Church Of St Mary

Church of St. Mary

Parish church, largely dating from the early 11th century, with the chancel rebuilt in the mid-14th century. The tower dates from the 13th or 14th century and was raised with other alterations in the 15th century. The church was restored and a south porch added in 1863–64 by the architect Slater.

The building is constructed of coursed flint rubble with Barnack stone and clunch dressings, with red brick repairs and some cement rendering. The roofs are tiled.

The plan comprises a small rectangular nave with a narrower, shorter and lower chancel, a west tower, and a south porch. The nave retains its original long and short quoins, flush with the walling at all four angles and splayed at the base. The splay continues as a base-course from the west angles only, where a second higher splay also continues as a plinth onto the tower.

On the north side of the nave is a blocked doorway of the 11th or early 12th century with a crudely executed round arched surround. The outer face is broadly roll moulded, with a clunch tympanum, continuous splayed abaci, and inner shafted jambs with incised voluted capitals and square cut outer order. Flanking this are restored 15th-century two-light windows with rectilinear tracery in square heads and hollow moulded surrounds. A 19th-century stone course projects to close the eaves. The south side of the nave has two 19th-century windows copying those to the north.

The south porch is a 19th-century addition with a pointed arch, shafted jambs, two-stage diagonal buttresses, coped gable parapet, and two-light windows with square heads in the returns. The inner entrance is a 14th-century pointed arch with double wave moulding and a hood mould with foliate stops. To its right is a semi-octagonal stoup. An early plank door with iron strap hinges and lock plate remains in place.

The chancel has a cement-rendered east end with a restored five-light pointed arched window featuring reticulated tracery, flanked by two-stage diagonal buttresses. The north and south sides have 14th-century two-light windows towards the nave with foiled and cusped pointed heads, restored to the north and remade in the 19th century to the south. Brick courses project to form sprocket eaves. Ridge crosses sit on the east gables of both the chancel and nave. The nave has a gable end parapet to the west.

The tower is of three stages, unbuttressed and quoined, with a raised plinth and string courses separating the stages. On the west face are traces of a blocked doorway with a pointed arched head; above in the lower stage is a restored two-light window matching those in the chancel's north and south walls. Louvred lancets appear in the second stage to the south and on all sides in the belfry, with chamfered brick and stone surrounds. The parapet is embattled on all sides except the east, with extensive red brick repair. A weathervane finial crowns the tower.

Interior

The interior features a 15th-century pointed tower arch with two chamfered orders dying into the jambs. A 19th-century chancel arch has two wave moulded orders on shafted responds. The 19th-century roofs include four bays in the nave with arched braces springing from short colonnettes on corbels; the chancel is ceiled with a seven-sided vault. Steps at the northeast angle of the nave formerly led to a rood loft. In the north jamb of the tower arch is a 14th-century recess with an outer ogee arch.

The font has a 15th-century octagonal bowl carved with rosettes and shields on splayed lower faces, with a 20th-century square panelled stem. An early 17th-century communion table with bulbous turned legs survives. On the southwest wall of the nave is a lead memorial with a low relief allegorical figure commemorating T. Cherry, Church Warden, and W. Mowbray, Plumber, dated 1807.