St Mary's Church, Thornton: Satan's Face

St Mary’s Church at Thornton in Craven is a short bicycle ride of 15 minutes from my home. One of the church wardens had kindly agreed to unlock and went about her business as I inspected the interior. I had visited back in 2006 when I first started working in Skipton but arranged for a re-visit seeing as I could remember nothing. St Mary's sits by the old Roman road between Ilkley and Ribchester as does Salem, though her antiquity is nearly half as old as the road's, dating to about 1250, and then rebuilt 250 years later.

St Mary’s is a fairly typical construction of this era with chamfered arcading and octagonal piers. Outside, a number of simplistic carved faces grace some of the windows. Whether these depict particularly gormless villagers, or whether the mason’s skill did not extend so well into portraiture, one cannot tell.

Yet it was a strange, carved face within which really caught my attention. Whoever carved this one certainly did possess skill, because one can quite easily detect emotion in its features. It carries a distinct air of disapproval. It is found on one of the pillars on the nave’s north, and faces the back of the building. The face wears a turban and is, dare I say, faintly menacing. It must have been carved when the pillar was erected in either 1450 or 1250, but the reason for its existence is inexplicable, the church warden being as puzzled as me.

If it is some village matriarch or goodwife, I should certainly not like to have crossed her. If it is in fact a he, it is redolent of Satan. Most medieval depictions of the devil are stylised and stereotypical, with pointed horns and sharp teeth, but this mason surely understood his more subtle forms.

It pays little to speculate, but I can say that there is one who most certainly disapproves of people going to church and that is Beelzebub himself. There will always be plenty of better things to do on a Sunday than attend divine worship and hear the reading of God’s word, which he certainly hates. Although I think it a strange idea to carve a disapproving face to gaze out upon a congregation, there is a real, spiritual reality which it mirrors. As a rule, if Satan does not wish something to happen, it is a good thing that it does. And if he desires something, it is best avoided. So read the Bible, pray to God and meet with His people. Let Satan scowl; his feelings are not our concern. 

And let the prince of ill
look grim as e'er he will,
he harms us not a whit;
for why? His doom is writ;
a word shall quickly slay him.

-Martin Luther, A Safe Stronghold is our God, 1529