Church Of St Oswald

SE 32 NE ROTHWELL CHURCH SIDE LS26 (west side) Methley

6/74 Church of St. Oswald 5th June 1964

GV I

Parish church. C14 and C15, restored and renewed in C19 and early C20. Squared sandstone, shallow-pitched roof concealed by parapet. West tower, nave with south aisle, chancel with south chapel and north vestry. Three-stage Perpendicular-style tower with diagonal buttresses has west door, 3-light window with Perpendicular tracery, louvred 2-light belfry windows, corbelled-out embattled parapet with crocketed corner pinnacles. Three-bay buttressed south aisle has C19 gabled porch, a 2-light window on each side of this, and in the 3rd bay a 3-light window with reticulated tracery. Two-bay chapel has large 4-light windows with Perpendicular tracery. Chancel, rebuilt 1926, has a 5-light east window in Perpendicular style. North wall of nave, 4 bays, with buttresses, has a shallow porch to the 2nd bay, three 3-light windows with reticulated tracery, and 4 square-headed clerestory windows each of 2 cusped lights.

Interior: early C14 three-bay aisle arcade of double-chamfered 2-centred arches carried on short octagonal columns with moulded caps; double-chamfered chancel arch springing from figured corbels; king-post roof trusses of shallow pitch with arch-bracing from stone corbels depicting angels with Instruments of the Passion, trefoil-headed panels over the tie-beams; early C18 wooden pulpit, octagonal with fluted pilasters and fielded panels; exceptionally fine collection of monuments, principally: tomb chest of Sir Robert Waterton (d.1424) and wife, with recumbent alabaster effigies, under a crocketed canopy; Lord Welles (d.1461) and wife, with recumbent alabaster effigies; Sir John Savile (d.1606), with his son Sir Henry (d.1632) and his wife, on tall tomb chest with black Ionic columns; Charles Savile (d.1741) reclining on large lettered base with mourning wife seated beside him (by Scheemakers); John Savile, 1st Earl of Mexborough (d.1778), with semi-reclining figure pointing upwards (by Wilton). For further details see Pevsner.

Listing NGR: SE3911026622