishop of St David’s’) has an incised slate floor slab and lettered text around the walls from the Elegy of Rhygyfarch, both by Ieuan Rees.

The Stained Glass: ‘The Transfiguration’ John Pollard Seddon (designer) of S Belham & Co from a painting by Frederic Shields, 1884; ‘Christ with the Woman of Samaria, Simeon and Dorcas’, John Pollard Seddon (designer) of S Belham & Co, 1885; ‘Jonathan, David and Samuel’, Frederic Shields (designer) of S Belham & Co, 1884; ‘The Shunammite Woman and Her Son’, S Belham & Co, 1879, ‘Justice, Wisdom, Reverence, Love’, Hugh Arnold, 1904; ‘Faith’, to a design by Peter Lord William Morris & Co Westminster – Elizabeth Edmundson, 1988; ‘Moses, Abraham and David’. Heaton, Butler & Bayne, 1894; ‘Christ saves Peter from Drowning’, c1887; ‘Standing Figure’, Roy Lewis, 1963; ‘Music in Praise of the Lord’, John Petts, 1985; ‘The Nativity’, Heaton, Butler & Bayne, 1936; ‘Scenes from the Life of Elijah’, Heaton, Butler & Bayne, 1882; ‘Scenes from the campaign in Burma’, Celtic Studios, 1985; ‘Scenes from the Life of St Padarn, Elizabeth Edmundson, 1988; Christ with Mother and Children’, S Belham & Co, 1878; ‘St Padarn, St David and St Teilo’, Heaton, Butler & Bayne, c1930 and 1936; ‘Hope’ William Morris & Co (Westminster); ‘Summer’, Elizabeth Edmundson to a design by Peter Lord, c1988; ‘Autumn’ Elizabeth Edmundson to a design by Peter Lord, 1988.
There are ten bells, five cast by Abel Rudhall in 1749 and five cast by John Taylor & Co in 2001.

Reference
Buildings of Wales – Carmarthen and Ceredigion 2006

Cadw Listings Notice

A National Bell Register - George Dawson's Website - Homestead
Stained Glass in Wales