290. A MEDIEVAL OAK BENCH OR PEW CIRCA 14TH CENTURY, ENGLISH.

The slab-ends each with moulded inner and outer upper edges, the back with a conforming moulded top rail, atop a single board, the thick seat board with rounded front corners, 152cm wide, 29cm deep, 87cm high, the seat 46cm high.

Previously in connoisseur Mike Handford’s collection in Oxfordshire this pew is reputed to have originally come from Beauchief Abbey, South Yorkshire. The Abbey was founded in the 12th C and was dissolved and part demolished during the reformation in the 1530’s when this pew would have been removed. Research done by and for St Andrews Church, Great Durnford, see images and notes of the set of rough hewn “benches “ in the church which are dated to the 14thC and are among the earliest in the country, illustrate that this bench follows the same constructional and decorative techniques and is stylistically very similar.