The most striking thing about this painting of St. Christopher is its size. At a bare three feet wide, it is one of the smallest examples of the subject in England. Much colour has disappeared, and the painting is generally very faded, but HC Whaite, who saw it in the 1920s, reported traces of yellow pigment in the Christ Child’s halo and orb, along with some green in his robe and in flowering top of St. Christopher’s staff.

There was also once an inscription along the lower horizontal border, indecipherable now, but suggesting, as Whaite pointed out, an early fifteenth century woodcut as a more or less direct source. The absence of much in the way of extraneous detail (restricted to a single fish now appearing as a dark shape beside the saint’s left foot) is also indicative of a comparatively early date in the century.

Belton, Suffolk	Burnham Overy, Norfolk	Cottered, Hertfordshire	East Wellow, Hants	Edingthorpe Norfolk
Fritton, Norfolk	Haddiscoe, Norfolk	Hemblington, Norfolk	Impington, Cambridgeshire NEW	Irstead, Norfolk
Layer Marney, Essex	Littlebourne, Kent	Martlesham, Suffolk	Molesworth, Northants	Oaksey, Wilts
Paston, Norfolk	Pickering, N. Yorks	Raunds, Northants	Shorwell, Isle of Wight	Slapton, Northants
Stoke Dry, Rutland	Thurlton, Norfolk	Wickhampton, Norfolk	Woodeaton, Oxon

21/6/2004