Church Of St John The Baptist

The Church of St John the Baptist is a parish church dating back to the 12th century, with significant additions from the 14th century and a restoration around 1854. It is constructed of roughly coursed gritstone rubble with machine tile roofs. The building comprises a nave and chancel under a single roof, a west tower, and a south porch.

The tower, likely from the 12th century, is squat with two stages and a later pyramidal roof. Rectangular chamfered openings are found on the north, south, and west sides of the second stage, while plain rectangular openings are located on the south and west sides of the lower stage.

The nave and chancel are unified, featuring three mid-19th century windows with Y-tracery on the south side and two on the north. The north wall also has a square-headed, blocked doorway leading to the chancel, and an infilled round-arched doorway (likely 12th century) which is cut through by one of the two 19th-century windows. A small, blocked rectangular window is present on the south side of the chancel, and the east wall has a 14th-century window of two cusped lights, with quatrefoil and mouchettes above. A gabled south porch features a round-arched doorway, probably dating to the 17th century.

Inside, the round-arched, single-chamfered south doorway is fitted with a nail-studded plank and muntin door, likely from the 17th century. The narrow doorway to the tower is pointed on the east with two chamfered orders ending in small broaches, and has a square-headed section on the west, with a door featuring long strap hinges. A notable feature is the late 14th-century arch-braced collar beam roof. The three eastern trusses (over the chancel) have cusped struts from the collars forming quatrefoils, double purlins, and cusped windbraces. The two eastern trusses over the nave are boxed in (without struts to the collars), and the western truss consists of a tie beam with raking struts supporting a principal rafter. A finely carved 17th-century pulpit incorporates a tester with pendant knobs, and a contemporary reading desk crafted from matching panels. A hexagonal font was added in 1875. The church contains no monuments of particular note.

Historically, the church was a dependent chapelry of Cound during the medieval period and is situated within an originally oval-shaped churchyard, indicative of an early origin.