23 July 2023

The Prebendaries of
Wigginton and Comberford
in Saint Editha’s Church,
Tamworth, 1290-1548

Comberford gave its name to the title of the Prebendaries of Wigginton and Comberford in Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Saint Editha’s Collegiate Church, Tamworth, is a Grade I listed building and the largest parish church in Staffordshire. It stands on a site where successive churches have stood since the eighth century.

The town and church were destroyed by fire in 1345, leading to the building of the fourth, present church, between 1350 and 1369 by Dean Baldwin de Witney.

Tradition says the College of Canons of Saint Editha was a royal foundation in the tenth century, but the date of foundation is not known. Although the right to appoint canons was disputed, by the 12th century all appointments were royal. There was a dean and six prebendaries or canons: the Dean held the prebend of Amington, and the other five canons held the prebends of Bonehill, Coton, Syerscote, Wigginton and Comberford, and Wilnecote.

The canons or prebendaries received an income from the tithes of the areas that gave their names to the prebendal stalls. At the time, neither Wigginton nor Comberford were parishes in their own right, but parts of Tamworth parish.

Although the Comberford family had no role in appointing the Prebendaries of Wigginton and Comberford, the names of those prebendaries are part of the history of Comberford. They can be traced for a period of more than 250 years, from 1290 until the chapter was dissolved in 1548 with the dissolution of the chantries and monastic foundations during the Tudor Reformation.

Throughout most of those two and a half centuries, the dean and canons were usually crown nominees, with no involvement of the Comberford family. But, for a brief time, the appointment of the Dean and many of the prebendaries, including the Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford, was claimed by the Marmion family of Tamworth and, as their heirs, by members of the Butler family.

Inside Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

When Philip Marmion, the fifth and last Baron Marmion of Tamworth, died in 1291, he had no male heirs, and his properties and estates were divided among his daughters and their husbands: Mazera married Ralph de Cromwell, and her interests passed to their daughter Joan, who married Alexander de Freville; Maud married Ralph le Botiller (Butler) of Wemme; and Margaret married first Thomas de Ludlow, and then Henry Hillary. Three other daughters, Joan, who married William de Morteyn, Matilda and Elizabeth, had no children.

Tamworth was inherited by Joan Cromwell, who married Alexander de Freville. Scrivelsby passed to Margaret de Ludlow and then to Sir John Dymoke, whose family also inherited the title of ‘Champion of England.’ Maud Butler was the heiress of Pulverbatch, Middleton and Norbury.

The Marmion heirs continued to contest the right to nominate the deans and canons of Tamworth. In the late 1320s, the crown made two unsuccessful attempts to nominate Deans. Eventually, there were two occasions when the male heirs in the Butler family were legal minors or under age. This state lasted from at least 1342 until 1359, and gave the crown a series of opportunities to intervene.

A priest in the Butler family, Thomas le Botiller, became Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford on 5 May 1341, but this appointment had royal ratification on 10 December 1341.

A year later, in 1342-1343, the right of presentation to the prebend of Wilnecote was disputed between Baldwin de Freville I, Joan’s son and heir, and the king as guardian of the Butler heir. The crown argued that the right of presentation was held in common by Marmion’s heirs and that the next presentation fell to the Butlers. The crown’s argument was successful and the royal candidate was appointed.

When the prebend next fell vacant in 1347, the king again presented, still basing his claim on his custody of the Butler heir. But, on this occasion, the earlier argument, which in 1347 would have given the right of presentation to Henry Hillary, was abandoned, and the Crown based its case on a royal grant of 1317 allotting the advowson of Wilnecote to the Butlers. The verdict again went in favour of the king.

The final stage was reached in 1358 and 1359, when the crown presented to two prebends, including Wigginton and Comberford, making the wider claim that the advowsons once held by Philip Marmion were now in the king’s hands. The claim apparently went unchallenged.

After 1341, in fact, the Marmion heirs made no further presentations to Tamworth. The unsuccessful attempt made by Baldwin de Freville I in 1342-1343 to present to Wilnecote appears to have been the last serious challenge to the crown.

