File:BlakeMonument StPeter'sChurch Barnstaple Devon.xcf

English: Mural monument (seemingly erected after 1649, execution of King Charles I) to Nicholas Blake (d.1634), who died aged 9, St Peter's Church, Barnstaple, Devon, erected by his father Rev. Martin Blake (d.1673), vicar of Barnstaple, Devon. Rev Martin Blake, Vicar of Barnstaple 1628-56; 1660-73, suffered much for his adherence to the Royalist cause during the Civil War, as related in John Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy (1714).^[1] Martin Blake erected the surviving mural monument in St Peter's Church, Barnstaple, to his nine-year-old son Nicholas Blake (d.1634) and other children, but "as much in allusion to his own position and sufferings", described by Chanter (1882) as "perhaps the most noteworthy and interesting monument in the church", "not only a work of art, but of allegorical literature and imagination, telling its tale as fully in its medallions, cartouches and sculptured mottoes as if written - an actual instance of 'sermons in stone'".^[2]See: Chanter, J.R., Memorials Descriptive and Historical, of the Church of St Peter, Barnstaple, with its other ecclesiastical antiquities, and an account of the conventual church of St Mary Magdalene, recently discovered, Barnstaple, 1882, pp.96-8.

The bust in the middle is of Nicholas Blake, his left elbow resting on a skull, a symbol of mortality, his right hand clasping a Bible, a symbol of immortality. In the four spandrels surrounding the bust are portrayed various scenes, each with a Latin description. Clockwise from top: first spandrel: A hand sowing seeds of wheat and wheat growing up from the soil: cum foenore et flora reddit ("it gives back with interest and a flower", from fenus (faenus) -oris (n)); second spandrel: a putti head winged, with four stars: splendebu(n)t ut stellae eruntq(ue) sicut angeli ("they shone as stars and were like angels"); 3rd spandrel: soap bubbles and a pipe resting on a bowl, with a splayed hand below: dies hominis palmares et homo bulla (est) ("the days of man are as an hand-breadth" (variant of Psalms 39:5) "and man is a bubble"), referring to the vanity of life. 4th spandrel: a hand holding a bill-hook cuts the triple stem of a flowering lily: ut flos simul ac egressus est succiditur ("like a flower as soon as it comes out it is cut down").

The inscriptions and imagery share many similarities to the monument to Mrs Faieth Tayler (d.1657), who died 3 years before the Restoration of the Monarchy, wife of Rev. Edward Tayler (1610-1693), Vicar of Bletchley 1641-93, described in Lipscomb, George, "The History and Antiquities of the County of Buckingham", 1847[1]. The following text on his monument is especially similar to that on Blake's: Requiesce in fide placide: requiesce desiderat etiam ad migrandu, et te cum esse cum Christo maritus tuus moestissimi utriuq. coarctatus Edvardus Tayler, M.A. huius Ecclesiae Pastor indignus in tempore opportuno etiam reversurus ("unworthy pastor of this church about to return in an opportune time"). No evidence suggests that Edward Taylor was also a priest ejected from his living during the Commonwealth[2].

At the top of the Blake monument is a cryptic Royalist political statement: a sculpted crown, below which is inscribed reposita est, below which is a quasi-heraldic device on an escutcheon, below which is inscribed sed vincenti. This may be contrasted with the Tayler monument which is inscribed more fully: corona fidei reposita est atque dabitur sed vincenti ("the crown of faith has been laid aside and will be given but to him who overcomes"). The heraldic device is not familial, as the same device, namely two sceptres in saltire (or possibly in cross on Tayler's) is shown in both the Blake and Tayler monuments in the same position. The Blake monument shows the sceptres as flory, sprouting a fleur-de-lys at the top, and on each side of the saltire is a martyr's palm-frond, with two crowns, one above and one below. This device of two sceptres flory in saltire appears on "farthing tokens" ^[3] minted during the reigns of the first two Stuart kings, James I and Charles I. The two sceptres and two crowns represent the two kindoms of Scotland and England, the saltire representing the Cross of St Andrew, patron saint of Scotland. The fleur-de-lys on the tip of each saltire represents those kings' claims to the kingdom of France.^[4] See farthing minted during the reign of .[3] King Charles I, to whom Blake was so firmly attached, was executed in 1649 at the end of the Civil War. It is thus likely the "crown of faith laid aside" refers to the abolition of the monarchy during the Commonwealth, and the palm-fronds to the martyrdom of King Charles I. The imagery is somewhat cryptic, as overt displays of Royalist sentiment at this time were not advisable.