Photographs © Colin Hinson, of the Genuki: Yorkshire Genealogy website, who has kindly contributed them in large resolution. They should not be reused without his permission. Captions, text and formatting by Jacqueline Banerjee. [Click on images for larger pictures.]
Whole Window
This beautiful rose window is at the west end of Christ the Consoler, Skelton-on-Ure, Yorkshire. Horatio Walter Lonsdale (1844-1919). c.1876. This shows Christ surrounded by those seeking consolation. It differs from the east window not only in general design but in mood. There are no angels, only vignettes of human suffering, need and prayer. Those in positions of authority and those who are entirely powerless, the young and the old, the bereaved, the sick, the weary and the enslaved, all turn to the same source for comfort. Many hands are clasped in supplication, and the directness of the people's prayers, and the variety of the scenes in which they are involved, make it a very moving demonstration of this aspect of the Christian faith. The full nature of their trials and the outcomes of their prayers are unknown, but the pity of the central figure, whose arms are open to all, is unmistakable.
Details
Every stage of life is represented in the inner of the two circles: "Small panels with the figures in bright clear colours, the subjects related to the theme of consolation," these all seem to have a story to tell (Leach and Pevsner 701).
Left: A woman with an infant, and a slave with bound wrists, are amongst those who look for consolation. Right: A king and a bishop offer up their prayers too. The size and brightness of this window is important. As Simon Jenkins points out, the nave of this memorial church is of a "funereal white ... colour in the nave being confined to the stained glass in the windows" (899).
Sources
Jenkins, Simon. England's Thousand Best Churches. London: Penguin, 2000.
Leach, Peter, and Nikolaus Pevsner. Yorkshire West Riding, Leeds, Bradford and the North. The Buildings of England series. New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2009.
Last modified 7 December 2011