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breedon on the hill |
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| It's five miles northeast from Ashby to the village of BREEDON-ON-THE-HILL
, which sits in the shadow of the large but partly quarried hill from
which it takes its name. A steep footpath and a winding, half-mile road
lead up from the village to the summit, where the fascinating church of
St Mary and St Hardulph (daily 9.30am-6.30pm or dusk; free) occupies the
site of an Iron Age hillfort and an eighth-century Anglo-Saxon monastery.
Mostly dating from the thirteenth century, the church is kitted out with
Georgian pews and pulpit and also, much rarer, contains a number of
Anglo-Saxon carvings, both in the form of wall friezes with folkloric
themes and of individual saints and prophets. They are quite
extraordinary and the fact that the figures look Byzantine - rather than
Anglo-Saxon - has fuelled academic debate. The church has something else
too, in the form of several tombs of the Shirley family, who long ruled
the local roost. One is a sombre alabaster affair with the kneeling
family up above and a skeleton below. |
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