Church Of St Mary

TUNSTEAD CHURCH LANE TG 32 SW 8/34 Church of St.Mary 16:4:55 - I

Parish church. C14 and later. Flint and stone; lead and copper roofs. West tower, nave, south porch, north and south aisle, chancel. Embattled C14 4- stage tower; stone frieze with curved, cusped relief to plinth; west door with continuous moulding, grape vine trail to hood-mould; 3 light west window with panel tracery; single light cusped openings to ringing chambers; 2 light bell-openings with panel tracery; gargoyles at corners. Buttressed nave of 5 bays with angle buttresses; C14 3-light north and south aisle windows with mouchettes; north aisle door to first bay with continuous moulding; hood mould and stops with rosettes. External rood stair in angle between chancel and north aisle of brick and flint with quatrefoil light; copper roofs to aisles; blind clerestorey of intersecting cusped arcade in flushwork to south; blind cusped arcade to north. Chancel of 3 bays, band at sill level; doorway in centre south bay under window; Perpendicular windows of 3 lights with panel tracery. North-east chancel window blocked. C19 east window of 3 lights. Porch of 1864 to first south aisle bay. Door to nave has exuberant medieval iron work door-ring with trail and trefoil leaves. Interior. North and south arcades of clustered shafts, fillets in the diagonals, figure stops to hood moulds; brackets in the spandrels of south arcade with heads to-base, to north crenellated brackets with niches above revealed in restoration of 1950's. Arch-braced roof with simple ashlaring, 2 tie beams of 1683 with traces of paint. Stone benches to aisle walls. Cusped piscinae to north and south aisles. Aisle roofs with roll-moulding, restored. Tower arch with clustered shafts, castellated abaci. Chancel arch with clustered shafts. Piscina and 3-bay sedilia with cusped ogee arches and ribbed vault. Raised platform at east end reached by steps to north, doorway to south leads to tunnel vaulted chamber beneath, lit by opening behind altar; remains of niches with paint to west face, perhaps of reredos. Niches with remains of vaulting to either side of east window, some paint. Arch-braced roof with tracery in the spandrels. Remains of poppy-head to bench in chancel. C15 rood screen with painted figures to lower panels, platform to top. Rood beam, not in original position.

Listing NGR: TG3086022713