A Visit and Tour of Wensley Church in Wensleydale - A Yorkshire Treasure House

[@balesjo]

What a beautifully maintained medieval church. The later additions (the pipe organ, heating radiators, etc.) were done very nicely so that they blended harmoniously in with the older parts of the church.

[@prarieborn6458]

At first gance I thought the radiators were wood carvings :) they do blend in beautifully. I would love to hear the sound of the organ swelling to the lofty spaces. The floral offerings are so lovely. Thank you for the tour.

[@GottaBeThere2736]

Oh, beautiful. In the States we call the intricate wood work on the screen 'Carpenter's Lace'. Thank you.

[@denisemountain4887]

Hi Allan. I stopped at Holy Trinity just a couple of weeks ago when I drove past and noticed the door was open. It is just a beautiful building and, as you say, absolutely full of wonderful things to see. I only found your channel this week and after watching a couple of your posts was going to suggest that you visit Wensley, so I was delighted to find that you had already done so. Getting your perspective on it was very interesting and I will be making more visits to Holy Trinity as there was so much that would repay a closer look. Keep up the good work - these places are a vanishing resource of beauty and inspiration and deserve to be seen by so many more people.

[@allanbarton]

I first got to know it about twenty years ago when I took my York university students there for a visit - they is so much to see and get excited about. You have some tremendous churches in Yorkshire.

[@nickimontie]

If only those figures could talk, the stories they'd tell! Thanks for the tour!

[@karenashworth5743]

The church at Easby has some beautiful paintings on the walls , they are worth a look.

[@danielpridgen6018]

You're always showing us precious gems of each church or chapel you tour with us. Yours is my new 'Discovery Channel'!! And each 'find' is as intriguing and interesting as the other. It's also wondrous so many ecclesiastical element have survived through England's notables time span. What else adds to the fascination is that here in America, not many if a mere handful of churches that are left in bits and pieces are dated on or somewhat later once English colonies or settlers arrived. We of course, do not have such structures from the 10th thru 16th/17th centuries; to my limited awareness. Another thing, I have difficulty following the floor plans for many of these 'Houses of God'. Probably because they don't follow the order of Chruch floor plans I am used to. I suppose or it appears to have been, that congregating from your very earlier periods, worship must have been more 'intimate' in nature and closeted due to the smaller dimensions of these Holy structures. Thank you for all you share with those of us enthralled and heartened towards Ecclesiastical, Chruch & Chapel architecture, exterior and interior. Please continue, broken lenses or not!!

[@stephenburns3678]

Thank you

[@paddypup1836]

Love your channel. Do a small bit of church viewing. In my home town in Galway west of Ireland there is a cathedral, st Nicholas. A grave is inside that is said to hold the remains of the most western buried knights Templar. That’s the rumour anyway. Slab is there with sword on shield.

[@Kevin-mx1vi]

There's another Holy Trinity Church at Coverham, quite near Wensley, which is now in the care of the Historic Churches Trust. It's rather more plain than this one and was heavily restored in (I believe) 1875, though it originally dates from the mid-1300's, and the lintel of the main door was made from a "recycled" carved saxon cross, which suggests that the site has been used for worship for over 1,000 years.

[@stuartfisher8419]

This church was covered by Dan Cruikshank many years ago in an episode of One Foot in the Past. According to Cruikshank, the Powlet pews as they’re known were brought by the 3rd Duke of Bolton and were the opera boxes from which he ogled his mistress to be - Lavinia Fenton - who played Polly Peachum in the first run of John Gray’s The Beggar’s Opera. I’m not sure if he was referring to the pews within the elaborate screening or those high box pews just outside? An interesting fact is that when the programme was made, the current Lord Bolton’s wife’s maiden name was Lavinia Felton.

[@will2Collett]

Allan, I've been enjoying your videos for about a year now. something has bothered me lately that I've heard other pages have done also - sorry to nit-pick here, why do people call the ground/earth a FLOOR. A floor is indoors, the ground is outside, sorry for your camera - it would make me NUTS knowing my camera HIT the GROUND. I suppose this is more of a general question . The Bench ends look too elaborate to be from a Monastery.. Who were the Scrouts to have such a fine looking church with beautiful additiions. Thanks so much for youradventures in these places. ,

[@allanbarton]

I don't know I'm afraid that had rather passed me by, I don't usually refer to the ground as the floor, it was just an unconscious slip of words, but I was really very distracted by the camera accident. There was a trend in the past to assume all good quality work was monastic spoil. The screen is, but I don't suppose the bench ends are. The Scropes were a major landowning family, seated at Bolton Castle and particularly prominent in the 14th and 15th century.

