Great Canfield, Essex

Great Canfield is cited as the location of a similar wall painting to that found in St. Mary's Belchamp Walter. The painting in question is that of the Virgin and Child and was identified as being similar by Dr Eve Baker when she performed restoration on the wall paintings in the 1960's.

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The Madonna and child

The description of the Madonna on the Great Canfield Parish Council website

I will have to dig back through my collection of church information sheets as I am not sure if I have one for St. Mary's Great Canfield. We have visited the church and can confirm that there is a similarity between the paintings in the two St. Mary's churchs.

The account on the Parish Council website, a page for the church, states that the Madonna dates from the early 1200's. There is no reference source only that the painting is nationally renown and that it had survived the Reformation due it being covered by the patron of the church at the time.

The list of vicars found in the chancel of St. Mary's

Background to this page

Having seen some of my history pages being found by those making an Internet search I have decided to add a bit more context on how the pages came about.

As part of my research I took a look at their websites, I was reasonably impressed. The site is based on a Weebly --- CMS platform.

The Canfield Website

Overall I am quite impressed with their website. It a Weebly CMS site and in a lot of ways some of the navigation is similar to what you see here.

The location of Listed Structures

" Note : The Ordnance Survey licence referred to on the maps is no longer valid. Great Canfield Parish Council is now a member of the Public Sector Mapping Agreement, licence number 0100052784 "

Great Canfield Castle

Below is a drawing of the earthworks reported in The Victoia History of Essex edited by ...... 1903 This was found when resarching High Sheriffs of Essex and was a reference link from the highsheriffofessex.com website.

Great Canfield Mount

" GREAT CANTIELD MOUNT.

By the Rev. E. A Downman.

The earthwork forming the remains of what is now called Great Ganfield Mount, is a good specimen of a special class of bygone fortifications. The largest and most perfect specimen in England and Wales is Pleshey, some nine miles East of Canfield in the same county, so that I shall call this class of camp the Pleshey type. The general form of these earthworks consists in a mound, either formed out of a natural hill as at New Radnor in Wales, or the local soil heaped up into a cone artificially as in this case at Canfield. Bound this mound is a deep trench or ditch in many instances containing water, and either entirely artificial, or where the bend of a river has been chosen, the wash of the stream has done part service for a ditch ; Clun Castle in Shropshire is such an instance. Near the mound, but separated by a portion of the ditch is the yard, generally also surrounded by a trench, which in every case runs into the moat or river guarding the mound. So we have in the Pleshey type, mound, yard and ditches. Some of the larger and more important strongholds as Pleshey, New Radnor, and Loddiswell, have in addition a large portion of ground also enclosed by a deep ditch. Canfield (considered by some to be a corruption of Campfield) has its mound 20ft. high above the level, 30ft. above its ditch in its present deepest portion. The castle yard, only two feet above the natural level, is protected not only by a ditch, but also a rampart 8ft. above the castle yard, 18ft. above the ditch, the whole forming an oval pinched in the middle, some 350 yards N. to 8. and 216 yards in its widest part E. to W. This camp or castle, whichever it should be rightly called, has no natural strength, neither could it have been at any

The Madonna and Child Wall Painting

The information on the Great Canfield Parish Council website for the church gives a little more information on the wall painting but does not discuss its heritage and how it was discovered.

" The greatest treasure of the church is the painting of the Virgin Mary and Child, which dates from the early 1200s, and is of county wide, if not, national renown. This was covered up during the Reformation and fortunately survived, although its survival remained unknown for several centuries afterwards. This led to the church being mistakenly dedicated to St Peter in 1876.
The name “St Mary” was restored after the painting’s rediscovery a few years later.

A visit to the church and a tour with the Church Warden revealed more information. The date of "early 1200's" would put the painting at the time of Matthew Paris.

Great Canfield, Essex

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