The St Eligius stone
Introduction
The photograph on this page of The St Eligius stone by Neil Owen as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk
The St Eligius stone
Image: © Neil Owen Taken: 18 Apr 2024
Set into the interior wall of the north porch is an old stone workpiece, depicting St Eligius (or Eloi) of sixth century France. He was said to have helped a blacksmith to shoe a recalcitrant horse. The saint, then Bishop of Noyon, removed the horse's leg, nailed the shoe on it and miraculously re-attached the leg to the bemused beast. The scene features this event, but has lost the heads - probably due to the destruction by Protestant iconoclasts after the Reformation. The stone was found in a wall when the church was rebuilt in the eighteenth century under Nathaniel Ireson's supervision. Despite the extensive demolition and rebuilding in 1887-89, it has been retained to the better illustration of this ancient church.
Images are licensed for reuse under creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0
Image Location
Latitude
51.055019
Longitude
-2.413855