[@frippp66]

the creatures on the bench-ends remind me of the sinister carved figures in MR James's ghost story The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral

[@Connie-z6k]

Well shown and narrated thank you for your time and work onn history above and beyond the history books 📚📚

[@rhiannonpoole6019]

I do wonder what the intentions of the artists were who carved rabbits and bears for pew ends! I rather liked the light shining on the face of the brass, I thought it was quite symbolic. I would love to have seen these churches when the wall paintings were new. They must have been a riot.

[@brownale1000]

Wonderful video ,and channel just watched and subscribed cheers look forward to seeing more

[@allanbarton]

Thanks very much!

[@nancyhope2205]

Thanks for a delightful time looking at it all.

[@CrowSkeleton]

No! Not wyvern and eagle, dragon and griffin, lookit the legs...hares show up as trinity symbols in the southwest, but are probably allegorical in this context, either for Jesus as prey animal or the soul as a non-gendered entity free of such worldly cares (cf. Gal.3:28), English folklore considering them to change sex annually. I think the next one is intended for a hound, but my internets or the video is a touch blurry. It might actually have horns or an otter tail.

[@allanbarton]

I’d just smashed my camera, so was a touch preoccupied.

[@annwagner5779]

I just found this two years after you created it. I hope you were soon able to replace the lens - what a loss! But you gamely showed us the glories of the church anyway. Thank you!

[@allanbarton]

Glad you appreciated it!

[@ZAV1944]

I saw Wensleydale in the title and immediately thought of Wallace and Gromit, and I'm fairly certain I'm not the only one.

[@allanbarton]

More cheese Gromit? 😂

[@floydiandreamscapes5145]

I wish to thank you for your wonderful channel. I love everything about history.

[@allanbarton]

Thank you very much indeed, I am glad you enjoy it.

[@peterkrauss6962]

Must have been beautiful

[@Marian-pb7fd]

So sorry about your camera, hope you were able to get a new lens if you couldn't fix the one that broke. You read an inscription, ........ "Gloria" could you please give a translation. When the monasteries or abbeys were torn down or ransacked by Cromwell during the reformation, did people in the nearby towns come by and take what they could? Thank you so much for this channel, I found you when I found your post on the Royal vault.

[@allanbarton]

Thank you - well friends and family rallied round and I managed to get a new lens, so I am up and running again. It was like losing a leg. When the monasteries were dissolved the fittings and furnishings and lead on the roof was often sold off by the commissioners, who used the proceeds to pay the pensions for the monks. There was some theft and profiteering too.

[@judycater2832]

So sorry about you camera. 😢 Very good video nonetheless.

[@allanbarton]

Thank you Judy, thanks to all the interest on my KZbin channel I have very luckily been able to update all my equipment. I'm glad you enjoyed the tour.

[@MKHobson]

Your tours are wonderful! So sorry about your camera.

[@allanbarton]

All sorted in the end, but it was a great disaster at the time. Thank you.

[@samiam619]

A nice little Church. But what makes is a “Treasure House”?

[@allanbarton]

A very fine set of furnishings.

[@jaypaulauskas7108]

Wow I went to a McDonalds that was 42 years old in Sarasota Florida, last week. Love your work as history is so full of secrets to be discovered.

[@allanbarton]

We are blessed in Britain to be surrounded by history, though I think a lot take it for granted.

[@reginaromsey]

I hope you have been able to get a new lens for your camera. My husband loved his ancient Leica and when the lense was too fogged to use he was able to get one from A shop on ENay.

[@allanbarton]

I did thankfully Wanda, but it was devastating. I have since managed to replace all of my equipment.

[@hollyhumbyrd3362]

Loved this video! You have called attention to "Brasses" in floors in many videos. Please forgive my ignorance in these matters, but dovthose Brasses mean that thevperson is actually interred underneath?

[@allanbarton]

Great question. Yes, they would have been buried under them originally, buried in either a shroud or in a stone coffin. In many cases they still are, but often the brasses have been moved around in subsequent centuries as new burials take place. English medieval churches are full of burials.

[@hollyhumbyrd3362]

@@allanbarton thank you!

[@christopherdrekr1078]

You should do something covering the Scope family history it is interesting enough to be worth it.

[@TyrSkyFatherOfTheGods]

I'm so curious why these churches never seemed to have maintained or touched up the beautiful decoration of the walls and pillars. Lack of money or expertise, maybe? A conscious decision?

[@allanbarton]

No real will to do it and of course the theology of the Church of England, which in general terms is against flamboyant decoration (the C of E is too complex for generalisations). In this case the church is redundant and currently unused.

[@Connie-z6k]

The Church should never be the Treasure house ddivision of church and State. Monetarily and still have the ability to protect the righteous mixxing money church snd State was not gods will or words 🙏🙏