Events

Professor Martin Biddle, a patron of FRPC, delivered our first Annual Lecture about St Wystan’s church crypt. He has a long association with the village, leading over a decade of archaeological digs around the church in the 1970s and 1980s.  He presented his latest thinking as a formal lecture followed by speaking to small groups in the crypt itself.

He pointed out that the eight flat pillars against the walls in the crypt were not bonded in and must therefore have been added later together with the four round spiralled pillars and corbelled ceiling. The quality of construction of the original structure and the fact that it is partially subterranean led him to conclude that it had started life as a mausoleum for Mercian Kings. Archaeological evidence of a drain outside the north eastern corner led him to the conclusion that it was open to the sky, or at least partially so, with no access other than from above. He was clear that the spiral design of the four later central pillars was heavily influenced by pillars in Rome, citing Trajan’s column and other churches as examples and noting that there was no evidence of a  twisted rope effect on the spirals at Repton. He had concluded that the mausoleum was separate from the earliest church and in line with it to the east. He noted that there is another small mausoleum to the west, but not quite in line with the church and crypt, which had later been re-used as a charnel house and covered by a burial mound.

At some point, the early church had been extended eastwards until it covered the mausoleum which became the crypt and included the part of the building which is now the chancel. At some point the pair of stairs were cut through the existing masonry giving access from the church.

It was fascinating, and greatly appreciated by the more than 150 people who came.