News from Somewhere

Our William Morris pilgrimages continue with a visit to the Cotswolds for the day.

On Saturday we visited Kelmscott House in London which is named for Morris's favourite house, Kelmscott Manor in Oxfordshire (although confusingly, the address is a Gloucestershire postcode.)  A Tudor manor house that Morris used as a country escape until the end of his life. He leased the house in 1871 with his friend, the widowed Pre-Raphaelite painter and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti. According to Hampstead guidebooks, Rossetti and his wife and muse Lizzie Siddall lived for a time in a cottage on the site where our flat now stands. Like many ailing Londoners they hoped that Hampstead's pure air would restore the health of Lizzie who had tuberculosis.

Unfortunately for Morris, housesharing with Rossetti created a difficult situation when Rossetti and Morris's wife Janey had a passionate and very open affair. Morris survived by traipsing off to Iceland, the marriage was repaired, and Morris never held it against the house. In fact, Kelmscott Manor became the utopian paradise of his most famous novel News From Nowhere.

Photos were not permitted inside so I can't show you the lovely interior. Janey moved into the house after William died, and their daughter May, who carried on the family business and was an extraordinary embroiderer lived in the house until her death in 1938 when she deeded the property to Exeter College, Oxford. They found the upkeep to be financially draining and passed it to the Society of Antiquarians. Thus the interior decoration is much as the Morris family knew it during their lifetimes.

The garden was lovely.

A whimsical bit of topiary

A streamlet of the river Thames, or Isis as it is called in Oxfordshire runs past the house.

As Kelmscott is an ancient village, there is of course an ancient church, where William Morris, his wife and daughters are buried.

The Morris tomb that is badly weathered.

 St George Kelmscott is an accretion of bits dating back to the 12th century, with no additions or alterations since Henry VIII was on the throne in the 16th century.

 

The arcade is an early 13th century replacement for the north wall of the nave permitting the addition of a north aisle. The Norman round arches still have their decorative paint pattern.

And here are some of heads carved in the points between the arches.

The baptismal font is dated late 12th early/13th century

This lovely lady is in the South Chapel

As is the piscina, where the priest could wash his hands 

The really amazing treasure is the wall painting dated circa 1280.

A detail of the figures to the left of Bob

Adam and Eve in the window to the right of Bob