Church Of St Stephen

ST 39 NE BETTISCOMBE

5/8 Church of St Stephen 11.11.66 GV II Parish Church. Entirely rebuilt 1862, in Perpendicular style, by John Hicks of Dorchester. Rubble-stone walls with freestone banding and dressings. Tiled roof. West Tower, Nave, North Aisle, Chancel, South Porch, West Tower, of four stages with stone quoins, unbutressed. South stair turret of only two stages. Medieval Perpendicular west window of three lights with tracery, reset. Two-light bell openings with stone "traceries". Plain parapet with raised corners, stone-coped. South elevation: window-porch-window; chancel: window-buttress-window. C19 windows of two trefoil-headed lights with a quatrefoil over. One reused medieval head and mullion at east end of chancel south wall, with heraldic label-stop. Porch with 2-centred arch entrance with moulded stone jambs. Diagonal buttresses with set-offs. Interior: Nave with three-bay north arcade, carried on standard responds with hollow chamfers. Plain capitals and bases. Tower-arch: straight- chamfered dying into walls. Chancel-arch: three responds with wave-mountings over. Roof, wooden, of single-hammer-beam design with arch-braces, all carried on carved stone corbels. Segmental ridge-members Pulpit: C19, stone of debased Perpendicular type with tall panels and traceried heads. Signs of the Four Evangelists. Font: C19, octagonal stone bowl with central stone support and four Purbeck marble colonettes. Carved panels with e.g. Star of David, Dove, IHS, Passion flower, acorns and leaves. Monuments: (1) Stone floor-slab, at chancel-step, to Jane wife of John Pinney, dated 1695. (2) Blue lias floor-slab, next to (1), to Nathaniel Pinney dated 1724 and Naomi, his wife dated 1741. Lettering within panelled framing, comparable to Manor House hall. Source: R.C.H.C. Dorset I, p. 28(1).

Listing NGR: SY3990999978