Church Of St Phillip And St James

The Church of St Phillip and St James is a parish church dating primarily to the 12th century, with a 16th-century tower, a north aisle and arcade added in 1836, and a late 19th to early 20th-century restoration. It is constructed of sandstone rubble with sandstone dressings and tiled roofs. The church comprises a three-bay nave, a three-bay chancel, a west tower, a north aisle, and a south porch.

The nave has late 19th to early 20th-century Decorated-style windows. The north aisle has two such windows, and a re-set blocked 12th-century round-headed doorway on its east side, containing two scalloped capitals and a plain tympanum. The chancel features two single-light 12th-century windows with diapered heads in the north wall. Other windows were restored in the 15th century: two with two cinquefoiled lights and Y-tracery, an east window, a four-light cinquefoiled window on the south side, and a blocked 16th-century Tudor-arch doorway to the east of it. The tower is 16th century, of three externally undivided stages, with diagonal buttresses to the north-west and south-west. It has four twin bell-openings with cinquefoil heads, a late 19th to early 20th-century three-light west window under a four-centred head, and an 18th-century doorway in the south wall. The early 20th-century south porch has an ogee-shaped tie-beam. The south doorway is 12th century, with a round head and capitals similar to those on the blocked north doorway (one depicting a man and a horse).

The interior features barrel roofs. The 12th-century chancel arch is of two orders, the outer with restored chevrons; its capitals have patterned abaci, and heads similar to those on the north and south doorways. A 14th or 15th-century piscina in the chancel has a two-centred head and chamfers. Fragments of medieval stained glass, including a crowned Virgin (probably 15th century), are set into the east window of the south side. Unusual drilled holes are visible in the heads of the 12th-century north windows in the chancel. Beneath them is a 14th-century effigy of a woman set in a gabled, crocketed, ogee-headed recess decorated with ball-flowers and dog-teeth. The north aisle is separated from the nave by two 19th-century arches with four-centred heads, supported on an octagonal pier. The 16th-century tower arch is two-centred with crenellated imposts. In the south-west corner of the tower is a tapered stone coffin-lid with incised plain crosses from each arm of which hangs a ring. The 14th-century font has an octagonal bowl with cusped panels and eight fillet-moulded shafts. The 19th-century pulpit is four-sided, supported on an octagonal shaft, and has a top rail with cresting, ogee, and quatrefoil decoration to the panels. An excavation in 1931 revealed that the church previously had a chancel-apse until alterations in the 15th century.