Church Of St Mary

ARDLEY SOMERTON ROAD SP52NW (North side) 3/3 Church of St. Mary 07/12/66 GV II*

Church. C14 (possibly partly earlier) and 1792, restored 1865. Limestone and some marlstone rubble with limestone-ashlar dressings; limestone ashlar; Stonesfield-slate roofs. Chancel, nave and west tower. C14 rubble chancel has good flowing tracery in the 3-light east window and in the 2-light windows to west of it; the 2 westernmost windows are square headed but may be of the same date, that to south with a blocked lower section below a transom. C14 priest's door. Plain ashlar nave of 1792 has 3 simple pointed windows each side, the middle window to south blocked. The saddleback-roofed tower, which has c14 diagonal buttresses and marlstone banding to its lower stages, has a pointed western doorway of c.1792 below a square-headed 2-light C14 window. The limestone rubble of the upper stage looks earlier and there are simple 2-light openings to the top stage facing north and south, which may be Romanesque. Interior: Chancel has an unusual C13 double recess, one half of which is a piscina; it has linked trefoiled heads with a central piercing, and the jambs are ornamented with dogtooth. To north is an elaborately-cusped ogee-headed C14 tomb recess. The plain chancel arch has C13 detached shafts with moulded capitals, but the northern base may be earlier, The tower arch is probably C14 but is partly concealed by a western gallery of 1834. Fittings include a C12 tub font and two C17 chests, There is a wall monument of 1753 in the chancel, and several plainer tablets. (VCH: Oxfordshire, Vol VI, p13; Buildings of England; Oxfordshire, pp422-3)

Listing NGR: SP5424227371