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Unusual Animals On A 14th Century Pulpit (Wiltshire)

Dickydevo

Dickydevo

Gone But Not Forgotten
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http://history.wiltshire.gov.uk/com...ce=&order=community, image_date DESC&dir=Next

I lived in Bishopstone,Wiltshire between about 1970 and 1996 and took this photo in about the early 1990s,showing two animals,the identity of which I would like to know,on the pulpit of St John The Baptist`s Church there.The pulpit dates from the 14th Century and parts of it were said to have come from Spain.The above link tells more about the church.
image-1.jpg
 
They look like a stylised dragon and lion, carved by someone who has clearly never seen a lion before.
 
I forget the difference between a dragon and a wyvern right now... the 'dragon' there I am am sure I have seen a similar one to it on the outside of Glasgow cathedral.
 
Dragon - 4 legs
Wyvern - 2 legs
 
According to items located on the 'Net ...

The current pulpit (as a whole) dates from the early 19th century. It was donated / commissioned by Rev. George Montgomery. Some or all the panels came from fragments collected by Montgomery. According to an article in _The American Architect and Building News_ (Vol. LIV - No. 1084), Montgomery brought the panels from Flanders and Spain. The Spanish panels are noted as being 17th century in origin.

I can't find anything specifically relating to the animal figures, and multiple sources refer to Montgomery as the source of the panels (without any mention of the non-panel pieces). Absent reference to their coming from Montgomery, the animal carvings might be early 19th century items created for the pulpit.

There are additional photos of the pulpit to be found out on the 'Net, but none (I've found ...) provide closer looks at the animal figures. Based on some of these other photos the crouching / lower figure looks like a stylized dog to me.
 
Probably a dragon, and possibly a leopard - the latter were way more common in menageries back then than lions, being easier to domesticate. King John kept them in his zoo at the Tower of London. IIRC in Persia they were trained for hunting, as were cheetahs elsewhere.
 
EnolaGaia said:
According to items located on the 'Net ...

The current pulpit (as a whole) dates from the early 19th century. It was donated / commissioned by Rev. George Montgomery. Some or all the panels came from fragments collected by Montgomery. According to an article in _The American Architect and Building News_ (Vol. LIV - No. 1084), Montgomery brought the panels from Flanders and Spain. The Spanish panels are noted as being 17th century in origin.

I can't find anything specifically relating to the animal figures, and multiple sources refer to Montgomery as the source of the panels (without any mention of the non-panel pieces). Absent reference to their coming from Montgomery, the animal carvings might be early 19th century items created for the pulpit.

There are additional photos of the pulpit to be found out on the 'Net, but none (I've found ...) provide closer looks at the animal figures. Based on some of these other photos the crouching / lower figure looks like a stylized dog to me.
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Thanks very much for this info.
 
Having glanced through some pictures of carved leopards in churches, they often seem to have spots indicated on them. The almost human head of the feline creature and the apparent grin (as far as is I can make it out from this angle) makes me wonder whether it's a manticore. However, it also looks as though its tongue might be protruding a bit, which makes it more likely to be a pard.

EDIT: This shows the creatures a little more clearly.
pulpit1_zps447231f8.jpg

I'm betting the fella on the left is a dragon or wyvern. The one on the right seems to have human like ears. Could it be an ape?
 
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Take a look at some of the stone carvings on the pillars at All Saints Curch at Burton Dassett, Warks. They have some weird dragons and all manner of beasts that make the place seem almost pagan. This reputed Templar church also bears a Green Man carving.
 
That used to be my local! I had no idea it was possible Templar church.
 
OneWingedBird said:
I forget the difference between a dragon and a wyvern right now... the 'dragon' there I am am sure I have seen a similar one to it on the outside of Glasgow cathedral.
Click to expand...
A true dragon has four legs and two wings. The wyvern only has two legs and two wings. Dragons were gigantic with some said to run into hundreds of feet, wyverns much smaller, 30-40 feet. Lazy film makers are forever fobbing us off with wyverns instead of dragons, the worst culprit being peter Jackson's bastardization of Smaug in his bastardization of the Hobbit.
 
lordmongrove said:
A true dragon has four legs and two wings. The wyvern only has two legs and two wings. Dragons were gigantic with some said to run into hundreds of feet, wyverns much smaller, 30-40 feet. Lazy film makers are forever fobbing us off with wyverns instead of dragons, the worst culprit being peter Jackson's bastardization of Smaug in his bastardization of the Hobbit.
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This is being a little unfair to filmmakers. Successful filmmakers are rarely characterised as being lazy. Most are noted for their energy and dedication to detail. The only job they have to perform when designing their dragons is of making them look cool, a task fulfilled in the two bipedal examples that spring immediately to mind, Peter Jackson's Smaug and that one from Dragonslayer. Filmmakers have no duty to adhere to an imagined taxonomy for mythical beasts, when it's unclear to what extent even those who believed in the creatures centuries ago were aware of such distinctions. To be honest, I've pointed out to people in a self-satisfied tone that a supposed dragon is actuality a wyvern, but when I was in my teens. Strict taxonomy and morphology for draconids is for those designing role-playing games, in my opinion.

Edited a little to put right the typos of a work distracted brain
 
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PeteByrdie said:
Right! So we three are the only three humans in this dimension's version of Earth not to have seen Game of Thrones. Anyone else (in this dimension) will just have to go and see it as I'm not updating this again.
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Four!

I did see a bit of a repeat somewhere. But not a full episode.
 
I demand admission - never seen a moment of it.