Baldwin’s son, Baldwin de Freville II, made at least one effort to recover his rights in the college. After he died in 1375, it was claimed that, although the crown had made a number of presentations, the advowson of the deanery and of the five prebends belonged to him as lord of Tamworth Castle. By then, however, the king had established himself more firmly as patron and the Chancery clerks had begun to refer to the college officially as ‘the king’s free chapel of Tamworth.’

After Dean Whitney died in 1369, no canon remained who was not in office as a royal appointment.

The composition of the chapter did not alter appreciably. By the late 13th and early 14th centuries, when it was still in the hands of the Marmion heirs, the canons were mainly pluralists and absentees, some of whom, such as Ralph de Hengham, Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford, held office under the crown or were attached to the royal household. They left the services and pastoral duties to vicars to look after.

This state of affairs in Tamworth was usually accepted in royal free chapels, and it persisted in Tamworth until the dissolution of the college, with the canons appointed by the crown from all branches of the royal households and the royal administration.

Tamworth was one of a handful of royal free churches or peculiars that were ecclesiastical islands within yet outside the Diocese of Lichfield. The others included the Royal Free Chapel or Collegiate Church of Saint Michael and All Angels, Penkridge, Saint Michael’s, Tettenhall, Saint Peter’s, Wolverhampton, Saint Mary’s, Stafford, and Saint Laurence’s, Gnosall, all in Staffordshire, and Quatford in Shropshire. Other sources add the Royal Free Chapel of Saint Mary, Shrewsbury, and the Royal Free Chapel, Bridgnorth.

From 1290 until 1548, when the college at Saint Editha’s was dissolved, we can identify the Prebendaries of Wigginton and Comberford. They include a professor of theology, a Proctor of the University of Oxford, two Deans of York, a Dean of Salisbury, a Dean of Hereford, a Bishop of Salisbury, a Bishop of Exeter, a Bishop of Limerick, two Lords Privy Seal, a Lord Chancellor, and a number of royal chaplains.

Comberford is named with the churches in the Tamworth Deanery on a hassock in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Prebendaries of Wigginton and Comberford:

1290: Robert de Pyccheford, Pykford or Pygford was in office by 1290. He had royal letters of presentation on 18 October 1294 as Canon of Tamworth and parson of Hoginton and Picheford.

1311: Henry le Stoke de Solihull was admitted 18 June 1311, when he was presented by Ralph le Botiller junior.

1341: Thomas le Botiller was admitted 5 May 1341, and had royal ratification on 10 December 1341 to the Prebend of Wigginton and Comberford.

1359: Thomas de Keynes, almoner to the king, was presented by the king on 22 March 1359 to the Prebend of Wigginton on account of the custody of the lands and heir of Ralph le Botiller, and on 1 April and 28 June 1359 to the Prebend of Wigginton and Comberford on account of the advowsons of the churches of the inheritance of Sir Philip Marmion (who held them in capite) being in the king’s hands.

After this date, this Prebend is usually named simply as Wigginton rather than Wigginton and Comberford.

On 1 July 1359, Keynes was made the king’s keeper of the royal park of Foliejon in Berkshire and forester in the Bailiwick of Ascot, for which he was paid 2 pence a day for life by the Constable of Windsor Castle. He was Prebendary of Twiford in Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, 1361-1366. He died in 1367.

1367: John de Thorp was presented 4 July 1367. This is the first time Saint Editha’s Church is described as ‘the King’s Free Chapel of Tamworth.’ He was also the Rector of Nailstone in the Diocese of Lincoln, and had a Prebend in the royal chapel of Saint Mary and All Saints, Fotheringay, Yorkshire. He exchanged these three appointments for the Church of Cottenham in the Diocese of Ely, with Thomas de Oldyngton or Holdyngton.

1369: Thomas de Oldyngton or Holdyngton was presented by the king on 18 January 1369, and was instituted on 7 February.

