We visited St Mary's and St Nicholas's Church in the town of Beaumaris, on the Isle of Anglesey in North Wales back in February. It wasnt the first time we visited because my wife and I actually got married there back in 2006 (16 years this year !).
The church itself is quite beautiful - but it is this alabaster tomb that is set in one corner that always intrigues me whenever we visit it.
According to the sign on the end, the tomb is a little over 700 years old ! It shows William de Bulkeley and his wife - and also their dog which his feet is resting on.
Over the years people have carved their names, etc into the alabaster - a sort of historic graffiti if you will - with some of those carvings dating back a considerable number of years.
To me its a special one-off artefact that cant be recreated, and to have lasted all this time is a considerable tribute to the craftmanship of whoever put it together.
The church itself is also quite impressive and historic having been founded in around 1330 ! Although having had various alterations made over the centuries.
Its really pretty inside, although many of the pics I took came out quite blurred, so I only have a few to show here.
It has a beautiful upper gallery, and when were getting married, the ladies from the church choir were up there and sang all of the songs for our wedding - it was really lovely.
It has lovely stained glass windows throughout, depicting stories from the Bible.
At a glance I'm always surprised that the church is as old as it is, but when you look at the stonework, you can see that it is made from irregular sized stone (ie, whatever they could find), which is always a good hint of age. It also has an interesting graveyard surrounding it.
The tomb above is quite interesting, with its arch across the top - never saw anything like that before.
The church always seems to be open during the day, so visitors can just drop in, and its often empty - a small donation is encouraged because they are expensive things to maintain.
Anyway, I thought it worth sharing. Its a beautiful building and that alabaster tomb is something else - a real piece of unique history !