A high five through time: decoding Messages in Tudor Plasterwork

One of the most interesting features in this room is the design scratched into the plaster to the left of the bed.

A Secret in the Plaster: This rough pomegranate hints at the hidden passions of Soulton Hall’s builder, Sir Rowland Hill.

This kind of decoration on vertical plaster surfaces is often called pargetting, and is seen on the outside of half-timbered buildings from the the medieval period onwards. For this reason, people in the past have wondered whether this might be a piece of an earlier building reused inside the house.

The truth, however, is much more interesting.

The design used is a rough version of a pomegranate motif, popular during the Renaissance. The pomegranate is associated with Persephone and Demeter at the Mysteries of Eleusis in Ancient Greece.

Sir Rowland Hill, the Tudor statesman who built Soulton Hall, was very interested in Eleusis, and the square precinct this part of the manor sits in measures 55 yards by 55 yards: the exact dimensions of the Telesterion temple at Eleusis. Moreover, there are lots of geometric clues in the house and its grounds that refer to the geometry of the garnet crystal. Natural garnet crystals were the sacred Mystery objects handed around in the Telesterion at Eleusis.

The plaster pomegranate design would have been covered up by tapestries or fabric wall coverings like dornix. It is possible that the design was made by the plasterers when discussing what moulds to make for the elaborate plaster ceilings that once decorated the house. We know what they looked like, because examples made by the same plasterers still survive in other Tudor houses of the wider region, such as Plas Mawr in Conwy. At Soulton the ceilings were removed during renovations in 1847, and the most important design from the lost ceilings was carefully preserved in the Dancing Pavement to the south of the house.

This scratched fleur-de-lis, a lily symbol, hints at religious themes of purity.

Manwhile, this scratched fleur-de-lis might be a subtle nod to religious symbolism. Lilies, often depicted as fleur-de-lis, represent purity and chastity in scripture and religious literature. This association also connected the flower to the Virgin Mary. Additionally, the three petals of the fleur-de-lis could symbolize the Holy Trinity for some.The reason the Soulton ceilings had to be replaced probably connects to the long-term impact of the period of destruction during the English Civil War (the Wars of the Three Kingdoms). An army passed Soulton, along the road on its way to the Seige of Wem, where it was seen-off by the famous ‘Wild Women of Wem’!

It was in this period that the Hall was ransacked for religious and state papers, as Sir Rowland Hill had been a great statesman of the Tudor age, and as publisher of the Geneva Bible he was an important figurehead for both the Royalists (Cavaliers) and Parliamentarians (Roundheads). Through the window to the east you can see straight ahead where the army crossed Soulton Brook, and beyond, the caves of Hawkstone Cliffs and the Red Castle where the Hill family hid themselves and their treasures during the conflict.

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Text about the Hill room supported by by James D. Wenn of BYRGA GENIHT.