The tomb of Edmund de Stafford in the Lady Chapel in Exeter Cathedral (Photograph: Lobsterthermidor/Wikipedia/CCL Licence, 2020)

1387: Edmund Stafford (1344-1419) was the second son of Sir Richard Stafford (c. 1301-1381) of Clifton Campville, Staffordshire, the second son of Edmund Stafford, 1st Baron Stafford of Stafford Castle and the younger brother of Ralph Stafford, 1st Earl of Stafford.

Stafford attended Oxford University (BA 1363, BCL 1369, DL 1385). He was appointed a canon of Lichfield in 1369, and became Dean of York in 1385. He was also the Rector of Clifton Campville, his family lands.

Edmund Stafford made an exchange with Thomas de Oldyngton or Holdyngton and was appointed Prebendary of Wigginton by the king on 12 October 1387. He remained in office until early 1395, when he exchanged with Alexander Herle or Herds, becoming a canon in Exeter Cathedral. He became Bishop of Exeter immediately, and was Bishop of Exeter from 1395 until his death in 1419. He was the Keeper of the Privy Seal (1389-1396) and twice he was Lord Chancellor of England (1396-1399, 1401-1403).

He died on 3 September 1419 and was buried in the Lady Chapel of Exeter Cathedral, where he his elaborate monument includes a recumbent alabaster effigy.

1395: Alexander Herds or Herle had the king’s grant 24 January 1395, but almost immediately exchanged for a portion in Norton Church in the Diocese of Durham with John Prophet.

1395: John Prophet (1356-1416) became the Prebendary of Wigginton by royal appointment on 17 February 1395. He was Dean of Hereford in 1393-1407. By 1404, Prophet held several prebendal appointments at Lincoln, Salisbury, York, and St Asaph’s cathedrals, as well as Abergwili, Tamworth, Crediton, and Leighton Buzzard in the Diocese of Lincoln in 1405.

John Prophet was Dean of York from 1407 until he died in 1416, and he was also Lord Privy Seal (1406-1415) and secretary to King Henry IV. A capable administrator, he remained loyal to all kings through a mix of shrewdness, and cunning.

1402: John Chandler (or Chaundler) succeeded John Prophet on 3 October 1402, but probably resigned this prebend in 1404 when he became the Dean of Salisbury.

Chandler had become a resident canon at Salisbury in 1383 and was elected dean in 1404. A record of his work as dean is the earliest and most complete mediaeval dean’s register to survive at Salisbury, with detailed records and inventories from his visitations to each prebendal parish in 1405, 1408-1409 and 1412.

His first election as Bishop of Salisbury in 1407 was quashed immediately, but he was elected again on 15 November 1417 and he was consecrated on 12 December 1417. He died on 16 July 1426.

1404: John Bremore was presented on 21 July 1404, and died in 1418. He was also Rector of Chesterton in the Diocese of Lincoln.

1418: John Hunte was the royal nominee as Prebendary of Wigginton on 26 October 1418.

1418: Robert Shirynton succeeded on 29 November 1418, and continued in office for almost 20 years until 1438.

1438: Walter Shiryngton was presented on 20 June 1438, and continued until 1448.

1449: Roger Mersshe obtained this Prebend on 3 February 1449. Ten years later he exchanged it with Gilbert Haydock to become a canon of Windsor.

1459: Gilbert Haydock was presented 19 August 1459, and held the office for almost 30 years until he died in 1484.

Inside Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick … John Dunmowe was Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford when he was also Bishop of Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

1484: John Dunmowe (also Dunmow, Dumoe, Dunow or Dunowe) succeeded as Prebendary of Wigginton on 25 July 1484 when Haydock died. He was Rector of Hanworth, Middlesex (1432), a Canon of Windsor (1450-1455), Prebendary of Barnby in York (1475-1481), the ninth canon in Saint George’s Chapel, Windsor (1476-1488), Rector of Saint Magnus London Bridge (1481-1489), Archdeacon of Gloucester (1487-1489), Rector of Saint Peter ad Vincula, a chapel royal in the Tower of London (1488), and a canon of Exeter.

He was made Bishop of Limerick 13 November 1486, and was also an auxiliary bishop in the Diocese of Exeter. He was Henry VII’s ambassador to the papal court in Rome, and he died at the Papal Court on 25 January 1489. He was still Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford when he died. He had never visiting the Diocese of Limerick, and he probably never visited Tamworth, or Wigginton and Comerford either.

