Church Of St Mary And St Melor

The Church of St Mary and St Melor is a former abbey church of the Order of Fontevrault, now serving as an Anglican parish church. Built between the 12th and 15th centuries, it was restored in 1852-3 by William Butterfield at a cost of £1500. The church is constructed of flint and limestone, featuring some diaper work, with tiled roofs.

The building has a cruciform plan with a 12th-century nave and crossing. The chancel, transepts and tower were rebuilt in the 13th century, and a south aisle was added in the 15th century. The tall chancel is built of ashlar above sill level, with tall lancets. Its east window was replaced with a 5-light window during the 1852-3 restoration. The transepts have shorter lancets, and the south transept's south wall was rebuilt in the 19th century. There is a chamfered outset at the eaves. Evidence of a former east chapel on the south transept survives as creasing, later replaced by an arch and subsequently by a 3-light cusped window. The eastern chapel remains on the north transept, though a second inner chapel has been removed.

The nave retains a corbel table and jambs of clerestory windows on the north side, but has been shortened, probably before the 19th-century restoration. The present west end with three windows is by Butterfield. The original clerestory windows were replaced with 15th-century two-light windows. The south aisle comprises two bays incorporating some Roman brick, with 3-light windows with pointed segmental heads. A late 15th-century square-headed door is positioned at the west end of the south wall. The north side formerly had an attached structure, apparently neither an aisle nor the nunnery cloister. Beyond the west end of the nave's north wall is the lower section of an elaborate late 12th-century doorway, with four shafts and early stiff leaf foliage capitals on the internal side. The central tower has two stages, with lancets at the bell stage and a plain parapet. The entrance is now in the south gable of the south transept.

Inside, the nave has five roof bays with late 15th- to 16th-century moulded tie-beam trusses featuring open panelwork and carved wall brackets. The south arcade was inserted into the 12th-century walls in the 15th century, creating two bays. Three blocked 12th-century clerestory windows remain above. The pier has hollow mouldings between four shafts, and the arches have two hollow chamfers. There is an arch at the west end. The crossing arches rest on triple keeled shafts with three chamfered orders. The south west pier has late medieval panel embellishment. A 12th-century pier for a north nave opening has been excavated in the wall, possibly containing a pre-Norman shaft base.

The chancel has three roof bays with 19th-century trussed rafters featuring inclined ashlars and chamfered ties. The windows have embrasures and rere-arches. Windows on the north side are partially blocked, probably to accommodate a lean-to or chapel now demolished. There is a north priest's door. Adjacent to this is an elaborate moulded recess with crocketed gable and pinnacles, known as the abbesses' seat, possibly an Easter sepulchre. On the south side, a credence table is supported on corbels in the form of angels holding shields inscribed DED, from the east window and reset in the 19th century. The east end is panelled with marble divided by strips of red, blue and yellow tiles, though now hidden. The south aisle arch to the transept has a capital embellished with a leaf motif matching the arcade. There is a small piscina with credence shelf. A stoup by the west door now contains a medieval queen's head.

The transepts have 16th-century plaster vaults with moulded timber members and angels at the junction of ribs with wall plates. A 13th-century arch leads to the east chapel in the north transept. This chapel, known as the Jesus Chapel, has a 13th-century quadripartite vault with ribs on stiff leaf capitals and a large double piscina. Above the entrance arch is a doorway to the space over the vault.

The church contains numerous fittings. In the south aisle stands a 12th-century Purbeck marble font, a tapered square with shallow blind arcading, reset on a 15th-century arcaded limestone base. The pulpit is 19th-century oak on a stone base. A second font at the west end consists of a truncated octagonal shaft with string and triangular fillets to a square base, of medieval date. The chancel screen is 15th- or early 16th-century oak, reset in 1907, with large 5-light bays with tracery and a central pair of doors. Fixings for an absent rood survive above. A similar 19th-century screen stands to the north transept. The choir stalls by Butterfield are boldly panelled, with a similar altar rail. The organ has an elaborate case and came from St Edmund's church, Salisbury.

Furniture includes a small 17th-century chest in the chancel and a fine late 16th-century table on thick twisted balusters in the south transept. At the west end, a glass case contains fragments of a fine Anglo-Saxon double wheel-headed cross carved on face and edge with a double strand interlace, and a fragment of a second cross.

The north nave window contains 14th-century grisaille work and, below, the upper part of a fine 15th-century Queen of Heaven in an architectural frame. Early 20th-century glass fills two south lancets.

Eleven wall monuments stand in the chancel, including: a Delft tile on marble inscribed to Lucretia Corfe, died 1755; a carved moulded panel to John Thurloe and others, erected 1683; an alabaster aedicule to George Blake, died 1909; and various late 19th- and 20th-century marble and gilt monuments to the Antrobus family. There is one marble Fowle monument of 1916. In the north transept are: a tablet by Osmund in white marble on grey, comprising a sarcophagus with gabled top to Henry Selfe, died 1831; and a tablet, also by Osmund, in marble drapery on black, to Henry Long, died 1843, and Anne. The south transept contains two war memorials and three 19th-century brasses, plus: by Osmund, a white marble sarcophagus on black to Elizabeth Ouseley and Susan Palmer, children killed at Lucknow, 1857; a white stone tablet to John Bundy, died 1794, and his wife; and white marble on black, by Soper, to Edward Flower, died 1911. In the chancel is a small brass to Edithe Matyn, 1470. In the nave hangs a hatchment, dexter black, with motto DEI MEMOR GRATUS AMICI, for Sir Edmund Antrobus, died 1870. A benefaction board records four benefactions of 1677, 1708, 1725 and 1828, including the founding of the Free Grammar School in 1677. In the south transept is a 15th-century clock with twin drums; the original verge and foliate escapement have been replaced.

Amesbury Abbey was significant in Arthurian legend, becoming an important late Anglo-Saxon nunnery. It was refounded as a double house under the Order of Fontevrault in 1170 and later became the centre for a school of manuscript illumination, notably the Amesbury Psalter from the mid-13th century. The precise position and layout of the monastic house is not known.