The 12th century cathedral in Trondheim had an extensive diocese; by way of the Faroes and Iceland to Orkney and the Hebrides and round to the Isle of Man. Quite a reach, until I think about the Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe whose patch covers all of Europe and the former Soviet Union countries. These days the bishop is based in Brussels although his secretariat is in London. Here is another big diocese.
It’s in the Crimea and it is Sudak, marked with a red arrow above. Here is one of its outposts in the UK, in Ennismore Gardens.
The top photograph is off the internet as there is scaffolding obscuring the lower part of the facade today. When I saw the campanile it evoked Italy and indeed it is an almost exact copy of the facade of the Basilica of St. Zeno in Verona, below, where it is said Romeo and Juliet were married in the crypt.
Pevsner admires the Lombardic Romanesque facade and the later sgraffito on the upper nave walls and above the chancel arch, an example of the Italian trend in the Arts and Crafts movement, he says. Meanwhile perhaps you, like me, are pondering on “sgraffito”. Pevsner furnishes the answer in his glossary: “scratched pattern, often in plaster”.
It has a curious history. It was built in 1849 as an Anglican Church but in 1955 the parish was combined with the Church of the Holy Trinity in Prince Consort Road. Generously it was lent to the Russian Orthodox Church as a place of worship and was only formally acquired by the Sourozh diocese in 1978. While the Church of England has not had a really good schism since the Reformation, the Russian Orthodox Church has them almost as often as we have birthdays, so I will not attempt to explain why, in 2006, the bishop and most of the clergy and laity chose to leave the Moscow Patriarchate, nor why they were unsuccessful.
Saki, whose writing I admire, has something to say not strictly relevant to this post but I think strangely prescient considering Reginald in Russia was published in 1910.
“You English are always so frivolous,” said the Princess. “In Russia we have too many troubles to permit of our being light-hearted.”
Reginald gave a delicate shiver, such as an Italian greyhound might give in contemplating the approach of an ice age of which he personally disapproved, and resigned himself to the inevitable political discussion.
“Nothing that you hear about us in England is true,” was the Princess’s hopeful beginning.
“I always refused to learn Russian geography at school,” observed Reginald: “I was certain some of the names must be wrong.”
“Everything is wrong with our system of government,” continued the Princess placidly. “The Bureaucrats think only of their pockets, and the people are exploited and plundered in every direction, and everything is mismanaged.”
“With us,” said Reginald, “a Cabinet usually gets the credit of being depraved and worthless beyond the bounds of human conception by the time it has been in office about four years.”
“But if it is a bad Government you can turn it out at the election,” argued the Princess.
“As far as I remember, we generally do,” said Reginald.
“But here it is dreadful, every one goes to such extremes. In England you never go to extremes.”
“We go to the Albert Hall,” explained Reginald.
After the EU referendum we will have the Proms at the Albert Hall to heal our differences and, if you have not read Saki, I commend his stories; they are so up to date that it is hard to believe that he died in 1916.
Interesting that Saki was a cousin of Dornford Yates, another of my favourite authors.
Thank you for pointing out the connection between Saki and Dornford Yates, something I didn’t know. If you’d like to borrow any of the latter’s novels, I’ve got the lot. In the same vein, EW Hornung, creator of Raffles, was Arthur Conan Doyle’s brother-in-law.