Church Of St Mary

Church of St Mary, Hopesay

Parish church of late 12th and early 13th century date, restored around 1880. The building is constructed of uncoursed limestone rubble with ashlar dressings, with machine tile roofs to the nave and chancel; the chancel and organ chamber roofs have coped verges on carved stone kneelers. The plan comprises a nave, chancel, west tower, south porch, north organ chamber, and a 20th-century lean-to on the north side.

The west tower is low and squat with heavy buttressing. The buttresses at the south-east and north-west angles are probably original, while the south-west buttress dates to the 14th or 15th century and the remainder to the 17th century or later. Narrow rectangular openings appear on the north and west sides. The top of the tower is a 17th-century double-pyramidal structure with a roughcast belfry featuring paired louvred openings on the north, south, and west faces; the east side has pointed openings flanking a clock.

The south side of the nave contains a broad cusped 19th-century lancet to the west, followed by a mid-14th-century window of two cusped lights with an elongated quatrefoil above. A similar 19th-century window of slightly squatter proportions stands to the east. The gabled south porch may date to the 17th century but was heavily restored in the 19th century. The outer tie beam features a Tudor arch, though the remainder of the roof structure appears to be 19th-century; the rubblestone outer walls may replace an earlier timber frame. Mid-19th-century wrought-iron gates and two early 19th-century memorials are fixed to the east wall. The late 12th-century round-headed south doorway has one order of shafts and roll moulding over a plain tympanum, with leaf decoration to the left capital and scalloped capital to the right. The door itself is a nail-studded plank, probably dating to the 17th century. Two Decorated-style 19th-century windows stand to the east of the porch.

The north side has a broad single-chamfered lancet to the east dating to around 1280, and a 19th-century lancet immediately to the west of the 20th-century rubblestone lean-to. To the left of centre is a late 12th or early 13th-century lancet with a 19th-century broad cusped lancet above to its right.

The chancel contains a 2-light cusped window with elongated quatrefoil to the head dating to around 1350, positioned to the left; the west light has a blocked rectangular lowside window beneath. A late 12th-century single-chamfered round-headed doorway with a contemporary lancet above it stands at the centre, with another taller lancet to the right. The 3-light 19th-century east window features reticulated tracery and retains a medieval hoodmould with head-stops. Two lancets dating to around 1200 appear in the north wall. The gabled 19th-century organ chamber projects to the north and has lancets in its north and west walls and an external stack to the north.

The interior's principal feature is a late 15th-century moulded arch-braced collar-beam roof to the nave in six bays. Two tiers of purlins with double-ogee moulding support three quatrefoil wind braces to each side. Raking cusped struts spring from the collars, forming quatrefoils with cusped principal rafters; moulded tie beams run to the centre and end trusses, with indentations for a former roof visible on the east tie beam. Below the wall plate on either side are bands of ornamental vertical panelling displaying a variety of Perpendicular tracery patterns. The chancel roof is 19th-century panelled work.

The chancel arch is double-chamfered and segmental-pointed, with semi-circular responds and moulded capitals and bases, probably dating to around 1200. A pointed doorway provides access to the tower. A 13th-century piscina stands in the chancel.

The 19th-century gallery at the west end has a cast-iron column to its north end but retains a wooden board from a 17th-century predecessor inscribed "BUILTE AT THE CHARGE OF EDWARD BLOOME ESQ ANNO DNI 1631". The 19th-century pews incorporate 17th-century panelling from former box pews, some pieces decorated with floral and geometric motifs and dragon-like figures; this panelling is also used for wainscoting and on the choir stalls. A medieval priest's door stands on the inside, and a dug-out chest by the south door retains 13th-century ironwork.

The wooden pulpit dates to 1897. The richly carved late 19th-century octagonal font, altar, and reredos date to around 1909.

Stained glass includes fragments of late 14th-century glass in the quatrefoil of the second window from the west in the nave's south wall, featuring the coat-of-arms of Richard Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel. The east window commemorates Charles Henry Beddoes (died 1856), with additional late 19th and early 20th-century glass in the nave.

Notable monuments include a painted oval-shaped stone memorial to Whitehall Harris (died 1751) with an armorial device on the south side of the chancel arch. Plain mid- to late 18th-century memorials stand in the chancel and mid-19th-century tablets in the nave. A coat-of-arms of George III appears on the west wall, with "Daniel Bird. Thos. Morris. Church Wardens 1776" lettered at the bottom edge. A framed wooden board attached to the west tie beam of the roof bears painted lettering reading "Tho: Perks / Gave to this / Parish / Forty Pounds". The wrought-iron gates to the porch were probably made by John Disley in 1840 and cost £4 12s 0d.