Box pew
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A box pew is a type of church pew that is encased in panelling and was prevalent in England and other Protestant countries from the 16th to early 19th centuries.
History in England
Before the rise of
New England
In colonial New England, it was common for the colonial meeting house to have box pews. Families would typically sit together in a box pew, and it is theorized that the concept of the box pew resulted from the fact that the early meeting houses were not heated, and the walls of the box pews would minimize drafts, thus keeping the occupants relatively warmer in the winter. It was common for families to bring foot warmers (wooden boxes filled with hot stones gathered from the home or local tavern hearth) and crickets (foot stools) and blankets to meeting, huddling together with their feet held above the foot warmer on a cricket, using the blankets as a tent over their shoulders down to their feet. Another advantage to the box pew was that family elders would sit facing the pulpit while children sat facing the elders and with their backs towards the pulpit. Thus elders could keep an eye on the minister in the pulpit while also keeping an eye on their children.
Gallery
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Box pews with pulpit, Holy Trinity, York
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Box pews in Bethesda Methodist Chapel, Stoke-on-Trent, England
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Colonial Meeting House in Alna, Maine, US
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Trinity Church on the Green New Haven, Connecticut, 1814–1816 pulpit facing rectangular box pews
References
- ISBN 0-19-505779-1.
- ^ Nelson Encyclopaedia, Thomas Nelson and Son, 1911
Further reading
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- Speare, Eva A.: Colonial Meeting-Houses of New Hampshire Self-published, Reginald M. Colby, Agent, Littleton, NH, 1938, revised 1955.
- Sinnott, Edmund W.: Meetinghouse and Church in Early New England Bonanza Books, New York, 1963.