Church Of St Mary (Including Ruined Walls)

NUNEATON AND BEDWORTH

SP39SE 2/59

Nuneaton

MANOR COURT ROAD (East side)

Church of St. Mary (including ruined walls)

(Formerly listed as Abbey Church of St. Mary)

06/12/47

II

Church, incorporating the remains of a Benedictine nunnery. Fragments of late C12 and 1236-1238. Nave rebuilt 1876 by Clapton Rolfe. Chancel rebuilt 1906 and north transept 1929-1931 by Sir Harold Brakespear. Sandstone rubble with limestone ashlar dressings, and some brick. Slate roofs have coped gable parapets.

Chancel, nave, north transept. Romanesque style nave, Early English style chancel and transept. Four-bay chancel, four-bay nave. Splay and moulded plinths. Chancel and transept have geometrical tracery and moulded cornices throughout. Chancel has buttresses to all sides, and subsidiary buttresses below five-light east window. Gable parapet has cross finial. North and south sides have two-light windows. Rood loft stair projection on south side rises into short octagonal turret. Crossing south wall of brick has two plain arched windows. Transept of two large bays has angle and west buttresses. Datestone 1929 in east wall. Three-light south east window. Large bricked-up arch to an unbuilt east chapel. Large four-light north window. South west doorway of three moulded orders, one with nook-shafts, and double-leaf doors projects slightly. Springing for vaulting and roof of unbuilt porch. Three-light north west window. Hood moulds throughout.

Nave occupies four of the original six bays. Pilaster buttresses and corbel table. Moulded windows with nook shafts are set high up. West front of plain brick has small porch with segmental-arched casement and plank door in right return side. Small round window high up. Small timber bellcote. Low C12 walls of fifth and sixth bays remain; the others remains as ruins.

Interior: chancel has Early English style arcading, of two bays to left and right of reredos, blind to north, and forming piscina and sedilia to south. Trefoil panelling below windows. Four-bay hammer beam roof has wall shafts and corbels, and shaft between second and third bays. Crossing has remains of massive compound piers, with responds of four orders of detached and attached shafts. Early English east piers and much restored chancel arch. C12 west piers; southern pier has two original capitals. C20 queen post roof. Nave has triple wall shafts between bays. All but western bay have blind arcading of intersecting arches. Windows have triple rere arches with paired shafts and wall passages. Transept has bricked-up arch of two orders to unbuilt chapel. Wall shafts, arches and springing for unexecuted vaulting. Scissor-braced roof.

Fittings: traceried oak rood screen and rood dated 1921. Traceried octagonal font. C20 reredos.

The ground beneath is scheduled as an Ancient Monument.

This entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 21 June 2017.