Church of St Peter and St Paul is a Grade I listed building in the Breckland local planning authority area, England. First listed on 30 May 1960. A Medieval Church.

Church of St Peter and St Paul

WRENN ID
swift-quoin-fern
Grade
I
Local Planning Authority
Breckland
Constituency
Mid Norfolk MP: George Freeman (Con)
Country
England
Date first listed
30 May 1960
Type
Church
Period
Medieval
Address
Church of St Peter and St Paul, Dereham Road, Scarning
OS grid reference
TF 954 121
Coordinates
52.67226, 0.88874
Source
Historic England listing

Also on this page: flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

The Church of St Peter and St Paul is a parish church that dates back to the medieval period and has undergone later modifications. It is constructed of flint with ashlar and some brick dressings, topped with slate and plaintile roofs. The church features a west tower, an aisleless nave with a south porch, and a chancel with a vestry to the south.

The 15th-century west tower is supported by diagonal buttresses and has flush-work panelling on the plinth and buttresses. A canted stair turret is located to the south, and the tower includes a traceried three-light Perpendicular west window, two sound holes with diagonal traceried motifs, and two-light ovolo-moulded traceried bell-openings, which are likely post-medieval. The tower is crowned with a crow-stepped parapet that displays two surviving Evangelist symbols at the corners. The nave has six three-light Perpendicular windows, with the central pair featuring double-cusped soufflets, and there are two moulded doorways leading into the nave.

The chancel has been heavily restored and includes three two-light cusped Y-traceried windows along with a three-light east window in a Geometric style. The unusually large vestry features two two-light cusped square-headed windows in the gable end. The porch has dying mouldings on the entrance arch and two-light cusped Y-traceried side windows.

Inside, the tower arch has a continuous double-ogee moulded outer order, while the chancel arch features a continuous wave-moulded outer order, both with semicircular responds. There is a cusped piscina in the chancel, and a late-medieval seven-bay chancel screen adorned with tracery, crocketting, and mainly modern paint. The church also houses a 13th-century font with a bulbous circular bowl, surrounded by shafts with disproportionately large stiff leaf capitals, and larger corner shafts with bell capitals that are supported by octagonal shafts surrounding an octagonal stem. The tall font cover is designed in the form of a crocketted spire.

Local climate

Church of St Peter and St Paul receives an average of 740 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 73% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 90% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 30 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 63% of listed buildings. Of these, 16 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

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