title: The archaeology of Manx church interiors: contents and contexts 1634-1925
Creators: name: McClure, Patricia
Publisher: name: University of Liverpool Repository
Year: 2014

description: Despite the large amount of historical church archaeology carried out within English churches, the relevance of British regional variations to conclusions reached has only been recognized relatively recently (Rodwell 1996: 202 and Yates 2006: xxi). This offered opportunities to consider possible meanings for the evolving post-Reformation furnishing arrangements within Manx churches. The resultant thesis detailed the processes involved whilst examining changes made to the Anglican liturgical arrangements inside a number of Manx and Welsh churches and chapels-of-ease between 1634 and 1925 from previously tried and tested structuration, and sometimes biographical, perspectives for evidence of changes in human and material activity in order to place Manx communities within larger British political, religious and social contexts. Findings challenged conclusions reached by earlier scholarship about the Commonwealth period in Man. Contemporary modifications to material culture inside Manx churches implied that Manx clergymen and their congregations accepted the transfer of key agency from ecclesiastical authorities to Parliamentary actors. Thus Manx religious practices appeared to have correlated more closely, albeit less traumatically, with those in England and Wales during the same period than previously recognized, although the small size of this study could not discover the geographical extent of disarray within Island parishes. Amendments made to the material culture after 1665 which indicated the status quo was soon re-established in Man probably reflected a shared, compliant paradigm. Alternatively, in England and Wales the official exclusion of dissidents from the Church of England in 1662, visible in the landscape in Nonconformist chapels from the beginning of the eighteenth century, signalled the beginnings of the Church’s loss of full judicial authority. In Man, hierarchical acceptance of moderate religious dissidence within the Anglican Church after the Restoration of the Monarchy, traditional cultural practices, and changed relationships between clergy and parishioners visible materially within the two Island parishes studied, reflected the Manx Church’s more successful strategy to maintain power. A number of sections within chapters focused on material evidence of the unusual relationships between Castletown communities and their parish church between 1704 and 1925. Consideration of seating arrangements also highlighted the effects onto various Manx communities of the sale of the Island to England in 1765. Throughout, the contents of the Welsh churches provided informative, comparative contexts that informed the hermeneutic processes undertaken. To conclude, generally this project placed previously unexplored material culture within wider church archaeology and revealed regionally-specific habitus, human agency, and material activity and trends. The structuration approach taken identified a number of issues suitable for publication, and raised unanswered questions that would benefit from further research.