Richard Wenman

Date of Brass:

c.1510

Place:

Witney

County:

Oxfordshire

Country:

Number:

I

Style:

London F

Description

September 2025

Richard Wenman's brass effigy lies on the top slab of a Purbeck marble tomb chest now placed towards the west end of St Mary’s church in Witney. He is shown between the effigies of two wives, each with figures of daughters below. Some components of the brass are missing: the marginal inscription; one of the four shields on the top slab; three sons below Richard’s effigy; and shields in the panels on the sides of the tomb chest. Otherwise the brass is complete, with scrolls above the three main figures and a Trinity above Richard’s head.

Richard is variously described in archival records as a wool merchant, woolman, merchant of the staple, gentleman or clothier.

Mill Stephenson’s List (1926) gives the names of the wives as (1) Anne, daughter of John Bushe of Northleach, and (2) Christian, who died in 1500. Anne was the mother of his son and heir, Thomas. He was also a merchant of the staple, was knighted in 1553 and was MP for Oxfordshire in 1555. According to The History of Parliament, he was born by 1504.

The brass appears to have been made around 1510, perhaps prompted by the award to Richard in 1509 of a coat of arms. The inscription was recorded in June 1660 as reading:

Of your charity pray for the soulys of Richard Wenman, Anne and Christian his wifes, whiche Christian deceased the xi. day of April in the year of our Lord God mccccc. and the said Anne deceased the . . . . day of . . . . in the year of our Lord God mv. . . . on whose soules, &c.

                                 Man in what state that ever thou bee,

                                      Timor Mortis should trouble thee.

The Oxford antiquary Anthony a Wood gives slightly different wording, ‘Wainman’ for ‘Wenman’, 1501 for Christian’s death, ‘Jesu have mercy’ after ‘on whose soules’ and two additional phrases after the verse:

                                 For when thou leest wenyst

                                      Veniet te mors superare.

He also recognised that Christian, not Anne, was Richard’s first wife, as the inscription suggests. Anne’s incomplete year of death began '15-', with the day and month omitted, indicating that she was still alive when the brass was installed. As the mother of Richard’s heir, Thomas, she had been promoted to be named first in the inscription. Mill Stephenson was incorrect.

Note that the inscription made no provision for Richard's own death, despite the brass and tomb being erected many years before he died. The tomb was intended to commemorate his two wives, and to reflect Richard's status in Witney.

The shield over Richard’s head has the arms of Wenman, On a fess between three anchors as many lion’s heads erased. The other Wenman shield, now placed below Christian, appears to have been missing in Mill Stephenson’s time.

The arms beneath the left-hand wife's figure are Barry nebuly on a chief a lion passant gardant. These are the arms of the Staple of Calais, of which Richard was a member. 

Anne, the second wife, made her will in 1536, leaving £20 to her (half) brother, Thomas Midwinter. Her mother Alice had remarried to William Midwinter after the death of her father, John Bush. Both Anne's father and stepfather were prominent Northleach woolmen.

Richard himself lived until October 1534, having made his will a year earlier. He left Anne a thousand marks in ready money. In 1524 he is recorded as having paid four fifths of Witney’s tax. He had come to Witney as a child following his mother Emmota’s remarriage to Thomas Fermer, a woolman of Witney, after the death of his father, Henry Wenman of Blewbury, Berkshire. 

Richard’s brass, like those of many other woolmen, was a London product. It has figures typical of the late stages of the London F style. It makes no specific reference to his trade, and as already mentioned, was intended to commemorate his wives and reflect his own status. The Trinity at the top end of the slab and the phrase ‘on whose soules Jesu have mercy’, point to a greater degree of spirituality than the brasses of most woolmen. This is confirmed by much of his long and very particular will.

For more on the brasses of woolmen, see Nigel Saul, ‘The Wool Merchants and their Brasses’, in the 2006 Transactions of the Monumental Brass Society.

 

©Jon Bayliss: text and photos