Framlingham St Michael

St Michael, Framlingham

For many people, Woodbridge is the best of Suffolk's smaller towns. But I prefer Framlingham. There's something about its independence and self-sufficiency that reminds me of similar places in France, where a large rural hinterland coaxes a small place into a sense of importance as a town.

The great tower of St Michael. The Clerestory peeps above the aisles and past the chancel.

The other thing, of course, is that Framlingham is beautiful. And finally, Woodbridge is full of the kind of people who would live in a place like Woodbridge, which I always find a bit off-putting.

No, give me Framlingham anyday. It consists of a main street. At one end is East Anglia's biggest castle. At the other is a fine market square, with its banks, hotels and trees.

Shops line one side of the street, but on the other is the magnificent St Michael's Anglican parish church, one of the largest and grandest parish churches in all East Anglia.

The graveyard boils with trees, but is otherwise neat without being overtrim. There are some lovely houses on the south and west sides, and to the north the rather shabby parish hall. That is not meant as a criticism, incidentally; rather, a reminder that, despite its urban quality, Framlingham is a large village rather than a small town.

There is no other Suffolk church quite like St Michael. Suffolk is famous for its naves, but here the nave is almost hidden, squeezed between the huge chancel, longer and wider than the nave to which it is attached, the great tower, and two ornate aisles. The pretty clerestory peeps up in the middle, as if the nave were standing on tip-toe to take a look at the outside world.

The tower is,I think, Suffolk's most elegant of all, a more feminine one than Lavenham or Eye. Only Stoke by Nayland can touch it. Simon Cotton tells me that quite a few bequests in the last years of the 15th century left money for it, although there was evidence that it hadn't been started by 1500. The battlements came last of all, probably as the Howards were tidying up at the other end.

For the chancel is what makes this an extraordinary church. Whereas at Lavenham, Long Melford and elsewhere, the churches were rebuilt by the piety and patronage of 15th century industrial Suffolk as great public spaces, here the rebuilding was effectively an expedient measure for a landed family. The Howards, the Dukes of Norfolk, residents of the nearby castle, lost their family mausoleum at Thetford Priory to the dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s. They built the great chancel here as a new one, to be their final resting place for generations to come. It wasn't finished until 1554, after the brief but militantly protestant intervention of Edward VI's reign, when Mary I seemed to have brought some stability to the English church again.

In these turbulent years of the mid-Sixteenth Century, they had backed what seemed, for a brief while, the right side. Ultimately, it turned out to be very much the wrong side, so the Howards retired, licking their wounds, to their other castle at Arundel in Sussex, leaving the new Church of England a fascinating document of how the Reformation years affected a great landed family, a moment frozen in time. Framlingham's Catholic community today meet in the nearby parish church of St Clare, a bare shadow of this former glory; although, ironically, their great Cathedral at Norwich was built by a direct descendant of the Howards.

And so, we go inside, through the functional south porch. Ahead of us is a wall painting, which takes a moment to decode, but is part of a rare representation of the Holy Trinity. God the Father holds the crucified God the Son between his legs. You can just make out the dove between their heads. This is a survival from the early medieval church, but there's not much else. Almost all here is the rebuilding of the late 15th and early 16th centuries.

At first, the interior seems gloomy, despite the aisles and clerestory, but really, this is just in contrast to the sea of light to the east, where the chancel spreads beyond the chancel arch, another surviving element of the earlier building. The rood must have been a high one.

Most curiously, in the museum in the castle, there is a wooden head, supposedly found during the Victorian restoration of the church. It could so easily be the head of Christ from the rood, in which case it is an extremely rare survival.

The nave seems small; but really, it isn't. The screens to the aisle chapels, and the height of the chancel arch, accentuate the fact that this is a smaller, darker space than the chancel - but it is still actually quite big.

God the Father holds God the Son. A reminder that this building is, in fact, more than 500 years old after all. Notice the good early 20th century glass beyond.

Above the west end of the church hangs what many people consider to be the greatest treasure of this church; the 18th century organ. In fact, parts of it are 17th century, but it was installed here in 1709, only to be moved into the chancel by the Victorians. In 1969, reunited with its case, which had spent a century in the castle museum, it was returned to its rightful place at the west end.

Above, an angel holds a recut symbol of the Holy trinity; another holds instruments of the passion.

Left: the font, with its 15th century cover - not terribly exciting, I know, but more authentic than the font, I suspect.

The font beyond is interesting and good, but I cannot believe that it has not been recut. Otherwise, the nave has been sensitively restored by the Victorians, and I very much like the niche and image of the Blessed Virgin in the north west corner.

So, let us step through the chancel arch, where magnificence awaits.

Ahead is the altar, and beyond it an interesting altar piece from the time when Laudian piety and the beginnings of the Age of Enlightenment touched fingers for a moment. It is an abstract image of 'Glory', dating from the early 17th century.