1489: John Dunmowe succeeding his uncle as Prebendary of Wigginton. He was presented on 3 February 1489, and continued in office until he died in 1498.

1498: William Taillour, a king’s scholar in the University of Oxford, was appointed to the prebend 2 October 1498, but he died soon after.

1499: William Lathis or Lathes succeeded on 1 June 1499, and died in 1502.

1502: Thomas Norbury, chaplain of the royal household, followed on 8 March 1502 on the death of Lathes. He resigned in 1505.

1505: Brian Darley, a professor of theology, was presented on 29 March 1505. The records do not show where he was professor of theology, and his appointment predated the foundation of the Regius Professorships of Divinity in Oxford (1535) and Cambridge (1540). He died in 1527.

1527: John Oolde was almoner to Mary Tudor, Queen of France. She was a sister of Henry VIII and the third wife of Louis XII, who died in 1515; she died in 1533. Oolde was appointed Prebendary of Wigginton by Henry VIII on 14 July 1527.

1529 (?): Roger Dingley, a chaplain to Henry VIII, succeeded Oolde as the prebendary very soon after. He was educated at Oxford (BA 1506, MA 1513, BD 1523, DD 1526). He was a Fellow of All Souls’ College, Oxford, 1511, and Proctor of the University of Oxford, 1518. He died in 1538.

1538: Humfrey Horton, who was presented on 1 August 1538, was the last Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford. He was educated at Oxford (BA 1524). He was a secular chaplain, perhaps prebend, in Saint Mary’s Collegiate Church, Stafford (1541), and Vicar of Kenwyn and Kea, Cornwall (1547), Marston, Derbyshire (1554), and Fairford, Gloucestershire (1563).

Humfrey Horton was the last Prebendary of Wigginton and Comberford, and Simon Symonds was the last dean of the Collegiate Church of Saint Editha, Tamworth (1538-1548).

With the dissolution of monastic houses and the chantries during the Tudor Reformation, the college was dissolved in 1548 and Saint Editha’s became the parish church of the town of Tamworth.

A list of the Deans and Vicars of Tamworth in the porch of Saint Editha’s Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Daily prayers in Ordinary Time
with USPG: (56) 23 July 2023

The Great West Window in Saint Editha’s Collegiate Church is the most beautiful, modern feature in Tamworth’s parish church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, and today is the Seventh Sunday after Trinity (23 July 2023). Later this morning I hope to attend the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles in Stony Stratford before going to London for the commemoration of an old family friend.

But, before this day begins, I am taking some time this morning for prayer, reading and reflection.

In the weeks after Trinity Sunday, I was reflecting each morning with Trinity-themed images from cathedrals, churches and chapels. That series came to a conclusion yesterday (16 July) with my search for the mediaeval Holy Trinity altar in Saint Editha’s Collegiate Church, Tamworth. This week, my reflections each morning involve:

1, Looking at stained glass windows in Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

The lower part of the West Window in Saint Editha’s Church, designed by Alan Younger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Great West Window, Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth:

Perhaps the most beautiful, modern feature in Saint Editha’s Church is the captivating Great West Window, ‘Revelation of the Holy City,’ designed by Alan Younger (1933-2004), one of the most important stained-glass artists in post-war Britain.

Alan Christopher Wyrill Younger was born and educated in south-east London, and began his career in 1953 as assistant to Carl Edwards, working on large-scale commissions that included the House of Lords Debating Chamber, the Temple Church and the Anglican Cathedral in Liverpool.

He was inspired by an exhibition for the stained glass in Coventry Cathedral in 1956 and three years later became an assistant to Lawrence Lee, Professor of Stained Glass at the Royal College of Art, who had supervised the making of the nave windows.

Younger's first windows were made at the Fulham Glass House, using the Lowndes & Drury studio rented at that time by Keith New, who had worked with Lee and Geoffrey Clarke on the Coventry windows. Later, he moved to Crystal Palace where he set up his own small studio at the bottom of the garden.

