John Briggs’ interesting message reminded me of an interesting bell tower I saw yesterday at the church of St. Mary of the Assumption at Ufford in Suffolk.  By a happy chance, a group of very good bell ringers were ringing while we were visiting this fascinating church (an amazing font cover and 15^th century bench ends amongst other treasures).  The bell ringers were clearly seen in their chamber through both a large window facing west out of the 14^th century tower and through the large 13^th century window opening east onto the nave of the church.  Above this window, though, is a smaller one, presumably on a level with the bells themselves, or certainly much closer to them, which the guide book suggests gave the ringer in the tower a direct view of the altar in order to ring the sanctus bell.  Would a bell have been rung from this level only at the Eucharist, or is chamber a later addition, allowing longer ropes and so easier ringing?  (and if so what purpose, if any, would the large west facing window have had?)  Maybe the sanctus window was only used when there was an earlier tower there, and became redundant with the building of the 14^th century tower.  I’m not expecting definitive answers to this – merely adding to the interesting speculations on the relationships between the evidence provided by buildings and knowledge of liturgy etc.

Cate Gunn