Font, Burgage More, Co. Wicklow
Co. Wicklow |
Religious Objects
A granite block sitting in a Wicklow graveyard might not immediately announce itself as anything remarkable, yet this particular piece of carved stone carries the traces of a very specific and considered piece of craftsmanship.
It is a baptismal font, or what survives of one, and the detail that rewards a closer look is not the basin itself but the system of small holes cut into the stone around it.
The font is a sub-rectangular block of granite, roughly 57 centimetres long, 50 centimetres wide, and 30 centimetres high. Carved into its upper face is a basin, tapering slightly toward the base and reaching a depth of 18 centimetres. On three sides, the rim around the basin is flat and cleanly finished; on the fourth, it is lower and rougher, with a piece broken away at one end. Near the broken end is a small hole that appears originally to have been deeper, and at the opposite end is a second, smaller hole. The most plausible reading of these holes is that they once held fittings for a lid, which would have been common practice for fonts used in the administration of baptism, where the water inside was considered sacred and required protection from contamination or misuse. Towards one end of the flat base there is also a vertical drain hole, tapering slightly as it passes through the stone, which would have allowed the font to be emptied when needed.
The font is now housed in the new graveyard at Burgage, having been moved from its original location. Whether it was always associated with a church at Burgage More, or was brought there from elsewhere at some earlier point, is not recorded. What remains is the object itself, precise enough in its engineering to suggest a maker who knew exactly what was required, and careful enough in its small details to leave open questions that the stone alone cannot answer.