His West Window in Tamworth, unveiled by Princess Margaret on 2 July 1975, takes its theme from Saint John’s account in the Book of Revelation of the New Jerusalem, a new heaven and a new earth (Revelation 21-22).

‘And in the spirit he carried me away … and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God. It has the glory of God and a radiance like a very rare jewel, like jasper, clear as crystal’ (Revelation 21: 10-11).

‘And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb’ (Revelation 21: 23).

At the base of the window are the twelve foundation stones: ‘ The foundations of the wall of the city are adorned with every jewel …’ (21: 19).

Below in the third light, is a star: ‘It is I, Jesus, who sent my angel to you … I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star’ (22: 16).

Above the foundations are crowns: ‘The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it’ (21: 24).

In the centre, below and above the transom, is the city pierced by the twelve gates and at the gates twelve angels.

To the left is the angel with the measuring reed: ‘Then one of the seven angels … came and said to me …’ (21: 9).

‘The angel who talked to me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city and its gates and walls’ (21: 15).

Above, in the centre two lights, is an Alpha and Omega representing the words of God: ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end’ (21: 6).

To the right is a white dove, representing the Holy Spirit, mysteriously at work in the sanctification of the Church. The conception of the city, ‘coming down out of heaven from God … foursquare’ (see 21: 2, 16), is suggested by the four white shafts at the top of the four centre lights.

Further focus is given to the angel as the golden measuring-reed flashes across the city.

In many ways, this window is a bright symbol of a church that is rooted in over 1,200 years of history, lives in the present, and looks forward to the future in confidence and faith.

The lower part of the West Window in Saint Editha’s Church, inspired by the vision in the Book of Revelation of the New Jerusalem, a new heaven and a new earth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Matthew 13: 24-30, 36-43 (NRSVA):

24 He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; 25 but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. 26 So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. 27 And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?” 28 He answered, “An enemy has done this.” The slaves said to him, “Then do you want us to go and gather them?” 29 But he replied, “No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. 30 Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn”.’

36 Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, ‘Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.’ 37 He answered, ‘The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; 38 the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. 40 Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, 42 and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen!’

The west window in Saint Editha’s Church is a bright symbol of a church that is rooted in over 1,200 years of history, lives in the present, and looks forward to the future in confidence and faith (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Today’s Prayer:

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Reflections from the International Consultation.’ This theme is introduced today by Michael Clarke of the West Indies, who writes:

‘The Consultation was expansive and self-expanding. It opened an area of the human journey which I did not know apart from the terms used; Human Trafficking and Modern Day Slavery. I found a critical need to revisit slavery as an institution transcending time and space. Listening to the Zanzibar story refreshed the awareness of how often humanity has acted from a place lower than the Creator intended, a severe misunderstanding of dominion.

‘Then there was the sense that while we strive to have the colonisers acknowledge their misdeeds fully with the view towards a more equitable society in which the teachings and principles of sacred teachers across the ages can be realised; we are faced with the reality that slavery is not behind us but has lived on right under our noses and thrives in virtually every part of the world.

‘This further awareness challenges how we have shared the Good News. It begs the question: have we been so caught up with making believers that we lost sight of the actual commission to make disciples? To be a disciple is to walk the way. Perhaps we as the Church must repent, turn away from the doctrinal posturing, and pay greater attention to walking the path of love and compassion in a world devoid of such but at the same time filled with growing places of worship. Love and compassion must be superior, as seen in the life of Jesus Christ.

The Prayer in the USPG Prayer Diary today (23 July 2023, Trinity VII) invites us to pray in these words:

Heavenly Father,
thank you that we can forge new paths.
Help us learn from the past and seek your will in the present
and lay our plans before you. Amen.

