IMPORTANCE

“The Gazeley Ceiling”, of All Saints’ Church, Gazeley, has been in place since the 16th century, but only recently discovered. When Jack Marsh, a former resident of Gazeley, died in 2006 he left £30,000 to the church for refurbishment and restoration. Internal scaffolding erected in 2008 allowed people to see the chancel ceiling up close, and its roof carvings were photographed for the first time by Maggie Pugh. Later, Simon Johnson, a New Zealand based historian and photographer, was intrigued by the pictures, which led to his photographing most of the carvings. These photographs were incorporated into the book Men, Myths and Monsters (Lazarus Publications, NFP) now in its 3rd edition, which sparked considerable academic interest.

The ceiling clearly escaped the attention of the iconoclasts during the Reformation and the organised destruction in churches during the Cromwell Commonwealth,  and survives today as a remarkable, uncensored  record of the medieval mindset, with its seeming hotchpotch of religious images, farm animals, wild and mythical creatures, along with some images which would be inappropriate in church today.

“It is a precious record of medieval life and culture, an irreplaceable historical resource.” – Simon Johnson, 2024.

MAPPING THE CEILING

In 2023/24 Dr Sarah Cassell, an Independent Researcher and art historian mapped the entire ceiling of the chancel, as a preliminary step to investigating the carvings further, and to see if there were any patterns of a symbolic nature to be determined.

She has kindly given us permission to use the same system that she developed when displaying the photographs here.

In this website, the position of the carvings is referenced to the ceiling, with east being nearest to the east window and altar. Facing the altar, north is to the left, south to the right.

There are three types of carvings on the ceiling: those shaped like a lozenge are described as CL, rounded carvings called bosses, or B, and demi (or half) lozenges called DL.