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A basin with a drain, and a cupboard recess — both beside the altar.
Also known as: Sacrarium, Stone basin in a church wall, Recess beside the altar
Two recesses that mark where an altar stood, and they survive when the altar does not. A piscina has a drain running into consecrated ground; an aumbry is a plain locker with hinge marks. Finding either locates a lost altar exactly.
The drain is the point. Water that has touched consecrated vessels was not put into a common drain, so the piscina discharges directly into the earth — which is why the fitting is built into the fabric and survives the altar it served.
A piscina in a wall with no altar beneath it is direct evidence that an altar stood there, which is how side chapels swept away at the Reformation are located.
An arched recess in a wall at waist height containing a shallow round basin with a hole in its base, or a plain square recess with hinge sockets in its jambs.