Firebacks

Description: Cavetto-canted arched rectangle; twisted rope edging, separately around rectangle and arch; initials 'R' and 'H' in upper left and right corners of rectangle; 'M' above date in arch.

Notes: The arch does not appear to have been a separate stamp, although the rope edging gives that impression; the initials, in triad, suggest a husband and wife - R.. and H.. M..

Inscription: M / 1654 / / R H

Description: Pentagonal; convex, twisted cloth edging with inner fillet; Tudor royal shield, garter, crown and supporters (crowned lion and dragon); initials split by crown; date split by garter buckle.

Notes: Royal arms of Queen Elizabeth I; uncommon edging.

Inscription: E R / HONY SOIT QVI MAL Y PENSE / 1585

Arms: Tudor royal (Elizabeth I)

Description: Arched rectangular shape with stepped angles; twisted rope edging (top and sides); small flower bud stamp repeated inside edging, with ‘pineapple’ stamp repeated inside; lower part comprises three concentric half-rectangles formed from undulating vine strips and repeated ‘pineapple’ stamp; above, three vertical vine strips with parallel ‘pineapple’ stamps, human face stamps above them; two diagonal vine strips below the vertical strips.

Notes: A most remarkable fireback, incorporating stamps seen on other firebacks.

Description: Rectangular; top panel with bearded face between symmetrical horizontal scrolls, and faces at either end; scrolls are repeated below, on either side of the date, all above a horizontal double fillet; below, a pair of arches with guilloche decoration between fillets, and toothed on the underside, are supported on each side by Tuscan columns, also with guilloche decoration; this is repeated in symmetrical rectangular panels on either side; at the centre base a bulbous nozzle protrudes.

Notes: This is a smith's forge fireback, the nozzle being the tuyere directing the air into the fire from bellows behind. Stylistically similar to the Lenard and other firebacks of the same period, the carved elements above the nozzle may have been cast from a pattern inspired by the back of a joined 'wainscot' chair, with the date inserted. The back may have been used for forging non-ferrous metals as there was a trade in pot-founding in bronze as well as iron at some ironworks in the Weald. Formerly part of the Ade Collection (from Grove Hill, Hellingly, Sussex).

Inscription: 1655

Description: Carved wooden fireback pattern. Cavetto-canted rectangle with arch; ovolo-moulded edging; shield, garter, helm, mantling, crest, motto and supporters of William Cecil, 1st Lord Burghley, KG (1520-98). Date below garter.

Notes: William Cecil was Queen Elizabeth I's first minister. Owing to Lord Burghley's motto being merely painted and not carved, as the Garter motto is, the primary purpose of this armorial was probably decorative, and its role as a pattern for firebacks secondary.

Inscription: HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE / COR VNVM [ET] VIA VNA / 15 75

Arms: William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, KG

Description: Cavetto-canted rectangle with arch; ovolo-moulded edging; shield, garter, helm, mantling, crest and supporters of William Cecil, 1st Lord Burghley, KG (1520-98). Date below garter.

Notes: William Cecil was Queen Elizabeth I's first minister. The wooden pattern for this fireback (no. 926), itself a fine carved, wooden painted panel, is at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire.

Copies of this fireback are known.

Inscription: HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE 15 75

Arms: William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley KG

Description: Quasi-rectangular; twisted rope lengths along top and sides; centre top, unidentified quartered shield between two vertical carved stamps of a billet with five oval shapes; the same billet is repeated horizontally below between two irregular twisted rope saltires.

Notes: The arms are probably of Thomas Wriothesley, who was Henry VIII's last Lord Chancellor and created Earl of Southampton in 1547; he married c.1533 so the arms could date to before then, but the same arms are displayed on his enamelled stall plate in St George's Chapel, Windsor, of 1545, and in stained glass in a window in the parish church at South Warnborough, Hampshire. The shield is, quarterly, 1. Wrythe or Wriothesley quartering Dunstanville and Pink, 2. Drayton, 3. Crocker and 4. Peckham. A candidate for the earliest English fireback with an example of personal arms. A similar fireback, then at Warnham Court, Sussex, was illustrated by J. Starkie Gardner in Country Life in 1907.

Arms: Wriothesley (Earl of Southampton)

Description: Cavetto-canted rectangle with arched top; astragal and cavetto edging (top and sides); pictorial; back-to-back figures of a bearded man and a woman in a poke bonnet, both dressed in tunics, their arms raised, respectively left and right; they are chained to a vertical pole; below, flames issue from vertically stacked logs, while smoke rises above them; the physical proportions of the figures are naïve, the man’s eyes being over-large, as are the hands of both.

Notes: The design is a free adaptation of an illustration from The Book of Martyrs by John Foxe (1563), a copy from a back originally noted at Brick Cottage, Burwash, Sussex, in 1871. This may be the design of fireback referred to in an enquiry printed in the St James's Chronicle, or British Evening Post, of 9 August 1788, which described it as 'having two Bishops burning at Stakes thereon' at a house in Warwickshire. At an auction sale in 2017 the same design of fireback was interpreted as the burning of Bishops Latimer and Ridley in 1555. Protestants were burnt to death at several Wealden locations as well as elsewhere in the south-east of England during the reign of Mary I, notably at Canterbury and Lewes. The subject of the fireback should be regarded as symbolic rather than commemorating any individual martyrs.

Copies of this fireback are known.

Description: Arched rectangular shape with symmetrical floral scrolls on top; three horizontal plank lines; ovolo moulding all round edge of main panel; inscription along top edge of panel; central figure of a bearded man wearing knee-length coat, belted at waist, and holding a sledge hammer in his right hand, his left arm akimbo; both feet pointing to his right; various ‘tools’ of his trade arranged about him; (clockwise from top left) shield, the quarters containing a masonry hammer, a firedog, a weight, and a pair of pincers; the date split on either side of his head; a floral console supporting a shelf bearing a flagon, a tankard and a goblet; a fireback bearing the letters RL and a diamond shape; from the top of the fireback a dog leaping up at its master; between the man's legs a long-handled ladle, a weight and a cooking pot; a ringer, used to pull slag off molten iron; part of the elevation of a blast furnace, with wooden framework, casting house, and flames issuing from the top; an ore basket, wheelbarrow and a charcoal clamp

Notes: The 'Lenard' fireback; a much-copied plate. Items relating to the founder's working life are displayed to the left of the figure, those to the right reflecting his domestic life. Its individualistic design and naïve figuration are the key to identifying a distinct group of firebacks, all probably made at Brede. A pastiche of this fireback also exists (no. 668), with which it is sometimes confused.

Copies of this fireback are known.

Inscription: RICHARD LENARD FOVNDER AT BRED FOVRNIS [each D is reversed] / 1636 / RL

Description: Rectangular; twisted rope edging (top and sides); basic arrangement of crowned Tudor rose above a crowned Tudor royal shield, all between a crowned lion passant guardant sinister and lion passant, both per bend, repeated on both halves of the plate; irregularly arranged, mainly along the top and bottom, are sixteen small figures, alternately with right arm raised or lowered; bottom left and centre right are two different arrangements of a length of twisted rope in 'V' and 'I'.

Notes: The stamps used on this large fireback are encountered on several firebacks indicating their common source; previously at Legh Manor, Cuckfield, Sussex.

Arms: Tudor royal arms of England