The Inscriptions of St Cyriac's Church, Swaffham Prior
St Cyriac's is currently barren of any inscriptions whatsoever. However, this does not always appear to have been the case. By chance the author of this web site discovered a plan of St Cyriac's that looks to have been prepared by the incumbent vicar around the year 1900. This plan marks the positions of fourteen inscribed graves that once lay within the church and, more usefully, lists the inscriptions that were once on them.
These graves contain some valuable genealogical information and includes a reference to the graves of some of my own sixteenth century ancestors from the parish.
I have made a copy of this plan and have reproduced it as faithfully as possible below. My apologies for any spelling errors (especially in the Latin), the original is not easy to read.
Plan of St Cyriac's Church showing the location of inscriptions on grave slabs.
The numbers refer to the notes below:
1 - Memorica sacrum Martini Hill, died 1712. [black marble slab]
2 - Israel Bank obiit 20 mo. martii 1691 et hic jacet corpus Mayo Bank cenerosi sui obiit XVII die Octobis anno dni 1725. [small freestone]
3 - Susanna Hill obiit Jun 27 otatis 11 anno dni 1686. [Written on a freestone]
4 - 1674 - rest obliterated.
5 - Obliterated
6 - Hic jacet corpus Johannis Rant cenerssi qui obiit XVIII die Septembris anno dni 1603 anno regni Jacobi primis olatis sue XLVIII. Above this on the same stone is twice added - Here lyeth the body of Elizabeth Rant the wife of Roger Rant Esq. who deceased September the 12th 1726. [On a grey marble slab]
7 - Here lyeth the body of Roger Rant Esq. who deceased May 26th in the year 1654 and in the year of his age 55. Labor in vita in patria guieo and also here lyeth the body of Roger Rant Esq. obiit November ye 15 anno domini 1728. Otatis 69.
8 - Here lyeth the body of Roger Rant Esq. son and heir of Roger Rant Esq. by Eleanor his wife who changed this life for the better April ye 27 in ye year 1684 in ye sixteenth year current of his age - the memory of the just is blessed.
9 - Here Lyeth the body of Roger Rant son of Roger Rant gent. and Mary his wife who departed this life March ye 27, 1732 aged XV months. {On a black marble slab]
10 - Here lyeth the body of Mary Rant wife of Roger Rant gent, who departed this life April ye 5, 1735 aged 30 years. [On a freestone]
11 - Here lyeth the body of Walter Poulter son of John Poulter late of St Edmunds Bury who departed this life Jan 27 1736 aged 20 years. He unfortunately shot himself with his gun going over a ditch. [On a small freestone]
12 - Here lyeth the body of John Chambers buried ye 13 of Feb 1586 and ye body of Margorie his wife buried 5 of Dec 1582.
13 - Old characters now illegible.
14 - Katherine Edwards one of the daughters of Thomas Edwards Esq. who died Xth day of March 1594.
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