Church Of St James The Great

Church of St James the Great

This parish church originates from the 12th century, with a 15th-century tower and substantial later alterations. The east wall of the nave was rebuilt around 1600 with contemporary windows, and the chancel underwent restoration by the architect Ewan Christian in 1873-4. The building comprises a west tower, nave, south porch, and chancel.

The tower is constructed in coursed limestone freestone, rising in three stages. Its west door features fleurons around the architrave and a crocketed ogee hood with angels carrying shields as stops. Above this is a double door and a pointed arched 6-light window with hood mould, 2 mullions and transom, and lattice glazing. The second stage has single lights to north and south and a 2-light window to the west, all pointed arched with hood mould and stone bell louvres. The third stage features similar but larger 2-light windows on all sides. Weathered angle buttresses support the tower with crocketed pinnacles and string courses continued around the stair turret. The embattled parapet displays blind trefoil-headed recesses, with each central merlon having a crocketed pinnacle and niche; the east niche contains a sculptured figure. Two fine gargoyles project from each side, notably including an anthropophagus to the south, with the victim's feet resting on the string course and his calves grasped by the dragon's hands. A south-east stair turret with lancets and similar parapet is topped by an obelisk and ball.

The walls are constructed of random rubble with stone dressings and quoins, with plain tiled roofs featuring raised coped verges and a cross finial to the chancel. The porch has a sandstone rubble construction and stone tiled roof.

The 3-bay nave shows both Norman and later features. To the north is a stair turret for the rood stair with a lancet and pitched roof, alongside two 6-light mullion and transom windows with lattice glazing and hood mould. A blocked 12th-century doorway retains jamb shafts with scalloped capitals, a round roll-moulded head and hood mould, accompanied by a small lancet with lattice glazing and weathered buttresses. The south side contains a small 19th-century pointed arched 2-light window and two similar 6-light mullion and transom windows. The porch in the second bay is large and gabled, featuring a stone sundial in the gable above a pointed arched door with hood mould and relieving arch. The inner door has a round head, jamb shafts with scalloped capitals, and a roll-moulded head; above is an image niche, with a 19th-century door below, stone benches to each side, and a ceiled wagon roof with moulded ribs. A stack rises behind the porch.

The 2-bay chancel has a blocked priest's door with pointed arch to the south, two paired lancets with trefoil heads, and an east window of 3 lancets with the central one taller, all with lattice glazing. No window appears to the north. An inserted phallic figure in the east wall is probably not pre-Conquest.

The interior features a tall pointed tower arch in a surround of 2 chamfered orders, with a 19th-century panelled screen and door. The nave has a ceiled wagon roof with 3 tie-beams; the blocked north door retains its pointed arch and imposts, with remains of a smaller inserted door having a pointed segmental head; the south door has a similar head. The chancel is entered through a tall pointed arch in 2 hollow-chamfered orders; to the left is the segmental-headed upper door to the former rood loft. The chancel has a common rafter roof with collars and struts below collars, and the blocked priest's door retains a pointed segmental head.

The fittings include a Perpendicular octagonal font with a bowl enriched with arcading, quatrefoils and flowers on an arcaded shaft; a pulpit dating to around 1630, panelled with a sounding board; a fine altar table from around 1600 with carved female figures as legs; dado of 18th-century pew ends in the nave; seats from 1901; and choir stalls perhaps by Ponting. Parts of a carved wooden medieval screen are preserved in the nave.

Three early 18th-century brass memorial plates commemorate Gabriel Ivy, Richard Ivey and Deborah Ivyleafe, dated 1737. Ledger stones of the 18th century are present in the nave, along with a marble tablet to Mrs Christian Haynes (1818) by Emett of Frenchay. All windows are lattice glazed except for the north-east nave window, which contains stained glass from 1952.