Parish Church

ASTON EYRE PARISH CHURCH

This small late 12th-century parish church retains important Norman features alongside later medieval windows, with 19th-century restoration and additions.

The church is built of red and grey local sandstone rubble with freestone quoins and dressings, under a clay tile roof with plain ridge tiles. It comprises a nave with a lower and narrower chancel, a south porch, and a west bellcote.

The principal exterior feature is the reconstructed late 12th-century south doorway. It has a single order of shafts with waterleaf capitals, possibly added when the tympanum was rebuilt. The tympanum is carved in high relief, depicting Christ's entry into Jerusalem with Christ seated on a donkey, turned face-on with hand raised in blessing. To his right a man strews palms in his path, and behind Christ on the left side is a man with an ass. The door retains long strap hinges terminating in fleur-de-lys, one dated 1636. The nave has two restored round-headed windows to the right of the porch on the south wall, and another on the left added in 1896 (date recorded on a plaque inside). The north wall of the nave contains two restored round-headed windows, and the west wall has a pointed window. The porch, which replaces a timber-framed structure noted in 1855, features a wide arched-brace truss at its entrance. The chancel has low shallow angle buttresses in its east wall, which was rebuilt in the mid 19th century and now has triple round-headed lights under linked hood moulds. The north wall of the chancel contains a pair of pointed lights, the south wall a similar two-light window and pointed doorway with chamfer. The west bellcote is simple and gabled, containing two bells in tall pointed openings.

Internally, the nave has a four-bay queen-post roof on heavy cambered tie beams. The Transitional chancel arch has a pointed arch on a moulded impost band with two orders of roll moulding, the outer enclosed by notional chevrons. The east window has 19th-century rear-arches on round columns with carved block capitals and linked hoods. The chancel roof comprises two bays of two collar-beam trusses. Walls are plastered except for the panelled dado in the chancel, which displays geometric patterns with foliage in the east wall, including panels with Alpha, Omega and a six-pointed star behind the altar. The north and south walls feature foliage trails above the dado that may have come from the late medieval screen. Floors are laid with red and black tiles, one stamped "J Onions, Broseley, 1834".

The principal fixtures include a 19th-century font with a round pedestal on square base and shallow bowl. The square panelled pulpit dates from the 17th century and has two caryatids, with a simpler matching reading desk. Pews of the late 18th or early 19th century have reed-moulded borders to plain panels, except for two plainer pews on the south-west side installed in 1896. Choir stalls have panelled fronts, and the wooden communion rail has open Gothic arcading. The east window contains 19th-century glass depicting the crucifixion flanked by Mary and John.

The church was founded in 1132 as a chapel of Morville, though the earliest surviving architectural details date from the late 12th century. It was described in 1855 as recently rebuilt, with work including the addition of the bellcote and insertion of the neo-Norman east window. The church stands next to an unfortified 14th-century stone manor house. It has no known dedication.