Abstract
Elizabeth Etchingham and Agnes Oxenbridge are remembered in a modest memorial brass (figure 9.1) on the floor of a side aisle in a small parish church deep in the Sussex weald.1 Laid in the late fifteenth century, the brass shows the two women turned towards each other. Elizabeth Etchingham, on the left, is depicted with loose hair flowing down to her hips. Agnes Oxenbridge, on the right, is considerably larger than Elizabeth, and her hair is tightly coifed, but not covered. They are identically dressed. A Latin inscription under Elizabeth Etchingham tells us that she, first-born daughter of Thomas and Margaret Etchingham, died on December 3, 1452. A similar text under Agnes Oxenbridge identifies her as the daughter of Robert Oxenbridge, gives her date of death as August 4, 1480, and solicits God’s mercy on behalf of both women.2
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Notes
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© 2011 Noreen Giffney, Michelle M. Sauer, and Diane Watt
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Bennett, J.M. (2011). Remembering Elizabeth Etchingham and Agnes Oxenbridge. In: Giffney, N., Sauer, M.M., Watt, D. (eds) The Lesbian Premodern. The New Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230117198_10
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230117198_10
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