LINCOLNSHIRE GALLERY 6

Aunsby can be found not far off of the A15, and I visited the church there as I made my way back towards Bourne, travelling back from the Sleaford area.

  Sadly, this church is quite badly neglected and in need of some tender loving care! The rear of the church is particularly badly overgrown.

  Three pictures enclosed. The carving above right is exquisite, though worn, and I like the squinting head to the left of it.

  Below that, two visuals from high up on the tower. Below left, I am tempted to say Owl-like, but I doubt if anyone has ever seen an Owl like this before! Below right, a fearsome looking creature. This one, I admit, gave me the creeps when I looked at the images when I was back home!

The church of St Mary at Wilsford was visited on the third day of my May 2008 cycling holiday. Just about every church I visited that day had a nice selection of gargoyles and grotesques and by the end of the day my thoughts were pretty much along the lines of "Oh no, not more gargoyles!!".

  This church had more than its fair share of gargoyles and grotesques with, to be fair, one or two of them not being the best of quality. An example of this can be seen in the photograph immediately above right. This Owl like creature is very insubstantial looking and not well carved. Much more to my liking was the image immediately above, with cross legged figure holding sword! Several of the gargoyles on show were very badly weathered.

  For me, the unusual thing about this church was to be found on the North wall. Along the wall were several niches that were empty. Above the niches were some very nicely carved stone heads, some of which appeared to be wearing crowns. Above these were a line of poorish quality gargoyles. Four examples are included below.

One gargoyle from Newton near Folkingham pictured left, with the gargoyle wearing a lead hat. To the right of that a gargoyle from Kirkby Underwood, picture taken as the light quality dropped by the second!