Parish Church Of St Nicholas

SY 5785 ABBOTSBURY CHURCH STREET, EAST SIDE

10/13 Parish Church of St Nicholas 26.1.56 GV I

Parish Church. C14 north aisle wall and north porch. C14 West Tower, north of central axis, perhaps implying earlier aisleless church. C15 rebuilding from the east end of the Chancel and addition of North Chapel. C16, nave remodelled with rebuilt arcades. Plaster ceiling of chancel inserted 1638. Reredos erected 1751, blocking the east window. Church restored in 1807-8, when gallery erected, and in 1885 and 1930. Rubble-stone and ashlar walls. Lead and slate roofs. Nave continuous into chancel. North hall, 4 windows, irregularly spaced, from the east: of 3 cinquefoiled ogee lights with vertical tracery in a 2-centred head, with moulded reveals, label and head-stop projecting stair-turret for roof stair; 2-light C14 window; 3-light window with cinquefoiled lights in a pointed-arch head, C15. 2-light C14 window west of north porch. The north porch, unbuttressed, has a C14 outer archway with chamfered jambs and segmental-pointed arch with pinnacles standing on corbels carved with grotesques. West Tower, C15, of 3 stages with an embattled parapet and carved bosses on the parapet string. Diagonal buttresses. West doorway has moulded jambs and 4-centred head. The west window is of 3 cinquefoiled lights with vertical tracery in a 2-centred head. Niche above the window with carving of The Trinity, c.C15. Bell-chamber has windows of 2 trefoiled lights. South aisle, C16, with regular fenestration corresponding to bay divisions internally, windows with trefoiled ogee lights with vertical tracery in a 3-centred head, labels over. Blocked south doorway, C16. C17 doorway between the 2 eastern-most windows, with 3-centred head and label, dated 1636. Chancel,east window, blocked in C18, covering reredos. Interior: 6 bays, early C16 north and south arcades with 2-centred and moulded arches springing from hollow-chamfered piers. Carved foliage capitals. Early C16 clerestorey has 5 windows. Fittings: font, octagonal bowl, C15, base C20. Pulpit: oak, octagonal with 3 ranges of enriched arched panels, early C17. Reredos: of painted wood and plaster, with panelled centrepiece and Corinthian side-columns, entablature and pediment. Monuments: Porch: Purbeck marble slab carved with figure of abbot with chasuble and maniple , c.1200. Royal Arms: on front of west gallery, Hanoverian, carved in wood and coloured. (RCHM, Dorset I, p.l(l).)

Listing NGR: SY5776985210