[Bell Historians] Latin inscription meaning & Elizabethan hand bell

[Neal Dodge]

Hi all,

The 3rd at Wickham Skeith in Suffolk, cast in 1615 by John Driver and James
Edbury, carries the inscription:
*"De quatuor quinque, invito livore superbo Ut templa bona sint inviolata
dei."*
Along with the initials of the bell founders and four locals.
Can anyone please tell me what it means? I believe it's some kind of
reference to iconoclasm? Along with 'four of five' or similar.

Raven in his county book says it points "to resistance by 'village
Hampdens' to some 'little tyrant of the their fields' which is a reference
to a verse in Thomas Gray's Elegy Written in a Country Church-Yard:



*"Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breastThe little tyrant of his
fields withstood,Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,Some Cromwell,
guiltless of his country's blood."*
Hampden being John Hampden the principal leader of the Long Parliament in
its opposition to Charles I.
All of this of course postdating the casting of the bell.

Unrelated, coming up for sale is purported to be an Elizabethan handbell
dated 1560 that belonged to the Rector of Spexhall, Suffolk.
https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/lockdales/catalogue-id-lo10278/lot-755db66c-a8a8-4cd3-9f40-b31000e6edb6



-- 
Many Thanks
Neal Dodge
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