Dead People Hanging About

My father is passing family mementos down to his son's and daughter in preparation of emptying out his house, the house that he and my late mother shared.  Winter he flies down to Arizona where he has his own room in my twin brothers home.  Summer he flies back to Oregon where he will now have his own room at my younger brother's large house.  When we all lived in England back in the late sixties our neighbor in the village of Ardley became a good friend.  Mrs Bond lived in a lovely thatched roof cottage.  One of her hobbies were brass rubbings and before we moved back to the U.S. she gave my parents two of her rubbings, which they had matted and framed.  The largest one now hangs in the Arizona house, a perfect place for it as it stands at about five and a half feet.

The second one has come to live at Menagerie Manor and is much more manageable at slightly less than four feet tall.

The inscription on both are in Latin and I failed to take any notes on the one in Arizona so I will ask my brother to send me any part of it that can be read by non-Latin speaking heathens as ourselves.  The one here at Menagerie Manor clearly reads Paul and Margaret Dayrell, so I got on the Internet and did some perusing and voila, here is what we have.

Paul and Margaret Dayrell

From the Church of St. Nicholas, Lillingstone Dayrell, Buckinghamshire.

The inscription translates to

"Here lies Paul Dayrell, knight and Margaret his wife; this Paul died on the 29th day of March in the year of our Lord 1491; upon whose souls may God have mercy."

Paul is shown in armor of the early Tudor period and his feet rest on a lion.
 Margaret is wearing a

 fur-trimmed gown, gathered at the waist and a variation of the "butterfly" headdress, in the

 fashion of that period.  Margaret Dayrell (Priest) was born in 1438, married Paul Dayrell in 1473 and died in 1491.

 Unfortunately the guest room that Paul and Margaret will be occupying does not have picture rail in it.  Picture rail is a must in old houses that have lath and plaster walls as when one attempts to hammer a nail into it, the nail will just pop out.


The rest of the rooms have the original picture rail as can be seen in this photo of one corner of the parlor. We have dozens of the fancy little hooks that hook into the rail.

And other rooms have picture rail and plate rails that we can sit some of the unframed photos
of grand kids and cherished pets

 

So I will be calling those carpentry geniuses that just finished the roof on Menagerie Manor to come in and put picture rail in that room and the Master bedroom as well.