Similar to those that can be seen in some Cambridge college chapels (this church was inherited by Pembroke College, Cambridge, in the late 16th century). If you've seen a picture of it, then it is smaller than you imagined. It did jolly well to survive the Puritan terror.

A brief description of the tombs. There are six of them, two to the south and four to the north. There is room for many more, which is clearly what the Howards intended. However, one of those to the south is not a Howard at all, which they certainly didn't.

The four tombs to the north of the altar are in chronological order from the altar outwards, anti-clockwise. The first is to Henry Fitzroy, one of Henry VIII's many illegitimate children. The most remarkable thing about it is the series of friezes around its sides, depicting scenes from the Old Testament.

Looking east, in the north chancel aisle. From left to right: Henry Howard, son of the third Duke of Norfolk, and various members of his family; Elizabeth Howard (partly hidden); the two wives of the fourth duke of Norfolk in the far corner; and, cut off at the right hand side, Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and bastard son of Henry VIII. That red rope must deter all but the most determined vandals.

Next to it, against the north wall, is the tomb of two wives of Thomas Howard, the fourth duke of Norfolk. He was one of those who plotted against Elizabeth I, in favour of Mary Queen of Scots, and his head was neatly severed in the Tower of London as a result. There seems to be room between the two wives for Sir Thomas himself, but perhaps the disgrace was too much for the family. There are lions in each corner, although one was recently vandalised, and has been removed for repairs.

The understated tomb of Elizabeth Howard, with that of her mother and step-mother to the right. Note the missing lion on the nearest corner of this second tomb (or, rather, don't note it - it's been removed for repairs.)

Beside this is a comparitively understated tomb for the infant Elizabeth Howard, daughter of one of the unlucky ladies on the previous tomb.

Finally, the most recent tomb is for the fourth Duke's younger brother, Henry Howard, an enthusiastic Catholic, who was, not unreasonably some might think, executed by the advisors to the boy King Edward VI in 1547. This tomb actually dates from about 70 years later, and is the most spectacular of all of them.

Left: Henry Howard, third Duke of Norfolk, in unrealistic head-not-severed-yet pose. His daughters kneel behind him.

Above: And these are his sons. The tomb was actually made after all their deaths.

On to the south side of the sanctuary, then. The first tomb is the second oldest, and is for Thomas Howard, third Duke of Norfolk and architect of this amazing mausoleum. This man was a lackey of Henry VIII, but it all went pear-shaped after the King's death, in terms of both Henry's and Howard's successors.

This tomb may not be as spectacular as some of the others, but it is important as the final statement in England of religious imagery before the Reformation - note the extraordinary series of Saints around the sides. His beard is rather awesome, too.

Finally, the tomb of Sir Robert Hitcham, the interloper in this family mausoleum. After the disgrace of the Howards (they just couldn't shake off that Catholicism, I'm afraid), the castle passed through the hands of relatives until Hitcham bought it for a wacking £14,000 in 1635. Unfortunately, he died less than a year later. But it's the quality of life not the quantity that counts, don't you think?

Hitcham was a great benefactor to the town, and his name is remembered by that of the primary school. Another famous benefactor here, from a generation or so later, was Thomas Mills. He is remembered in the name of the comprehensive school, and by the almshouses he bequeathed.

A staunch non-conformist, he lived through the turmoil of the Commonwealth and subsequent emancipation of non-Anglican protestant communities, and was buried in his garden. Judy Masters tells me that his estate continues to benefit the town through the Mills Charity. His descendants at Great Saxham have a mausoleum in the church there.

Hitcham's castle is now in the care of English Heritage, and may be visited for a small fee. A walk along the curtain walls is exhilarating and recommended.

Simon the zealot.

I remember the first time I visited Framlingham church, about 15 years ago, knowing nothing about it, and being utterly gobsmacked by the sheer arrogance of the Howard tombs. I wanted to grab the complete strangers wandering around the church, and say "hey, have you seen this? Come and look at this! Have you ever seen anything so vulgar as this in your life?"

I resisted, you'll be pleased to know. But I was thinking of that experience as I stood staring, after taking these photos. An American lady came and stood beside me. "My God", she declared. "These Howards thought well of themselves."

I mentioned before that one of the tombs had recently suffered an attack of vandalism. This happened while the church was locked, I hasten to point out. The insurance will pay for all the damage to be repaired, I understand. But I was astonished to discover that, not only were these rare and priceless survivals of the English Renaissance not alarmed, which is understandable, but they weren't even under video surveillance. I mean, any museum in the world would give its right arm for treasures like these, and station a custodian on each one.

But there isn't the money, I hear you say, and you are right. In the meantime, a cool eight million pounds has been found to build a grand folly tower on the Anglican cathedral at Bury St Edmunds. Sometimes, even I am left speechless.

Sir Robert Hitcham's workhouse in the ruins of the castle.

St Michael, Framlingham, is right in the middle of the town. Instructions above.

St Michael has its own website.