Sir Thomas Erpingham was a fifteenth-century English nobleman who distinguished himself when in charge of the King’s bowmen at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. As an important and significant Norwich figure he made substantial donations to the city’s religious institutions. Charitable donations during the medieval period were more than just duty, they allowed an individual to display their status, but, more importantly, financially supporting the church purchased a speedy journey through purgatory and up to heaven. A wealthy knight like Thomas Erpingham made a very significant earthly and heavenly mark when he provided the funds for the building of a new gatehouse at the entrance to Norwich Cathedral.
The gatehouse was built between 1420 and 1435 and has a single arch supported on each side by semi-hexagonal buttresses. The arch is divided into two decorative schemes, the inner order is the twelve apostles (probably) set in a series of niches, and the outer is a series of twelve female saints. The carved foliage, used as a visual linking device running up the arch, has been weathered over the centuries, but you can still see that it is oak leaves and acorns. The buttresses are covered with shields and devices of the families of Erpingham, Clopton, and Walton (those of Sir Thomas Erpingham’s wives), but I couldn’t pick out the forget-me-not design which apparently also makes up part of the Erpingham heraldic achievement.
I was disappointed that I couldn’t see the forget-me-not sculptural detail so I’ve had a good hunt round the Internet. One of my past Art History lecturers, now retired, has spent six years accompanied by his photographer wife, surveying the public sculpture of Norfolk and I’ve studied her excellent, up-close and detailed photographs and I’ve found the forget-me-nots. It is a single flower motif carved above a shield, above a falcon rising on the outer front columns of the buttresses – second panels up in this early nineteenth-century etching by Cotman – still a bit difficult to see though not as eroded as now.
Below is a ring from MagpieHouse showing a contemporary version of the single, more architectural form, of the forget-me-not motif. When you are looking at weathered architecture it certainly helps to know the basic design shapes you are looking for, but it is only when the scaffolding goes up for repairs that accurate recording and high quality photographs can be achieved.
The fifteenth-century forget-me-not sculpted motif is in the middle of the upper niche in this photograph on the right.
Share this:
Agnes Ashe 
A stunning post – thank you! Always good to really look at architecture with someone with detailed knowledge.
Thank you for your comment – I’m not sure what happened to it originally as I’ve only just found it languishing in the ‘Spam’ box. Most certainly not spam!! Hope you had a sunny Easter Weekend.
So just imagine that the settler who lived in the Australian slab hut in 1841, came from a town as ancient and established as Norwich – I wonder how he would have managed the cultural shift?
Well, it all depends – if he and his family lived and worked in Norwich then it would have been quite a shock I would imagine. But if he had had family that lived in rural Norfolk (a big county by English standards), then I think he might already have experienced rural isolation and possibly very poor, agricultural subsistence living. A good reason to emigrate to Australia for a new life.