Personally, given that I take dragons to be ancient imaginings of dinosaurs via their fossils, I'm perfectly satisfied with any cinematic depiction of roughly dinosaur size. I think the mythological waters are muddied by the fact that there are two overlapping tendencies in old tales. In some cases they are presented as immense beasts - monsters if you will but still flesh and blood creatures - while in others they are put to metaphorical work as instantiations of either the landscape itself or powerful forces such disease, sin or alternative peoples and beliefs; in this latter case, it makes sense for them to be unquantifiably large - more like a storm or an earthquake than an animal you could 'see' in its entirety.
 
The Dragon. A beast of such power...

...that if you were to see it whole and complete in a single glance...

...it would burn you to cinders.

Where is it?

It is everywhere. It is everything. Its scales glisten in the bark of trees. Its roar is heard in the wind. And its forked tongue strikes like....

Like lightning.

Yes, that's it.
 
PeteByrdie said:
This is being a little unfair to filmmakers. Successful filmmakers are rarely characterised as being lazy. Most are noted for their energy and dedication to detail. The only job they have to perform when designing their dragons is of making them look cool, a task fulfilled in the two bipedal examples that spring immediately to mind, Peter Jackson's Smaug and that one from Dragonslayer. Filmmakers have no duty to adhere to an imagined taxonomy for mythical beasts, when it's unclear to what extent even those who believed in the creatures centuries ago were aware of such distinctions. To be honest, I've pointed out to people in a self-satisfied tone that a supposed dragon is actuality a wyvern, but when I was in my teens. Strict taxonomy and morphology for draconids is for those designing role-playing games, in my opinion.

Edited a little to put right the typos of a work distracted brain
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Every drawing Tolkien did of Smaug shows him as a true dragon with four legs and two wings. Jackson's bastardization makes him looked like a plucked chicken. Add to that he's brown instead of golden red. He also screwed with the plot so much and padded it so much that it became unwatchable. One of the most magnificent monsters and coolest books reduced to excrement by Hollywood (like so many other comics, books and TV shows raped by that hollow, worthless institution). True, four footed, two winged dragons are known as far back as Babylon and ancient China from carvings and pottery. The wyvern did not emerge until medieval Europe.
 
Yithian said:
I demand admission - never seen a moment of it.

Personally, given that I take dragons to be ancient imaginings of dinosaurs via their fossils, I'm perfectly satisfied with any cinematic depiction of roughly dinosaur size. I think the mythological waters are muddied by the fact that there are two overlapping tendencies in old tales. In some cases they are presented as immense beasts - monsters if you will but still flesh and blood creatures - while in others they are put to metaphorical work as instantiations of either the landscape itself or powerful forces such disease, sin or alternative peoples and beliefs; in this latter case, it makes sense for them to be unquantifiably large - more like a storm or an earthquake than an animal you could 'see' in its entirety.
Click to expand...

Many early dragons were thought of as gods or god like beasts rather than mortal monsters. I've written and research widely on the topic for years and concluded that dragon lore stems from a number of different things including large reptiles of known and unknown type, discovery of large fossil bones and for want of a better word 'paranormal' manifestations.
 
lordmongrove said:
Many early dragons were thought of as gods or god like beasts rather than mortal monsters. I've written and research widely on the topic for years and concluded that dragon lore stems from a number of different things including large reptiles of known and unknown type, discovery of large fossil bones and for want of a better word 'paranormal' manifestations.
Click to expand...

Is any of your writing on this topic online?
I'd be interested to read it.
 
Yithian said:
Is any of your writing on this topic online?
I'd be interested to read it.
Click to expand...
His book, Dragons: More than a myth is a fairly wide ranging examination of the subject. It could have done with a little more proofreading, which seems to be a common issue with books these days (is it because more are self-published?), and it can be a slog in places reading through eyewitness reports, but I enjoyed the read.
 
lordmongrove said:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/095128729X?keywords=dragons more than a myth&qid=1443360747&ref_=sr_1_1&s=books&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Explore-Dragons-Richard-Freeman/dp/1872883931/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1443360803&sr=1-1&keywords=explore dragons

Shameless plug!
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Dragons: More than a myth? Paperback – 12 Jun 2005
by Richard Freeman (Author)

10 customer reviews

Four teenage boys are dragged to their deaths by a reptilian monster that emerges from a fog-bound sea off the coast of Florida.

In the north-east of England, a shadowy cult is rumoured to have sacrificed human victims to a dragon-god well into the 20th century.
In New Guinea, giant lizards with huge teeth and claws kill dozens of villagers and send the natives into a panic.

In the Gambia, an enraged dragon smashes a bridge, tipping people to their doom.

These all sound like the scripts for horror films or novels, but they are all alleged to have actually happened - and furthermore, well within living memory. From our earliest childhood, we are taught that dragons are imaginary beasts; the stuff of myths and legends, yet these most ancient of monsters are still being reported from all corners of the globe in this, the age of reason. Could the dragon legends have a basis in fact?

Richard Freeman, cryptozoologist, author, explorer, adventurer, and Zoological Director of the world’s largest mystery animal research organisation, follows this uber-monster right across the globe, from prehistory to the present day. He tracks it from the steamy jungles of the Congo, to the desolate lakes of eastern Siberia.

The dragon rears its scaly head in every culture on Earth; from the Indians to the Australian Aborigines, and from the Vikings to the Pygmies. The inescapable conclusion is that there are very real beasts at the core of these fantastic stories.

The dragon has its teeth and claws deep into the collective psyche of mankind, and it’s not about to let go. Our most ancient fear still stalks the earth today. Beware. This is no fairytale! When your parents told you that there were no such things as dragons, they lied

Sounds good!
 
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