Church Of St Keyne

Church of St Keyne

Parish church of approximately 15th-century date, possibly built on the site of an earlier cruciform church. The building was heavily restored between 1868 and 1877 by J P St Aubyn. The coursed slatestone fabric was partly rebuilt on the south wall of the nave, east end of the chancel, south transept, and south porch. The roof is of slate with a lower slate roof to the chancel.

The church comprises a nave, chancel, three-bay north aisle, west tower, and south porch. The south transept now serves as a vestry. The west tower has three stages with a moulded granite plinth and strings, a battlemented parapet with crocketted pinnacles, and a west door of moulded granite with a two-centred arch, hood and labels. A 19th-century door with ornate hinges is fitted to this opening. Above the door is a three-light Perpendicular west window with tracery partly replaced, hood and labels. Two-light belfry openings sit beneath segmental arches with chamfered jambs.

The north aisle has a high plinth. Its west window is of two-light granite Perpendicular tracery, partly restored, with a two-centred arch, hood and labels. A blocked north door features a three-centred chamfered arch in a rectangular hollow chamfered surround with trefoils in the spandrels. Above this is a single-light opening probably with a reset early 14th-century cusped ogee head. Two two-light Perpendicular north aisle windows each have two three-centred arches with chamfered arches and jambs in rectangular surrounds. A three-light Perpendicular window occupies the east end of the north aisle.

The chancel has a three-light Perpendicular east window with restored hood, and a south window of circa 19th-century Perpendicular tracery. The south transept displays two-light 19th-century tracery in its gable end, with ornate 19th-century slate bargeboards above. The south side of the nave dates to the 19th century and features a two-light Decorated window with quatrefoil, with a single-light window to the west of the porch having a foiled head.

The south porch has a gabled roof with ornate slate bargeboards. Its inner opening has a shallow segmental arch, chamfered with pyramid stops. The hood is possibly reset with two heads as label stops and a third at the apex, and may represent remains from an earlier church that stood on the site.

The interior features a 19th-century roof with scissor braces and cambered collars with arch bracing. The south porch has a 19th-century waggon roof. The three-bay north arcade has type A (Pevsner) moulded piers with moulded bases and caps and segmental moulded arches. The tower arch is pointed with tall moulded bases and type A (Pevsner) moulding to engaged piers. Furnishings are largely of 19th-century date.

A 15th-century octagonal font has a bowl lined with lead, an octagonal stem and base. The east window of the north aisle contains circa 15th-century glass in its top light, comprising two shields of arms each bearing Kendall impaling others. The church contains six bells, two of which were recast when the church was restored. The fourth and oldest bell is inscribed "WIL : LARKE : TO : ANGER. Warden T.P.J.P. 1663". On the outside wall of the north aisle are reset slate stones: one commemorates John Edgcumbe, died 1770, and another is a well-engraved slate memorial to John Hicks, died 1800. The Sites and Monuments Register records an old communion table in the vestry, possibly standing on a Lan.