Collect:

Lord of all power and might,
the author and giver of all good things:
graft in our hearts the love of your name,
increase in us true religion,
nourish us with all goodness,
and of your great mercy keep us in the same;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion:

Lord God, whose Son is the true vine and the source of life,
ever giving himself that the world may live:
may we so receive within ourselves
the power of his death and passion
that, in his saving cup,
we may share his glory and be made perfect in his love;
for he is alive and reigns, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

The baptismal font at the west end of Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Antonio Salviati’s reredos
in Tamworth is part of
the revival of mosaics in
Venice and glass in Murano

The reredos above the High Altar in Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth, was made by Antonio Salviati of Venice (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

In my search this morning for the mediaeval Altar of the Holy Trinity in Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth, I described the late 19th century reredos above the High Altar made in 1887-1893 by the Salviati family firm, working with John Birnie Philip when the church was extensively restored in the mid-19th century by Benjamin Ferrey, Sir George Gilbert Scott and William Butterfield.

The glass manufacturing business founded in 1859 by Antonio Salviati (1816-1890) of Venice, revived the glass-making traditions in Murano and a strong impact and influence on the arts in Victorian England. Salviati’s reredos in Saint Editha’s Church links Tamworth with an important element in architectural decoration and the decorative arts in Europe.

A new interest in Catholic liturgy and ritual led to a revival of Gothic architecture that, in turn, boosted a demand for traditional church decoration. The Anglo-Catholic revival in the Church of England and the writings of John Ruskin inspired a renewed popularity of Venetian mosaic architectural decoration.

During Sir George Gilbert Scott’s restoration of Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth, the sculptor John Birnie Philip (1824-1875) designed the beautiful reredos at the High Altar, with its cusped arcading with marble shafts flanking five cusped gabled arches.

John Birnie Philip was the father-in-law of the American painter James Abbott McNeill Whistler. He carried out most of his work with Scott. His works in English churches and cathedrals include the statues for Scott’s reredos in Lichfield Cathedral, and the reredos in both Ely Cathedral and Saint George’s Chapel, Windsor. In London, he carved the decorations for the porch at Saint Michael, Cornhill, built by Scott as part of his Gothic embellishment of Wren’s church, including an elaborate tympanum sculpture depicting Saint Michael.

Philip’s five arched niches in the reredos in Tamworth were filled with mosaics that are the work of the Italian glass manufacturer Antonio Salviati (1816-1890). The five mosaic panels in the reredos commemorate five pre-Reformation altars in the church.

They depict (from left): Saint George with a flag and sword; Saint Nicholas, robed as a bishop and holding a ship, his symbol; the central figure of the Risen Christ, surrounded by the words Pax Vobis, perhaps representing the Blessed Trinity Altar and the High Altar; Saint Katherine, with the wheel of her martyrdom and a palm branch; and Saint Editha, holding her crozier as Abbess and a model of her church.

Antonio Salviati revived glass making on the island of Murano in Venice (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Salviati family were glass makers and makers of mosaics based on the island of Murano in Venice and in London. They worked first as Salviati and Co and later, after 1866, as the Venice and Murano Glass and Mosaic Company.

The founder of the business, Antonio Salviati, was born in Vicenza, 60 km west of Venice, on 18 March 1816. He began in life as a lawyer. However, at an early age he became interested in glasswork after taking part in restoration work on the mosaics in Saint Mark’s Basilica in Venice by Lorenzo Radi.

Salviati founded Compagnia Venezia Murano in 1866 with the British diplomat and archaeologist Sir Austen Henry Layard (1817-1894), who lived in Ca Cappello, a 16th century palazzo on the Grand Canal just behind Campo San Polo.

Murano had been a centre of fine glasswork since the Middle Ages, producing the glass that bears its name. But the pieces were lavish and expensive specialty pieces that only the wealthy could afford.

Salviati transformed the reputation of Murano glass, opening the first glass factory to employ a large number of skilled workers to mass-produce glass for export. Murabo glass had once been rare pieces enjoyed only by a wealthy few. But Salviati produced ornamental pieces that could be bought by millions, and so he re-established Murano as a centre of glass making.

The Salviati workshop in Murano made a mosaic portrait of Abraham Lincoln that was donated to the US by Antonio Salviati in 1866. It is now in a corridor off the Senate floor in Washington.

Antonio Salviati produced the mosaic glass for the altar screen for the high altar in Westminster Abbey

Salviati’s fame and work spread to England and France, where his work was usually in association with architectural designs. His mosaics can be seen in many European churches, while his smaller, mass produced works were sold throughout Italy.

