Church Of Saint Piran

The Church of Saint Piran is a parish church dating back to the 15th century, with significant rebuilding in the 19th century. The chancel was first rebuilt in 1842, and then the chancel, nave, aisle, and porch were rebuilt in 1882 by Piers St Aubyn. The church is constructed of granite ashlar, killas rubble, and dressed granite details, with dry Delabole slate roofs and gable ends.

The plan comprises a nave and chancel under a single roof, a west tower, a south aisle, a south porch, and a small 20th-century vestry at the east end of the aisle. The three-stage west tower is of granite ashlar, with strings dividing the stages of diminishing width, and an embattled parapet with crocketted corner pinnacles. The pinnacles have cross finials on shafts corbelled out and rising from a coved parapet cornice. The tower has original openings with hoods and relieving arches; a moulded 4-centred west doorway with a 19th-century door; and 3-light Perpendicular windows with slate louvres and quatrefoil tracery to the upper stage. All other windows are 19th-century in the Perpendicular style. The north wall has chancel windows and four nave windows, all with three lights, except for a two-light window on the right. The east wall has an aisle gable with a three-light trefoil-headed traceried window, partly obscured by the 20th-century vestry, and a projecting chancel gable with a three-light traceried window. The south wall features a window to the left of the porch and four windows to the right of the porch, all with two lights, except for a three-light window to the far right. A further three-light window is located in the west gable of the aisle. The porch doorway and the inner south doorway are 19th-century with pointed arches.

Inside, the church has 19th-century arch-braced and wind-braced roof structures. A 19th-century six-bay granite arcade with steep 4-centred arches leads to an inner doorway containing a resited Norman tympanum. Fittings include a painted letter from King Charles I, dating from 1643, written at Sudely Castle, with a painted coat of arms on the reverse. There is also an octagonal granite font, possibly late medieval, but reworked in the 19th century. The pews and other fittings date from the 1882 rebuilding. Monuments include a Classical marble wall monument to Benjamin Sampson, who died in 1840 aged 70, of Tullimaar, and coloured glass in the east chancel window to John Jose of Mellingey. A coloured glass window in a south aisle window commemorates Wm. Jory Henwood F.R.S., a prominent geologist, who died in 1875.