Church Of St Medard

Church of St Medard

Parish church on Little Bytham High Street. Built in the 10th, 12th, 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries, with additions in 1590 and 1875. Constructed from coursed limestone rubble with ashlar quoins and dressings, roofed with Collyweston slate. The building comprises a western tower, nave, south aisle, porch, and chancel.

The early 13th-century three-stage tower features an offset to the belfry stage and a 15th-century embattled parapet with pinnacles, frieze, and gargoyles. A 14th-century recessed spire rises above, decorated with four gabled two-light lucarnes to the lower stage and similar single lights above. The west wall of the tower contains single lancets in the lower stages and paired lights in the belfry, each with octagonal shafts and stiff leaf capitals beneath moulded round arches.

The north nave wall displays a late 12th-century doorway with angle shafts and roll moulding, featuring dogtooth decoration and a continuously moulded lozenge head with dogtoothed hood terminating in beasts' heads. Above this is a reset stone carved with a dancing human figure. Two early 15th-century three-light windows with cusped heads and panel tracery occupy this wall, with a similar two-light window to the east. The chancel east window dates to the 16th century and contains five tall lights with a concave chamfered four-centred arched surround.

The south wall of the chancel preserves an early 12th-century doorway of considerable importance. It has a roll moulded surround with fillets and an outer flat order of carved ornament. The tympanum displays low relief billet moulding and chip carving, with a deep circular recess at the centre flanked by roundels containing bird carvings. The recess reputedly once held a relic of St Medard, to whom the church is dedicated. Immediately west of this doorway is a two-light 13th-century squint. The south-eastern nave quoin is 10th-century work in long-and-short style. The late 13th-century east window to the south aisle features intersecting tracery with moulded surround and hood, whilst the south wall contains three 13th-century three-light windows with triangular moulded heads and hoods.

The south porch, dating from the early 13th century, is gabled. Its outer doorway has rounded reveals with collared shafts and annular capitals supporting a single chamfered arch, whilst the inner doorway is a 15th-century addition with moulded detail.

Interior. The 12th-century south arcade comprises three bays with circular shafts and annular capitals, two of which display hobnail decoration. These support single chamfered and stepped arches. The 12th-century tower arch has plain imposts, a chamfered hood terminating in beast heads, and a round-headed doorway above. In the north nave wall is a pair of 13th-century niches with trilobed heads, surmounted by a further niche with an elaborately crocketed and floriated 14th-century gabled canopy. A 13th-century piscina in the south aisle has side shafts and a moulded trefoil head.

The 13th-century chancel arch is of single chamfered order with octagonal responds. The north wall of the chancel contains a handsome early 14th-century canopied tomb recess with moulded arch, ballflower gable with crockets, and flanking crocketed gabled pinnacles topped by human heads. A late 19th-century double piscina occupies the south wall, with a contemporary reredos behind the altar featuring a central painted panel set in an ashlar frame.

Fittings include four 14th-century bench ends, two with poppyheads, and a 14th-century octagonal font with shaft, decorated with a painted sacred monogram. The stone pulpit base is dated 1590 and inscribed "Orate et Arate" and "Pray and Plough". All other fittings are 19th-century.