[Bell Historians] Re Godalming and recasting in general

[davidbryant@hotmail.co.uk [bellhistorians]]

It was noticeable in the late 1990s / Early 2000s that the practice of reproducing inscriptions in facsimile on new bells, which had been fairly common for much of the C20, was falling out of favour and there were far fewer instances. I always assumed that this was due to the notable increase in the reuse of redundant bells at around that time (the latter being largely a result of the efforts of the Keltek Trust). A facsimile reproduction could seem rather pointless when the original bell still existed anyway. It was of course debatable whether fasimile reproduction was a good idea anyway as it implied to the uninitiated that it was still the original bell or at least contained its metal, whereas in fact it was a completely new casting which may or may not have contained some or all of the metal of its predecessor.

That said, facsimile inscriptions could be informative in tracing the history of a particular church's bells, especially in cases where the original founder's name or initials weren't mentioned in the inscription and the style of lettering or decoration could be the only clear indicator.

David
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