Spencer Means
The Pilgrim Rabbit (c.1320) in context: The doorway to St Michael's Chapel, St Mary's, Beverley, Yorkshire, England
A detail of the carving can be seen here: www.flickr.com/photos/hunky_punk/15828910446.
Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) was born in 1832. His father (the Reverend Charles Dodgson) became vicar at Croft-on-Tees in Yorkshire in 1843 before becoming a canon of Ripon Cathedral in 1852 and later Archdeacon of Richmond, so Carroll spent a few impressionable years in Yorkshire before entering Rugby School in Warwickshire in 1846, undoubtedly returning home at times.
Carroll is known to have visited the area around Beverley (his grandfather lived at Hull), and many believe that he saw this carving in St Mary's and that it inspired his later creation of the White Rabbit in "Alice in Wonderland." The similarity to John Tenniel's drawings for the book is striking: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Rabbit#mediaviewer/File:Down_...
Although Carroll is very likely to have been in Beverley, there is no documentation that he visited St Mary's or that he saw the rabbit, so, as with so many instances of "influence," it may or may not be true.
Here is the "Gryphon and Rabbits" misericord in Ripon Cathedral believed to be the basis of the descent of Alice and the White Rabbit through the hole into Wonderland: www.flickr.com/photos/hunky_punk/15861240161/
The Pilgrim Rabbit (c.1320) in context: The doorway to St Michael's Chapel, St Mary's, Beverley, Yorkshire, England
A detail of the carving can be seen here: www.flickr.com/photos/hunky_punk/15828910446.
Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) was born in 1832. His father (the Reverend Charles Dodgson) became vicar at Croft-on-Tees in Yorkshire in 1843 before becoming a canon of Ripon Cathedral in 1852 and later Archdeacon of Richmond, so Carroll spent a few impressionable years in Yorkshire before entering Rugby School in Warwickshire in 1846, undoubtedly returning home at times.
Carroll is known to have visited the area around Beverley (his grandfather lived at Hull), and many believe that he saw this carving in St Mary's and that it inspired his later creation of the White Rabbit in "Alice in Wonderland." The similarity to John Tenniel's drawings for the book is striking: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Rabbit#mediaviewer/File:Down_...
Although Carroll is very likely to have been in Beverley, there is no documentation that he visited St Mary's or that he saw the rabbit, so, as with so many instances of "influence," it may or may not be true.
Here is the "Gryphon and Rabbits" misericord in Ripon Cathedral believed to be the basis of the descent of Alice and the White Rabbit through the hole into Wonderland: www.flickr.com/photos/hunky_punk/15861240161/