He produced the mosaic glass for the altar screen for the high altar in Westminster Abbey. The altar and screen was erected between 1867 and 1873 to Scott’s designs. The sculpted figures of Moses, Saint Peter, Saint Paul and King David on the screen are by HH Armistead. Behind the altar, the mosaic of the Last Supper was designed by JR Clayton and executed by Salviati.

Salviati produced several mosaics for the grand dome in Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London. Five mosaics by Salviati are behind the altar in the new east apse in the chapel in Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and depict teaching incidents in the Bible.

In Saint Editha’s Church, Tamworth, Salviati’s iridescent mosaic glass panels in the reredos form a striking backdrop to the High Altar. He completed this reredos in 1887, and died three years later in Venice on 25 January 1890.

Apart from his work in Tamworth and Westminster Abbey, Salviati’s works in churches in England include the reredos in Saint Andrew’s Church, Biggleswade; the reredos in the chapel in Fulham Palace, London; a large reredos in Saint Mary’s Church, West Rainton, Durham; a mosaic of the Last Supper in Saint Thomas of Canterbury Church, Elsfield; a mosaic depicting the Last Supper after da Vinci in the Church of Saint Bridget with Saint Thomas in Wavertree, Liverpool; a reredos depicting the Last Supper in All Saints’ Church, Reading; mosaics in Exeter College Chapel, Oxford; and the chancel mosaics in in Saint John’s Church, Torquay.

He also worked in Saint David’s Cathedral, Wales, and Saint Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral, Dundee.

In Germany, Salviati produced the mosaic decoration of the dome of Aachen Cathedral and mosaics for churches in Berlin and Heringsdorf.

Mosaics by Salviati and his companies are also in the Central Lobby of the Housse of Parliament (Palace of Westminster), London, the ceiling and walls at the entrance to the Royal Mausoleum at Frogmore, the Paris Opera House, the Albert Memorial, the Council House, Birmingham, the Chamberlain Memorial Fountain in Birmingham (which I visited earlier this week), Ajuda National Palace, Lisbon, and Carl von Scheibler’s Palace, now the Museum of Polish Cinematography in Łodz.

The Palazzo Salviati on the Grand Canal in Venice was built as a shop and the furnace of the Salviati family (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

I have often admired the Palazzo Salviati on the Grand Canal, between the Palazzo Barbaro Wolkoff and the Palazzo Orio Semitecolo. It was built as a shop and the furnace of the Salviati family in Venice, and was designed by the architect Giacomo Dell’Olivo.

The building underwent a major renovation in 1924, with the addition of an extra floor and the placement of large mosaics on the façade.

Structurally, the façade is relatively simple, with arched doors on the first and third floors and matching arched windows on the second floor. The mosaic figures that cover most of the façade include a large mosaic in the centre of the building and smaller mosaics over the doors on the first floor and at the top of the third.

To the left, the Palazzo Orio Semitecolo Benzon was built by the Orio family and was owned by the Benzoni family by the 14th or 15th century. It was integrated with the Palazzo Salviati in the 20th century. The Gothic façade has a different style on each floor: the first floor is in typical 14th century style, the second is in 15th century, while the top floor was added in the 19th century.

To the left again, the Casa Santomaso stands between the Palazzo Orio Semitecolo Benzon and the Palazzetto Nani Mocenigo, close to the Basilica of Santa Maria della Salute. This is a typical 15th-century building, with Gothic and Renaissance forms.

Salviati’s Compagnia Venezia Murano continued as an important producer of Venetian art glass. Today, the company is Pauly & C – Compagnia Venezia Murano, and continues to be an important producer of Venetian art glass. Glassmaking remains the main industry of Murano, where the artisans continue to employ centuries-old techniques, crafting items from contemporary art glass and glass jewellery to Murano glass chandeliers and wine stoppers.

The Casa Santomaso, the Palazzo Orio Semitecolo Benzon and the Palazzo Salviati (right) form an interesting group of three smaller palaces on the Grand Canal in Venice (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)