To see: Jacobean costume, fixed in stone. Alderman John Walton, who died in 1626, and his wife Alice lie side by side on an altar tomb, hands joined in prayer — the most important monument in St Nicholas' Church, Gloucester. This is no longer the world of medieval effigies: these citizens of a rich merchant parish are shown in the "glorious Stuart costume" of their day, ruff, doublet, coif and gown rendered with a portraitist's care. The work belongs to the wave of civic monuments of the early seventeenth century, when the urban elite — not only the nobility — had themselves carved in effigy. Around them, St Nicholas keeps other tombs and slabs to notable citizens, several in Stuart dress.
Did you know?
St Nicholas, once one of Gloucester's most prosperous parishes, is now cared for by the Churches Conservation Trust: the Walton tomb recalls the age when the city's aldermen vied with one another in funerary display.
Info
St Nicholas Church, Gloucester. Altar tomb with two effigies lying in prayer, in Stuart costume; Alderman John Walton (d.1626) and his wife Alice. Alabaster. (Effigies and dating confirmed; material per corpus, to be confirmed on site.)